...Duck Confit, Foie Gras and Morel Mushroom Pizza

This pizza was created for the YYC Pizza Week 2015 Blogger Challenge and it's a fantastic one at that.  It is our opinion that you can never have enough duck; enter the 'Duck Duck Deuce' pizza. This doubly decadent duck creation is the perfect way to herald in the cooler months.  It features earthy morel mushrooms, ricotta, tender duck confit and duck rillete-foie gras quenelles atop a foie gras spread.  The sweet and tangy fig-balsamic reduction and fresh pea shoots balance out the richness.  This luxurious pizza is surprisingly easy to re-create as we document below.

YYC Pizza Week is an annual fundraiser for Calgary Meals on Wheels where restaurants across the city enter into a friendly competition for best pizza in several categories.  We have submitted our "lucky" duck pizza in hopes of victory. Please visit the YYC Pizza Week website for full details and vote for us!

Ingredients (Yields approximately two 10" pizzas)
-Duck confit (see our recipe here)
-1 package duck foie gras or foie gras/rillette
-1 package duck liver pate or foie gras pate
-200 g of dried morel mushrooms
-1/2 cup ricotta cheese
-1/2 cup pea shoots
-3 tsp fig jam
-1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
-Pizza dough (see our thin crust pizza recipe)
-3 tbsp melted butter
-Salt and pepper to taste

Method:
1. Rehydrate the morels by placing them in 1 cup of lukewarm water for 45 minutes.  Once rehydrated, slice the larger mushrooms in half.  Fry the morels in 1 tbsp of butter until tender (you can add 2-3 tbsp of the liquid from rehydrating them to ease the cooking process).

2.  In a small saucepan, combine the balsamic vinegar and fig jam and simmer over medium-low heat until the mixture reaches a consistency of syrup (approximately 20 minutes).  Set aside and cool to room temperature.

3. Preheat oven and pizza stone to 425 F.

4. Roll out pizza dough on pizza peel to approximately to 10".  Dock the dough with a fork, leaving a one inch border for the crust to rise.  Brush it with melted butter and sprinkle salt and pepper to taste.

5.  Bake the dough until the edges are a light golden brown.  Cool the crust for 5-10 minutes.

6.  Spread the foie gras/duck live pate on the crust.  Add pieces of duck confit, ricotta cheese and morel mushrooms.  Bake in the oven for 5 minutes to melt the cheese and warm the toppings.

7.  Remove the pizza from the oven and using two teaspoons make one quenelle for each slice of pizza (we made six).  Scatter on top the pea shoots and generously drizzle the fig-balsamic reduction over the entire pizza.

8.  Serve immediately and enjoy!

Let us know in the comments if you try this pizza out.  What is your favourite pizza?  Also, don't forget to vote for us on the YYC Pizza Week website and check out which restaurants are participating!

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Top 3 Fall Recipes to Try Today

We may be a little biased but we think we have a good collection of fall recipes here on the blog that we've posted over the last 4 years. In anticipation of the official start of fall, which is this Wednesday, we thought we'd share our top three fall recipe picks:

Butternut Squash, Sage & Cheddar 'Pizza'
What better way to use squash that are in season than in a 'pizza'?  The nutty butternut squash, sharp cheddar cheese and woody sage on a buttery, flakey puff pastry crust are the perfect fall combination.  Check out the recipe here.

Indian Spiced Cream of Carrot Soup
One of our favourite things to harvest from our garden are carrots.  Nothing beats the taste of an ultra sweet home grown, organic carrot.  This recipe takes advantage of the root vegetable harvest by spicing things up with garam masala, coriander, fennel and mustard seed.  Combined with the gentle hum of coconut milk in the background, you've got an extraordinary fall soup.  See the recipe here.

Apple Braised Pork Shoulder
This recipe comes from a time when we used an iPhone 4 to take photos; however it doesn't detract from the fact that this is an amazing dish that utilizes the fall harvest of orchard ripened apples.  The sweet apple paired with the melt in your mouth fennel braised pork is a warming (and winning) combination.  Check out the recipe here.

