Pizza Quest with Peter Reinhart

*Note from Peter: “The MacBeth” is a delightful pizza memoir sent in by a friend of Pizza Quest named Jeffrey Ippolito.  We loved it and thought it was a fun piece celebrating fond memories, good pizza (almost), and good friends.  We hope you enjoy it as well, and keep the conversation going. If you have pizza memoirs that you’d like to share and see published here please send them to…Read More…

So, how did we end up at The Cass House Inn? After all, it’s not a pizzeria, it’s far from big population centers, and we’re ending this series not with a pizza but with a fancy lamb dish and a plush wine. To answer this question let me reiterate what Pizza Quest is beyond the search for the perfect pizza: a celebration of artisans and artisanship (or, as noted in…Read More…

One of my favorite pizzas to make, each time I make pizza, is always different. What I mean is that it is never the same pizza.  It isn’t necessarily the best pizza of any particular batch of pizzas, but it is definitely one of my favorites to make. Okay, let me explain all this crypticness: When I make pizza, what I do is plan on making a couple of specific…Read More…

Slowly I Turned… There are some things that make even a Pizza Quest, that is, the search for the perfect pizza, shrink into nothingness and I experienced such a thing this past week when I was in Buffalo, NY. I’m not referring to having, for the first time, Buffalo Wings in Buffalo (that was pretty cool), and also my first official Beef on Weck sandwich (that was actually amazing and…Read More…

This week marks the final segment of the Cass House Inn webisode series, featuring a spectacular lamb loin, with ratatouille and raitta prepared by Chef Jensen that evokes all the flavors of the lamb pizza shown in an earlier episode. In other words, an upscale version, the papa bear, of what we experienced in its offspring downscale baby bear version in the earlier video segment. It brought our visit with…Read More…

Traci Nixon and Christa Hozie had an idea and they went for it. Somehow, they have managed to make a style of cookies so tasty that, even hidden away in the small town of Cayucos, people from all over the country have found them. They told me that a lot of their business is by mail order, so feel free to check out their website and give them a shout….Read More…

Note from Peter: Wes Bailey, a good friend of Brad and Jeff’s, was on his way to a long vacation with his family to Napa Valley.  After hearing about these plans, Brad suggested that Wes keep an eye out for a quest-worthy story or two.  Wes sent us this reflective essay that seems to capture the essence of the dichotomy of living the quest, as opposed to the idea of…Read More…

This is one of my favorite salads to make in one variation or another.  If I don’t have fresh mozzarella on hand, I’ll just make this as a tomato and basil salad with a little oil, balsamic and salt and pepper.  I am always happy with a tomato salad.   If you can’t get an heirloom tomato any quality tomato will work.  It’s a very flexible platform for pure goodness!…Read More…

Susan and I spent the weekend in Philadelphia for a Reinhart family reunion and to celebrate my mother’s 80th birthday, and I had chance to revisit some of my childhood haunts and spend time with old friends prior to the big event. I had planned to stop at Mama’s to pick up a cheese steak (the best!) on our way in from the airport, but our flight got delayed and…Read More…

Wow–it’s August already, which is really hard to believe (other than by this relentless cross country heat wave, which confirms that it is, indeed, August). So, this week we have some fun new material to post, including a Peter’s Blog on Tuesday about my trip to Philadelphia and the incredible pizza I had at Osteria. Brad English is also lending me a photo or two of his recent visit to…Read More…