Another Fun Session. Plus Calzones!

Yes, you can teach an old dog new tricks. The new policy of paying close attention to tides is definitely paying off. Yesterday, for example, predicted surf heights were right in my wheelhouse, but again the tides were not right for the time I'd normally want to head to the beach. So I moved things around so I'd get there at the right time. Becoming more flexible and adaptable is just one more lesson that surfing is teaching me. And it paid off. It was perfect mid-tide, and the waves were pretty mellow. I paddled into a couple, got up on a couple and fell off a couple! My next hurdle is really focusing on foot placement after the pop up and staying low.

Back at home, it was almost time to figure out dinner, since the surf session had been pushed ahead by a couple of hours. The other night I made pizza using Sullivan Street Bakery guru Jim Lahey's no-knead crust recipe, which was featured in a post back on July 18, 2014. This dough makes a nice thin, crispy crust. It requires a twenty four hour rise, but that's the hardest thing about it. Also, it always yields extra, so I stick what we don't use in the refrigerator (you can freeze it too). Then you can either make another small pizza, or better yet, how about calzones, like the one below, with fontina, chard and fennel-thyme sausage? All those pizza joints we'd frequent as kids always had calzones too. While I'll go for pizza almost every time if I'm out at, say, Prime Pizza on Fairfax, it's pretty easy to make them at home.

Here's how to do it, and here I'll use store-bought pizza dough so you don't have to worry about making your own. (However, if you do make the no-knead Lahey dough like in the earlier post, you will have about 1/3 of the dough leftover. Use that to make 2 calzones).

For 4 Calzones

1 1-pound package pizza dough
1 cup marinara sauce (your own, or bought)
1 bunch swiss or ruby chard (or you can use spinach), cleaned, stemmed and chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
4  tbsps. olive oil, divided
1 large or 2 small Italian Sausages, hot or sweet
1 1/2 cups shredded fontina cheese
4 tbsps. grated Parmesan or Romano

1. If dough is refrigerated, remove from refrigerator about 2 hours before baking. Form dough into 4 balls on floured surface. Dust with flour, cover with plastic wrap and let rest on counter until room temperature.
2. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. In small skillet, heat 1 tbsp. olive oil over medium heat. Add minced garlic. When garlic starts to sizzle, toss in chopped chard. Saute, stirring, until chard is wilted, adding a little water if necessary. Cook until Chard is tender, about five minutes. Season to taste with salt and fresh ground pepper. Set aside to cool, then squeeze out as much liquid as you can from the chard.
3. Wipe out skillet. Remove sausage from casing. Heat another tbsp. olive oil in skillet and add sausage. Saute, stirring until sausage is cooked through and beginning to brown. Drain out oil and set aside.  Mixed shredded fontina and Parmesan cheeses.
4. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. With floured hands, flatten dough and shape into about a six inch circle. Transfer to parchment paper. Repeat with remaining dough balls. Ladle about 1/4 cup sauce on the lower half of each circle. Top sauce with a layer of chard, and then some sausage. Top with cheeses. With wet fingers moisten the entire edge of the circle. Then bring the top layer of dough over the bottom half and press to seal the calzone well. Brush calzones with remaining two tbsps. olive oil. Cut a couple of small slits in the top. 
5. Place baking sheets in oven and cook calzones until golden brown, about 20-25 minutes. Rotate baking sheets halfway through.

Pretty easy, huh?  Here's some shots of the process, first the balls of dough resting on a floured board.

Here's the fennel-thyme Sausage from McCall's, all browned.

The chard was from the garden. Make sure you squeeze it well to get out all that excess moisture.

And here are the golden calzones, just out of the oven. They'll be piping hot, so let them cool a few minutes before you bite into them!

If you're looking for some really good sausages, get to McCalls Meat and Fish in Los Feliz. There's a lot of varieties. Try them all!

McCall's Meat and Fish:  www.mccallsmeatandfish.com