Today marks my first day of marriage. As this is my wedding week (which leads directly into three weeks of honeymoon abroad), these next few challenges will be truncated and minimized to just a brief overview in the series of pictures that may never be fleshed out with descriptions in the future.

In the first of this series will be a deep dish mac & cheese pizza that is stuffed with tomato and basil. To begin, the mac & cheese is made using basic elbow pasta for a classic look and texture.

The creamy, cheesy aspect is a matter of adding in the right amount of butter, milk, mozzarella and cheddar.

Many taste tests are done to ensure the mac & cheese is worth a nibble all by its onesie. A cast-iron is used to build the pizza.

In the construction, a base of macaroni is pilled onto a thicker style dough so as to support the macaroni that will be piled on. A layer of macaroni is followed by a sprinkling of chiffonade basil and halved San Marzano tomatoes. A final layer of pasta and cheese follows with a brief oven session that kisses the dish with light browning.

Using a spatula along the firm, crisp crust, this pizza can easily be removed before the cutting begins.

The resulting pizza is absolute hedonism with a soft punch of juicy tomato and basil leaves.

A bottle of Etna Rosso is selected to pair and its just what is needed to cut through all the richness brought on by the cheesiness and thicker crust.

This fusion of comfort food seems like the tame kind of thisiswhyyourfat cuisine that would be worth the energy expended in its production. In my opinion, it’s not. Thankfully, these challenges do not bear the weight of regret despite any hiccups. And despite the inferiority to the classics being amalgamated here, the pizza itself was worth devouring in full.

Unagi: one of the great standards to be unhesitatingly penciled in on a sushi order sheet. With their own dedicated sauce, those puppies don’t require a hit of wasabi to jazz up the flavor rollercoaster. They are a closed-system of deliciousness, which is being tapped for this week’s kitchen challenge: Japanese.

The local Japanese grocery store keeps a range of inspiring ingredients, anything from yuzu to octopus arms, for Japanophiles to get giddy about. Despite my Chinese heritage, I get a little dizzy with excitement over Japanese culture and cuisine. While shopping, a load of unrelated foodstuffs, including a large bottle of Kewpie mayo, find a new home in my kitchen along with the freshwater eel I originally came for. Even still, this pizza will remain a simple but moderately snazzy unagi experience. (And yes, this entire paragraph was built to prop up a single irrelevant gif.)

Unagi Pizza

To complement the eel, I decided on including both traditional & non-traditional toppings. Scallions were chopped coarsely with half joining the eel during the cooking process while the other half for garnishing afterwards. This would offer two types of textures and a bit of extra complexity with the range of fresh and cooked onion flavors.

Cheese bowed out of this project and instead I substituted the milky creaminess of macadamia nuts, which were lightly pummeled with mortar and pestle.

To craft this pizza appropriately, the dough needed to be a bit more oblong in shape, stretched out into a more rectangular platform so as to not require the usual circular symmetry in flavors.

While eel sauce would make-do as a sauce, it needed a bit of thinning out. For an extra bump of flavor, I blended in sesame oil and slathered the mixture right onto the dough with a brush.

Though this dough seems perfectly eel-shaped, instead the eel was chopped into three pieces to fit evenly side-by-side to create more uniform pizza slices.

Due to the high oven heat, the macadamia nuts threatened to crisp up beyond what might delight the palate. Next time, it would be wiser to wait until the final minutes of baking to add the nuts on top. Luckily, any possible off flavors from over-toasting did not distract from the larger flavors of sweet, tender unagi.

A wine fit to go with both aspects of sweet and savory in this pizza would need a touch of sweetness of its own to balance this pairing. Joh. Jos. Prüm – Riesling, Kabinett, Graacher Himmelreich, Mosel, Germany 2012 is refreshingly mineral-tinged with lime, green apple and peach offering a range of vibrant aromas that sing loudly on its own. While Kabinett in style, this Riesling keeps the touch of sweetness needed to manage the big flavors of unagi and eel sauce. Each sip energizes the palate to chase those unagi flavors while each bite of pizza begs for another taste of wine. It’s a near-perfect union and an experience worth recreating, which makes this metatheme project a win.

To satisfy this week’s requirement of chili, I decided to construct an oily deep-dish bed for this messy American meat stew to get cozy in. Both chili and deep-dish pizza were exotic enough kitchen ventures that, since taken on simultaneously, came with much insecurity and ready cynicism. Even in the final stages of plating, when all looked as it should have, my apprehension did not relent. It was only in that first bite when I realized I had aced it.

