This Land is Your Land, This Pie's From Thailand

Have you ever gone to bed in July, and when you woke up, it was September October? That's kind of what happened here ...

Needless to say, it's been a busy, crazy summer. It didn't help that having my favorite pizza-shooting camera stolen (a Panasonic LX-5) kind of took the wind out of my blogging sails for a while, too. So we took a couple of weeks hiatus, which turned into ... well, October. But we're back! Ready to blog, eat some more pizza, and take pictures with a shiny new Panasonic GX-1 courtesy of an insurance check and a higher homeowner's insurance premium. Because if you pay hundreds of dollars per year for a service, it should immediately cost more if you ever have to actually use it, right? Makes perfect sense. But I digress.

We ate a couple of pizzas before the summer ended that I never got around to blogging about, so I'd like to revisit one of my favorites to kick this thing off again - the Thai Chicken deLITE Pizza. And this just so happens to be one of the more unique pizzas we've eaten, as well.

Up close and personal with the toppings prior to cooking

I'm not a spicy food eater. I'm pretty sure we've covered this before, but "Mild Buffalo" is to me what "Naplam" is to most males in possession of a normal level of testosterone, so it should come as no surprise that I've steered clear of Thai food for most of my life. A fact that I am guessing was fairly obvious to the girl behind the counter when I attempted to order the "Thigh Pizza." Yep. 30-something years on this earth, and I still screw that one up under the pressure of public speaking every time.

She's baaaack ...

And still making pizzas with a smile

I'm not sure what Thai normally tastes like, but I was very pleasantly surprised by this pie. There was a twang of spicy (not sure how you'd describe that above the Mason-Dixon Line, but that should relate the amount of spice perfectly to all my fellow Southerners), but there was also a very pleasant sweetness in the sauce. I visited the Papa Murphy's webpage after eating this pizza to see what the ingredients list contained ("sweet chili sauce, 100% real mozzarella cheese, zucchini, grilled chicken, a mix of white, red and green onions, and finished with a dusting of crushed red pepper flakes," if you're interested to know), and the title of the press release was "Papa Murphy’s Brings the Sweet Heat ...", so it looks like they hit the nail on the head with that description.

The full view prior to cooking

And the melty, delicious "after" shot

Baked zucchini - SOOO tasty!

If this is what all Thai food tastes like, I may be a convert. The fact that I love zucchini definitely didn't hurt, either. If I had to pit it against my love for the Chicken Bacon Artichoke deLITE, the CBA would still come out on top, but it would be a close race. It makes me wonder what else I might have misjudged and been missing out on this whole time. Is bungee jumping actually fun? Could it be possible that the Crash Test Dummies' "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm" deserves a second listen? If given the choice between a Paul Walker movie marathon or hours of excruciating torture, have I been making the wrong choice all along? (Trick question - they're one in the same).

House rules - Dad gets the first slice

Point-of-view virtual pizza eating

Unfortunately, if you haven't tried the Thai Chicken deLITE pizza already, you've missed your chance for the time being. It's a seasonal special, and Papa Murphy's stopped offering it by the time Fall rolled around. But we hope you enjoyed these pictures regardless, and I apologize for my sloth in sharing this with you. If you see the Thai pizza still available in your local market, I'd highly recommend giving it a try. Otherwise, stick a pin in this as a reminder to try it out the next time the promotion rolls around!

The Chicken Bacon Artichoke deLITE and the Temple of Doom

There are three stages in the pre-consumption life of a pizza: fresh, leftovers, and science fair experiment. Prior to my eating the Chicken Bacon Artichoke deLITE pizza, the only time I would have found anything large and green on a pizza I'd ordered would have been well after it was into the last stage (pickles notwithstanding).

Chicken Bacon Artichoke deLITE, fresh from the oven

I'm vaguely familiar with artichokes. I once had a sandwich containing some. Not on purpose, mind you. I was trying to play it cool at a very fancy sandwich shop to which I had accompanied a cute girl, and, overwhelmed by the complexity of the menu and certain that she would judge my overall intellect by my sandwich's contents, my order was simply, "Make that two." It was ... okay. We're just good friends these days. 

Let's not even get started on the fact that it's actually the artichoke hearts that you are eating, either. In my head, this is all I see ...

