Mediterranean Pizza & Ugly American Stout

Well, I didn't really have these together. The pizza was lunch, the beer is supper. Okay, not really, but Ugly is definitely a beer that eats like a meal.

For lunch I went full test-kitchen mode and tried something I hadn't even seen somewhere else.



I was going for the same general effect as the Bacon, Fig, Caramelized Onions & Gorgonzola pizza I picked up from the NYT Magazine recipe goddess.

But instead of bacon, anchovies for the salty meat element, chopped dates instead of figs, Feta instead of Gorgonzola, and I kinda started playing around.



For the dough, it was this batch.

Mediterranean (for want of a better name) Pizza
1 onion, diced & caramelized in
3 tbsp. butter with
1 tsp. dried fenugreek
1 tsp. fresh ground black pepper
2 bay leaves
When the onion is caramelized, remove bay leaves, turn off heat and add
2 tbsp. olive oil
1/2 cup sliced baby bella mushrooms
Toss until mushrooms are coated. Gently spread mushrooms & onions on hand-stretched dough, then sprinkle with
1 tbsp. fresh thyme leaves
1 cup feta crumbles
1/4 cup chopped dates
and top with
1 2 oz. tin anchovy fillets
Bake on the stone at 550ºF for seven minutes, allow ten minutes to rest on the rack, slice and eat.



It felt risky concocting this recipe, but it turned out great. The combination of sweetness from the dates & caramelized onions plays off the acidity of the Feta and the saltiness of the anchovies. The fenugreek & thyme play well together, too.



As for the beer part, it would have gone great with the pizza except I had work to do and beer isn't exactly a performance enhancing drug when you're trying to meet a deadline. So, deadline met, I decided to see how Ugly was doing.



It doesn't strike me as quite the Sierra Nevada Stout clone it turned out to be last time, but it's still awfully fine suds. Blue ribbon material if I get around to CPFing a few bottles off before I drink it all.