Complying to the challenge at all was a big picky-eater step for me. Somewhere in my childhood I developed a rather aggravating fear of beans, thus the idea of chili never thrilled me. In fact, I’d never actually had chili. This may seem an atrocity until you realize I skirted around far worse super American cultural experiences until my mid-20s, like steak, burgers and bacon. Naturally, when I discovered Texas chili is traditionally made without beans, I mustered up some enthusiasm for this challenge. The next step was to learn how to make deep-dish.

Having grown up in a thin crust household and continuing on this tradition with my thin crust-eating future hubs (from Chicagoland, of all places), I have only recently become acquainted with the thrills that can be had while munching on a slab of deep-dish. The experience is usually over too fast, partially due to how damned filling a single slice can be. I remember the jolt of surprise to find that 5 grown adults could not take down a single order of Chicago pie, which I had originally insisted was not enough food. It sure fucking was.

After perusing some online recipes, I adhered to deep-dish guidance offered in The New Best Recipe, an America’s Test Kitchen publication, straying from the template for stylistic purposes. For chili expertise, I combed through many sources and styles before mostly committing to the Serious Eats version, which I preferred for its simplicity and flexibility.

I made the chili two days in advance of the final assembly. A couple days of rest not only developed the flavor, as promised by most every recipe, but allowed me to segment my cooking plans cleanly.

Texas Chili

Chuck steak is prized by stewing enthusiasts to be the cut of choice due to the high amount of connective tissue, collagen, which melts into gelatin and gives the meat a more succulent texture. After chopping up a hefty bone-in steak into inch thick pieces, the meat is cooked briefly over medium-high heat until just browned. This step is open to modification according to personal preference of texture. For further guidance, J. Kenji explains his reasoning for a variation in searing.

Meanwhile, the whole chili peppers to turn into paste (today: Pasilla and Guajillo) are deseeded and shredded into large pieces.

Over moderate heat, the peppers are lightly toasted in a pan for a couple minutes and carefully managed to prevent burning. Using a minimal amount of beef stock, the toasted peppers are simmered for 5-10 minutes before blending. The result: an ugly, yet super flavorful paste.

To gear up for the stew, chopped onions are softened and grated garlic is added soon after, cooked until fragrant. While aware the list of potential herbs and spices used to create the nuanced differences demarcating fervent loyalties between styles is extensive, I chose to use oregano and cumin with a whisper of cinnamon and allspice. Combining in the meat and chili paste, the remaining beef stock is poured in for the long simmer session ahead.

After three hours, the chili is thickened with masa harina, a corn tortilla flour, and salted to tasted. To meld the flavors thoroughly, the chili takes a couple days to hibernate in the fridge, awaiting its next big adventure.

Deep-Dish Crust

Aside from an unprompted decision to substitute a third of the flour for masa harina, the deep-dish crust is built according to every minute instruction. Everything from the many baths of oil the crust receives to meticulous sets of resting periods to conforming to the detailed oven heating requirements is designed to ensure the best possible outcome with minimal hassle. Such is the beauty of America’s Test Kitchen recipes.

A boiled potato is grated into the crust to provide a springy texture and the crust is baked before topped so as to develop its structure. Giving all that love and attention to the crust pays off by providing a sturdy base for the weight of the chili to rest safely in. For layering, a base of shredded cheddar is placed over the crust first followed by the chili, spread evenly so that chunks of beef can be found in every bite. To follow, another layer of cheddar cheese before cooked at 425°F and finished on the top oven shelf.

After the final stage in the oven, sour cream and cilantro leaves garnish the top.

To free the pizza from its pan, some tricky spatula work is required but the pie should be able to be transferred before slicing.

Again, I must emphasis just how shocked I am at the success of this union. Not only did the crust maintain its shape throughout, the flour swap ensured every bite was infused with deliriously blissful flavors of Fritos. The sour cream provides a velvety draping over the intensely savory edges of the chili. The meat is tender and perfectly juxtaposed with the texture of the soft, springy crust.  Altogether, it is immensely satisfying to eat and hard to not completely engulf. Wine could easily become an afterthought, but in this scenario.