"Kalim .... wait, what the?"

All the artichoke talk notwithstanding, this actually ended up being one of my favorite Papa Murphy's pizzas so far. I picked a few artichokes off the pizza to try on their own, and while I wouldn't crave a bowl full of artichokes and nothing else, I found I liked them quite a lot when paired with the other flavors on the pizza. This pizza uses a white creamy garlic sauce instead of your typical tomato-based affair, and it works very well with the other toppings (namely, chicken, bacon, spinach, parmesean, "zesty" herbs, and of course, artichoke hearts). Somewhat surprisingly to myself, I also loved having the spinach on this pizza. Who would have thought a double-dose of greens on a pizza would be so appealing.

Freshly unwrapped

Uncooked close-up

I once tried a BLT pizza (again, at the behest of a girl ... my food choices followed my heart more than my taste buds in college), which was nothing more than a bacon pizza that we took home and then topped with mayonnaise and iceberg lettuce. It was horrid, and I spent most of the night crop-dusting her foyer after consuming that abomination. Leafy greens have never been high on my pizza topping list since that night. I'm happy to say that following my foray into spinach on this pizza, I'm open to trying more leafy greens on future pies.

Hot and ready!

Post cooking close-up. YUM!

Thin crust depth. It's pretty crazy comparing this to one of the stuffed crusts.

My favorite thing about this pizza is how much flavor it manages to pack in while still feeling like a very light-on-the-stomach meal. We haven't had any deLITE pizzas in a while, and I've definitely missed them. Of all the deLITE's we've had, this is currently my favorite. I'm also happy to report that it reheats quite nicely. Being that it's a rather atypical grouping of flavors on a pizza and that it is so light on the stomach, I actually had a slice for breakfast a couple of days later. It beat the socks off starting my weekend with a bowl of fiber cereal!

The family sized pizza cut into eight large slices

First-person view

That's one pretty slice of pizza

The household discussed our opinions (well, at least the ones who are old enough to talk coherently), and we all wholeheartedly agreed: this pizza is a must-try!

Toppings close-up on the slice

The Bizarro Pizza and a 4-Year-Old's Fight Against Cancer

Click here to to skip ahead and read about 4-year-old Leah's brave fight against neuroblastoma cancer first.

Depending on how you came upon this blog and your relationship or lack thereof with my family, you may or may not be aware of the following fact: I'm a bit of a geek. I realize that doesn't necessarily tell you all that much about me in this day in age; the label "geek" is much more far-reaching now than it might have been in the 80's or 90's. But I think I fall somewhere comfortably in between Big Bang Theory and the fellow working at your local Apple Genius Bar. This picture of the left side of my desk probably sums me up nicely:

Spidey still can't decide on a new paint color for our living room

With that in mind, I'd like to dub our pizza this week "The Bizarro." It's the most appropriate name I could think of for a pizza so deliciously opposite of its own self. Plus, it has a bit more universal appeal than dubbing it "The Superboy #68" for our less geeky followers.

'Pineaapppllleeeeee!'  "Back, you crazed ruffian! You'll destroy us all!"

If you're thinking this pizza-of-a-home-divided sounds familiar, it's because it's almost the same toppings as the very first pizza we ever blogged about: our Double Heartbaker pizza back in February. The end result was the same this time around, aside from being decidedly rounder and with more evenly distributed slices. Delicious. Papa Murphy's pepperoni pizza remains one of the wife's de facto standards in what a good pizza should taste like, and pineapple continues to be my all-time favorite. She decided she wanted a little more meat this time around, so she also asked for some Italian sausage on her half, as well.

Made your way - even if they think your way is a little nuts

"Here you go, crazy-dude!"

M.C. Skat Kat would be proud.

If you haven't tried pineapple pizza yet, I highly recommend you give it a try at least once. If you're gun-shy about spreading it across your whole pizza in the event you don't like it, just ask the folks behind the counter to only put it on 1/4th of your pizza, and then get your normal favorite toppings on the other 3/4ths of it.

Cooking complete!

All the toppings managed to stay in their own area pretty well!

