Julie Pecenco’s Life in the Little City

Leah and I have taken two trips to Italy, one in 2004 and one in 2006.  On both, our base was Napoli, where Leah’s sister was stationed at the time.  Napoli is generally acknowledged as the home of the modern pizza, and we had many delicious examples while there, including at Brandi, where the Pizza Margherita was invented.  After returning, I was looking for a way to replicate those tasty pies.  A bit of research led me to American Pie: My Search for the Perfect Pizza by Peter Reinhart.  I received it for Christmas two years ago, but only finally tried out a recipe this weekend.  The choice was, of course, the Napoletana Pizza Dough, which I topped with the Crushed Tomato Sauce.  Though we currently lack a baking stone, or any appropriate device to simulate a brick oven, the pizzas turned out remarkably well, and remarkably reminiscent of authentic Pizza Napoletana.

If these two recipes are any indication, this cookbook is definitely a keeper.  Reinhart begins the book with his quest for the “perfect” pizza, starting in Italy, and then traveling all over the United States, tracking the variations of the simple dish we know as pizza as he goes.  The latter sections of the book are devoted to techniques and recipes for the doughs, sauces and toppings of the most known pizzas around the world and the US.  Just reading the book will make you crave a hot slice.

The next step is to head out to the tile store and get some unglazed quarry tiles to use as a baking stone.  Luckily for us, the dough recipe makes enough for six individual pizzas, so we have two more meals worth in the freezer for another day.

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I had a busy election day today, and had the opportunity to witness more of the election firsthand than usual.  I was recruited to be a poll watcher in the City of Oneonta for four hours in the afternoon.  I decided to vote in the morning, since my polling place is in the opposite direction of the one at which I was working.  I rode over to our town hall, and though it was 10:30 in the morning, the place was quite crowded.  (Not surprisingly at that time of day, I was by far one of the youngest people there.)  It didn’t take very long to cast my ballot on our old-school New York lever machines, and then I headed home for a few hours before my afternoon gig downtown.

Poll watching was quite interesting.  There were some slow times, and there were some busy times, especially after four and into the evening.  I learned even more about the details of the election process, about affidavit and emergency ballots.  Living in a college town, I saw scores of new voters, and helped many of them by explaining how the machines worked, using a cute little instructional model machine.

It was a really interesting and I’m glad I got the chance to be involved.  I was pleased to note several other folks who arrived at the polling place by bicycle.

And what a night it was watching the election returns afterwards.

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