Having consulted the fine people of Village Vino, a boutique wine shop in San Diego, I chose Parr Selections – “Cuvée Anika,” Syrah, Ballard Canyon, California 2012 to pair with this pizza. The youthful purple hues of the wine distract from its actual charm of elegance and balance. The style is reminiscent of Northern Rhône, offering a heady nose of fresh lavender florals with black raspberries and peppercorn on the palate. There is a gracefulness here not often found in California wines. The firm, finely grained tannins contribute depth to the moderate body while dark fruit and fresh leather aromas lead one another in a harmonious duet.

Alongside the pizza, the pairing is playful with just enough power to withstand the long chords of flavors while matching spice with spice and countering savory with fruit. The wine naturally enhances the experience by not only providing a companion for the pizza, but also a chance to catch my breath between bites. Even still, I’m already ready for more.

To satisfy the requirements of Week 3’s Greek theme, I contemplated the broad range of flavors found in traditional Greek dishes with the hope of successfully tackling something unfamiliar to my kitchen. The overabundance of ingredients that could be worked with was already quite daunting and I wanted to work with as many as possible without creating a mess of a pie. I squared in on lamb as the main focus, drawn to its grassy, gamey flavors that were still a relative stranger in my kitchen.

Wanting to see how lamb would fare when sous vided, especially a less tender cut, I took home a pound of shoulder without the clarity of a vision. My overall goal, beyond bringing the flavors of Greece to a pizza, was to achieve meat so tender it would not put up a fight when bitten into, a crucial aspect in building a pie. After tackling an abundantly hearty pizza in last week’s challenge, I wanted to keep flavors lively and fresh in this one. Eventually, the dish found its voice as a fancied up, open-faced lamb gyro, despite the non-traditional meat preparation.

Since only a small portion of the pound of lamb would be needed per pizza, a little experimentation could be afforded. Using a traditional oregano-heavy rub, the lamb was sliced and prepared in two vacuum-sealed bags, one with lemon juice and one without. Both would be steeped at the same 55° C temperature for 24 hours, but the lemon juice was theorized to help tenderize the meat, hopefully to its benefit.

And wow did it tenderize. The citrus really had its way with the lamb during its 24 hour span, disintegrating its outer parts into a grey pulp. Of the thicker pieces, I could sort out extremely soft pieces of meat of a recognizable pink hue underneath the exterior. The meat cooked without lemon juice kept its juicy red color and relative firmness while still soft enough to bite through cleanly. To provide some texture, I gave both sets of lamb time on the cast-iron over high heat.

For the sauce, excess moisture is the enemy. Cucumbers are deseeded of their fleshy core before being grated while the yogurt is placed in a nut bag and fiercely strained of its inherent liquid. The latter process of straining can be applied to the shredded cucumbers after allowing kosher salt to coax out the remaining moisture.

These ingredients are mixed together with lemon juice and finely chopped dill, mint and garlic.

After lightly toasting the pita bread, the sauce is heartily slathered on. Using both types of lamb, the meat is laid down first followed by the classic gyro accoutrement of tomato and onions. To add some flair, I sprinkle some feta and sprigs of dill over top. The results are equally as tasty, each slice becoming a miniature gyro of its own.

To pair, I chose to experiment yet again, tapping two possible pairings for this Greek dish. The first, Domaine Porto Carras – Limnio, Côtes de Meliton, Macedonia, Greece 2012, is an indigenous Greek varietal, Limnio, that features blackberries, dried leather and tar cast in a moody, spiced medium-bodied wine. While bold and straightforward in personality, this wine lacked the softness needed for this particular dish as its intense aromas tended to dominate the flavors on the pita.

The alternative bottle Joel Taluau – “Cuvée de Chevrette” St-Nicolas de Bourgueil, Touraine, Loire Valley, France 1985, (a birthday gift from my boo), could not be resisted in this pairing as I consider the style a classic alongside lamb. Although three decades of age had pushed this wine into an extremely developed stage in its life, it was still kicking with dried figs and raspberries. The acidity was still bright, offering clarity in the murky concentration of sweet fruit aromas. It was a surprisingly well-matched pairing as it embodied the antithesis of all the fresh cucumber, yogurt and dill while keeping a soft enough profile to not overpower any of the delicate flavors.

The pizza itself was such a success I made three rounds in one night, chasing those vibrant flavors with birthday wine. I can only hope this is the beginning of a streak. Let’s go, Week 4.