I'll even elaborate and say that before I became a take-n-bake fanatic, I was a die-hard Papa John's fan. Their pineapple pizza was pretty much the only pizza I ate all throughout my college years (which probably had as much to do with the garlic dipping sauce as it did my love of pineapple). But as much as I liked their pineapple pizza, it still doesn't hold a candle to the ones we get from Papa Murphy's. Price and portion size was one of the biggest reasons we initially switched to buying Papa Murphy's pizzas, but there ended up being no comparison between the taste and quality of pineapples once we'd made the switch. If it wouldn't make for the most boring blog in the world, it's what I would eat every single time we have pizza. So try it! And if you've never had it before and decide to actually take me up on this proposition, let me know what you thought about it.

Safer than splitting the atom, but almost as impressive.

Straight down the middle.

One of the reasons I decided to do a pizza this week that we'd already somewhat discussed before is because I wanted to talk to you about something else, as well. Or rather, someone else:

Leah Smallwood and her dad, Michael

This beautiful little four-year-old girl is Leah Bee Smallwood. On February 13th, the day after we started this blog, Leah was admitted to Vanderbilt and diagnosed with Stage 4 Neuroblastoma Cancer. Leah's condition is considered high risk at this stage, but she has been fighting with the heart of a lion and doing well with her treatments. She's currently finishing up her fifth round of chemotherapy, but she's having to stay in the hospital for another couple of weeks this round due to her chemo port developing an infection and causing fevers.

Leah's father, Michael, was a childhood friend of mine. We grew up playing soccer together and participating in boy scouts. The last time I saw Michael was nearly four years ago in the checkout line at Home Depot. He had the most beautiful little baby girl with him, and she just made my heart melt. Since that day, I've been blessed with two daughters of my own. My little Thing 1 and Thing 2, who are my whole world. Thinking back to that first time I saw Leah, my heart aches knowing what a burden she is having to endure, and what a hardship her parents have to bear while still remaining strong for her. I can't even begin to imagine, and my heart goes out to all the families out there who can and have had to go down this same path. No child should ever have to grow up so fast or be so brave.

Leah's bracelets and plaque at Papa Murphy's

Social networking is a powerful tool, and the owner of our local Papa Murphy's franchises interacts a lot with the local community online and ending up hearing about Leah through the Facebook grapevine (you might recall me mentioning the pizza for charity event that was held in Middle Tennessee to raise money for the Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt back in February, too). After getting in touch with Michael, all of the Middle Tennessee Papa Murphy's locations now have "Leah's Fight" bracelet's available for $5.00 to help support the family and Leah's fight. All proceeds go directly to the family, who are facing mounting medical costs for each round of treatments and surgery.

Leah showing off her new hat. Stylin'!

The next time you go out for pizza, I would implore you to take a moment to count your blessings and then share some of them with the Smallwood family. Every donation helps. You can also make donations at any Cornerstone Financial Credit Union in Middle Tennessee; just tell the teller you would like to donate to Leah Smallwood. If you are not local but would still like to donate, you can do so by mailing donations to:

Attn: Leah Smallwood Cornerstone Financial Credit Union

130 West Northfield Boulevard

Murfreesboro, TN 37129

If you'd like to get in touch with her family or follow her progress, Leah's father, Michael, has a Facebook page (it's not public, but you can message him there or send him a friend request). There is also a CaringBridge page for Leah, as well as a Facebook page and the website leahsfight.org, the latter two both being made and updated by one of Leah's sweet younger friends.

Thanks to all of you for your love and support in this difficult time. I know it means the world to the Smallwood family and to all of us who love them.

Getting to meet Jamie Lynn Spears.

Yo Quiero Taco Grande!

I absolutely LOVE Mexican food. I could seriously eat it just about every single day. So when I saw that this month’s special at Papa Murphy's is the Taco Grande pizza, I just knew we were going to have to get it as soon as possible. Seasoned Taco Beef, refried beans, and salsa all on one pizza just sounded delicious. It will be available until the end of the month here in Middle Tennessee, (depending on your local store's supply levels), so if you've been curious about this one but haven't gotten out to try it yet, there's no time like the present!

Big pizza on a budget!

Thing 1 enjoys watching the pizzas get made

I ran to our usual store on South Rutherford to snag one of these babies. I just had to ask the guy working if he had tried one before and get his opinion (particularly since the hubs isn't quite as into Mexican food as I am). He smiled real big and said, "Ma'am, it's one of my favorite ones on the menu." Sounds promising!