What is your favourite fall recipe?

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...Famoso Neapolitan Pizzeria (Westhills, Calgary)

Overall - 9/10
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Food - 9/10
Service - 9/10
Ambiance - 9/10

I first heard about Famoso when I was living in Edmonton. At the time, thin crust Neapolitan pizza was a bit of a rarity. Nowadays I can count half a dozen thin crust pizza places that have popped up in Calgary.  At that time your pizza options were limited to thick doughy slices of pie at Pizza Hut or Boston Pizza. So when I tried the pizza at the original Famoso in Edmonton I was blown away. Not only was the crust thin and crisp but the toppings were fresh and perfectly proportioned to the amount of dough. Thankfully their franchise has really grown and they now have spots all across the country. The location we tried just opened in the Westhills shopping area and I'm happy to report their pizzas are just as good as I remember them from my experience in Edmonton.

We started off with a couple of salads to share between the four of us. The first was a pesto caprese salad made from cherry tomatoes, Fior-di-latte cheese (a really creamy mozzarella), crunchy pistachios, and mixed greens. The dressing was combination of a basil pesto and sweet balsamic glaze. The flavours were really intense and matched the generous portion size. Our second salad was called the Famoso salad. This had a base of romaine lettuce topped with roasted chicken, spicy salami, feta and a Dijon balsamic dressing. Also very delicious and enough for a meal on its own.

Our favourite pizza had to have been the Cavoletti which was actually created by a customer submission. If you look on the Famoso website there is a submission link to pitch your idea for the perfect pizza. This one had just the right balance between sweet, bitter, savoury and creamy. It included roasted brussel sprouts, proscuitto crisps, gorgonzola cheese, sweet dates and honey. 

Next up was the Catalan which definitely had a Spanish flare with the romesco sauce, pine nuts, roasted peppers and grated grana padano cheese. For the meat lovers the Sicilliana is the way to go with italian sausage, ham and proscuitto. Both pizzas were delicious and quite filling.

At the end of the night when the bill came we were happy with the value of the meal and found the service to fast and efficient. We are definitely planning on heading back very soon!

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…Via Cibo (Calgary)

Overall - 7.5/10
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Food - 7/10
Service - 8/10
Ambiance - 7/10

You might have driven by this trendy eatery located in the Deerfoot Meadows shopping area just off Deerfoot trail and wondered what it's all about. As the name implies, Via Cibo is the more casual sister restaurant of Cibo on 17th Avenue. The food here still uses the finest and freshest ingredients but the service and style of preparation are much more casual.  Via Cibo offers dine-in or take-out.  Dining in requires you to order your food and drink at the counter and pay before finding a table, where your food is delivered. We arrived right before the rush and found the service to extremely efficient, with our entire meal arriving minutes after we sat down.

We ordered the linguini pomodoro with sausage ($13) and the pollo al pesto pizza ($13). The pasta was perfectly cooked but the tomato sauce was a bit on the watery side, with small bits of sausage that lacked seasoning/flavour. However, no fault could be found with the pizza. The crust was thin and had just the right amount of chewiness while the toppings were very well balanced.  The pesto was flavourful and not too salty, allowing the sweetness of the roasted peppers to come through, complimenting the chicken and goat cheese.

As a side we also ordered the via poutine which was their Italian take on a Canadian classic. Despite being on the pricier side for this type of restaurant ($9), we were quite pleased with this poutine.  The fries were topped with fontina cheese and a deliciously tender braised osso bucco ragu. 

Although the pasta wasn't our favourite, the pizza and poutine more than made up for it.   As it got busier, there were people awkwardly standing around waiting for the next available table, some of whom were noticeably agitated by the lack of seating.  Once we finished our last bite of food, a server swooped in to clear our dishes and not-so-subtly hinted we should be on our way.  Unless they increase seating somehow, Via Cibo is more of a place to grab a quick bite of good quality food, rather than a date night destination.  Next time, we want to try the Italian flatbread and sandwiches which seemed popular with other diners.  

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