&....cooking is not an exact science.

Cooking is a bit of an adventure here. Even when they have what I want I just stare at all the options. I can sit in front of a shelf in the grocery store silently discussing with myself whether this brand or that brand might be best for a very long time--really I'm only a little particular. My mother thinks this might cure me of my food snobbery. Not likely.

Most dairy products are quite cheap here. One of my newest finds is 40p (forty pence) for a lovely round of fresh mozzarella (that would be 60 cents). O the things I can do with cheap fresh mozzarella. (None of you would even consider following pinterest directions to make your own were it this cheap in the states. Ok maybe I'd consider it if you could guarantee that I'd have P712 fresh mozzarella skills.) 

&...the magic of 40p. 

I tried to make pizza for the first time in England. While I'm waiting to be impressed by my oven's cookie baking skills, its pizza skills are entirely acceptable. I can make a quick batch of dough and freeze what I don't need (in my ever so large freezer--shoebox size--for real). 

With a little bit of fresh mozzarella yesterday I wanted bbq chicken pizza. Alas bbq sauce is one of those things that I am a snob about and good bbq sauce is not to be had in this country--and I'm not yet ready to try brown sauce. I decided to try Ina Garten's bbq sauce, well kind of. I'm not sure I could even find everything in England and I had no desire to go to the store. 

So Ina's ingredient list looks like this [my substitutions in brackets]:

1 1/2c chopped yellow onions

1T minced garlic

1/2c vegetable oil [or much less rice bran oil--which i love for cooking--no trans fats, high smoke level]

1c cider vinegar [or regular vinegar]

1c honey [or some sugar]

1/2c worcestershire [or Cholula--obviously the same thing]

1c Dijon mustard [or this wonderful grainy hot mustard from ikea]

1/2c soy sauce

1c hoisin sauce

2T chili powder [not the same thing in England therefore no chili powder]

1T ground cumin [a minuscule amount of the super powerful Indian kind]

1/2T crushed red pepper flakes [more]

My substitutions and varying amounts = lazy bbq sauce. Almost the same, right? The magical thing about bbq sauce is that it came together. All in all it was just my kind of cooking experiment. It ended so well, I can't be sure I'll try the real one next time.

Oh and I accidentally thawed turkey, so it was bbq turkey pizza.

&...mmm.