RECIPE #11: Taffy Apple Pizza

And, just like that, November is nearly over. Time being at a minimum, I'll spare you a belabored intro and get to the point. I had to make something for a potluck a few weeks ago, and it had to be a breeze. So, I started Googling easy recipes and looked for dishes that would emerge with minimal shopping and construction. I came across a "cooking with kids" subsite of the ever-popular About.com and found something exceedingly simple, unhealthy, pre-prepared and scrumptious in a Midwestern housewifey sort of way: taffy apple pizza. For the rest of this post, please read every instance of words like pizza, sauce, toppings, etc. with quotes around it. When Lou Malnati's and Papa Saverio's are within walking distance from one's living quarters, one cannot make this and not infer quotes. No disrespect meant to Denise Witmer, the recipe's author... it is a prime white trash dessert, but it is not pizza.

It's funny how some recipes are written... the first step on the actual recipe is mixing the sauce for your pizza, but once you read it, it's obvious that you need a crust first. For this, you need to make a big-ass sugar cookie. The recipe gave no instructions on this (it only specifies "sugar cookie dough crust - pre-baked and cooled"), so I bought some disposable foil pizza pans and spread a package of store-brand sugar cookie dough over one. Although I enlisted the help of my rolling pin, my fists ended up doing most of the work for this. Following the dough package's instructions, I baked it for about 15 minutes at 350 degrees and removed it as soon as I saw the edges turning brown. The cookie crust cooled overnight, since I figured the rest would be better prepared fresh the morning I served it.

Come morning, I made some coffee and took an 8 oz. package of cream cheese out of the fridge to soften. By the time I finished my second cup of coffee and was ready to start on the pizza, it was, as they say, good to go. I mixed the cream cheese with 1/4 cup of creamy peanut butter, 1/2 cup of brown sugar and 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract. Once my wrist was good and sore, I went to spread the tan mass upon the cookie. Imagine my surprise when the entire thing plopped out in a single insouciant ball. Whether this was supposed to happen or not, it made cleaning the mixing bowl a snap. I spread the stuff as evenly as possible and prepared for the most labor-intensive part of the dish.

The recipe calls for two medium Granny Smith apples to be peeled, cored and sliced. I think I've mentioned how slow I can be preparing fruits and veggies in the past, and I'm pleased to report that I think I'm getting a little faster in this department. You're supposed to dip the apple slices in lemon-lime soda to keep them from turning brown, a less tart take on dipping them in lemon juice for the same purpose. I got a little crazy here. The delicious seasonal variation of Sierra Mist known as Cranberry Splash is back in grocery stores, so I figured that would be an even yummier alternative. It did the trick, but also stained the apples a ghostly pink, which made them look like some sort of exotic alien fruit that I went to great lengths to procure. That was pretty cool, as was having eleven more cans of Sierra Mist Cranberry Splash sitting around. Jesus, is that shit good!

I arranged the apple slices atop the cream cheese mixture in a half-assed spiral pattern, as if it was going to look nice in the end. It's not like the slices were symmetrical. Still, it looked okay for a self-taught schlub to have cranked out one morning. After a dusting of cinnamon, a healthy drizzling of caramel ice cream topping and distribution of 1/3 cup of chopped peanuts and pecans, the quote-unquote pizza was essentially finished. You don't bake it or anything... you just slice it and serve it. I would suggest not using a wheel-style pizza cutter, or you will make a mess of your first slice, as I did. Try a mezzaluna or a big knife instead.

Look, I do not lie to my friends. A number of the ingredients for this were still sitting around from my birthday pie in August. In fact, its ingredients are fairly similar overall. Aside from how neat fruit can look if you dip it in unnaturally-colored soft drinks, I didn't learn squat about cooking from this recipe. However, it was easy and somewhat fun, as intended. Next month, I will make it up with my twelfth and final recipe, which is, in fact, the whole reason I started this endeavor back in January. Expect a few other looks back at the year in December as well.

What CDs and movies have I reviewed lately? Might I have written about about Federico Aubele's Panamericana, Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings' 100 Days, 100 Nights, The Frantic's Audio & Murder, "What Poor Gods We Do Make: The Story and Music Behind Naked Raygun" and "Blade Runner: The Final Cut"? Why, yes, I've written about all of those.