New faces, same great service

Almost all put together

Back at home and unwrapped

One thing to note about this particular pizza is that they use the refried beans in place of the pizza sauce. I had been a little curious about that since the sweet tomato sauce seemed like it would clash with the Mexican flavors. This isn't the first day on the job for the pizza creators at Papa Murphy's, though; they're masters at balancing the flavors in pizza, and they nailed it once again. It's topped with seasoned taco meat, salsa, mozzarella, black olives, roma tomatoes, green onions and cheddar cheese. Again, there are those tricky olives, but I was much less worried about them this time.

Quite the festive looking pizza when it's all cooked!

Still missing our true macro lens camera, but still - a close-up!

I think I should have gotten out the big plates

I have to admit, I'm worried I may be running out of things to say about our pizzas. There are only so many synonyms for "delicious" in the English language. But as usual, this pizza did not disappoint. It was, in fact, delicious. It's not what I would really consider "Mexican food," but it's definitely not a traditional flavored pizza. Rather, it was that somewhere in between, but with enough of both worlds to conquer a craving for either. We got adventurous and decided to throw a little sour cream on a couple of slices since I usually add a heaping spoonful to my tacos, but the sour cream definitely threw the flavor off a bit. It could have been the temperature of it, too, since it was right out of the fridge, but I honestly preferred the pizza just as it came. The only thing I might have changed was to back off the olives just a tad, but that is just a personal preference.

Here comes the airplane ... open wide!

Taco Grande with sour cream. Not bad, but it was better without it.

And for those of you that can never finish a whole pizza in an evening, here's something to keep in mind: I typically find a piece of day-old reheated pizza is every bit as good as the day it was cooked, if not better. For whatever reason, this is the first of my Papa Murphy's that didn’t reheat as evenly. Maybe it's the refried beans being a different consistency than the usual sauce, but you may want to check the temps a couple of times, because my piece took a little longer than usual to reach its optimal temperature. I usually don't mind a bite or two of mildly warm or even cold pizza, but the Taco Grande pizza definitely needed to be reheated thoroughly for me to enjoy it. If you like your refried beans cold, however, you may find yourself in love with this pizza straight out of the fridge on leftovers day.

¡Arriba! ¡Arriba!

Gimme S'mores (Pizza, That Is)!

We're back, everybody! We took a week off our pizza eating while I was traveling for business, and unfortunately my bag containing my laptop and camera (among other things) was taken from the train I was on during that trip. Bugger.

Thankfully, I had already saved a few shots to my other computer of the last pizza we had before my trip. My old college roommate and his wife were visiting from several states away, so we wanted to do something a little fun and different. They'd never had a Papa Murphy's pizza before. We decided that instead of a more traditional choice, pizza for dessert sounded like just the ticket, so we picked ourselves up a S'mores Pizza!

The S'mores Pizza couldn't have been a bigger hit. I've had dessert pizzas before and they were okay, but most of the ones I've liked have had one of three key ingredients: apples, caramel, and cinnamon, or any combination thereof. They were really more akin to a pie or a cinnamon roll than a pizza. The S'mores pizza, on the other hand, comes off looking a bit more like a normal pizza that's been invaded by fanciful toppings. My only hesitation with the S'mores pizza was how the pizza crust would taste combined with the other ingredients; I didn't really want to feel like I was just eating a regular pizza with marshmallows and chocolate, after all. Thankfully, the S'mores didn't disappoint, and tasted like a real sweet treat. It comes topped with real Hershey’s® Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips and mini marshmallows. There is also some sort of "crisp topping" whose ingredients I'm not sure of aside from the oats you can clearly make out. (And a special thanks to our reader Celeste who brought to my attention the amount of extra work that goes into this pizza and making it so special - there is also a chocolate chip folded into every individual braid in the outer crust ring itself! Chocolate stuffed crust - yummm!)

Fresh from the wrapper

I hope whoever stole our camera at least makes good
use of its awesome macro mode. This looks so yummy!

Once thoroughly browned, it looked like a true dessert. And even better, it certainly tasted the part! This is one we'll definitely be picking up again to take with us to gatherings when we're asked to bring along a dessert, and I wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone with a sweet tooth.

It turned out perfect!

Deliciously golden-brown

8 Slices for 6 people ... somebody's going to get hurt.

I had pictures of our friends giving their seal of approvals as they enjoyed their desserts out on the patio with us, but alas, I didn't get those pulled off the camera before its untimely disappearance. So you'll have to make do with this point-of-view shot ... if you hold your nose and cover yours ears while staring intensely, you might be able to trick your brain into thinking it's about to really get a bite. That should hold you over for at least 30 minutes, which gives you plenty of time to go pick up one of your own.  :)

If you have the means, I highly recommend getting out of your chair and picking one of these up immediately!

Saddling Up with the Cowboy Pizza

This week the wife and I have decided to co-op the blog. She wanted to tell you about the pizza, and I wanted to tell you about how I lied to you last week. I'll start.

Last week I stated, "we decided to try something this week we've never done before - grilling a pizza." This is partially true in that we had never grilled a pizza before. But as it turns out, we had forgotten about a little sidebar during an afternoon trip to Lowe's a few years back. On that day, there were some people sitting outside the entrance and they were grilling pizza and giving it away for free. For free! We had a couple of slices, and it was delicious. It also happens to be the first time we ever tried a Papa Murphy's pizza, because that's exactly who the folks grilling all that pizza were with. And now we've come full circle, because this week we cooked up the very same pizza - The Cowboy.

"Courage is being scared to death, but taking the time to finish your slice of pizza anyway."

- John Wayne

Take it away, wife! ...

---

I've got to admit, so far we've been playing it pretty safe in our weekly pizza choices. Most of the pizzas we’ve tried have either been the monthly special or ones we’ve been dying to taste. However, this week we decided to be more adventurous. More daring. More brave. And the pizza that lived up to that kind of hype is rather appropriately named “The Cowboy.” It comes loaded up with pepperoni, Italian sausage, mushrooms, black olives, red pizza sauce, and an herb & cheese blend that is sprinkled all over the top.

Our pizza working its way down the line
(with a Combo Magnifico bring up the rear, it appears)

She's back! And still smiling! We love going
to the South Rutherford Papa Murphy's.

I tend to be a pickier eater than the hubs. There’s not much I could put in front of him that he wouldn’t eat, as he’s proven by eating every single meal I’ve made for him since we’ve been together, no matter how creative the recipe. But the one ingredient that always makes me cringe on a pizza is black olives (shudder). One of the stipulations we’ve given ourselves with our weekly pizzas is to order the pizzas as-is. We may go light on an ingredient, but we leave none out. So if you take a look at the pizza below, you’ll see that by my definition it is loaded with black olives. So buck up, cowgirl!

Presenting "The Cowboy"

Up close with all the toppings

That being said, when the hubs picked up the pizza, an essential ingredient was almost left off, and no, it wasn’t the olives (sigh). Right before the pizza was wrapped, one of the employees realized they'd forgotten to put the “herb and cheese blend” all over the top.  “Oh, glad I caught that!,”  she exclaimed. “This pizza is good anyway, but the blend is what really makes it!” and it was immediately remedied. And she was definitely right.

Family-sized and full of flavor. It's ready!

A little obsessed with macro shots? Maybe. But that is some good looking pizza!

Depth check! This is a pretty standard sized pizza this week.
Family-sized with a regular crust.

So for all my hesitation, I just have to say believe it or not, the olives were really good. Apparently I have been missing out for years. Or maybe I just needed the exact combination of hearty meatiness with earthy veggies and herbs. The olives added a bit of a salty taste, but the mushrooms counteracted that nicely (interjection from the hubs: he says he found the olives kind of meaty tasting when on the pizza. Meaty olives ... ooo-kay. His weird taste buds aside, he really liked them on the pizza, though he's still not a fan of eating olives by themselves, either). There was a solid portion of sausage and pepperoni, which in my book is always good. The red sauce was just the right hint of sweet tomato to compliment the flavors. The herb and cheese blend definitely made the pizza, though. I don’t even have a clue what’s in it, but whatever it is, it’s great. It added the complexity and variety that made me want seconds of this pizza. All in all, it was a great tasting and well-rounded pizza this week!

All sliced up!

Guess which slice is the hubs'?

First-person perspective on dinner!