The Pompeli Pizza

Since I can only eat every dish once, when I made pizza I wanted to make it special. There was an awful lot to live up to because the Calzones were so amazing. I also made an exceptional risk by trying to cook my favorite pizza on the barbecue, with no previous barbecuing pizza experience. I figured that a barbecue is almost like a forno oven and decided to take the chance, since the Beer Can Chicken turned out so good. To heighten the risk factor even more, I even fried the bacon naked. Now THAT'S adventure for you!

I've been drooling about the Pompeli Pizza ever since I had the Honey Garlic Pork Skewers because the sauce is so similar. Non-tomato based sauces seem to be a growing standard in the pizza industry now, but several years ago I had my first experience with a non-tomato sauce in — of all places — a pool hall slash sports bar. They've since removed the pizza from the menu, but after the first bite it instantly became one of my favorite dishes and I suggested it to anyone that would listen, similar to the Mediterranean Eggplant Cakes.

I have worked on and off in a pizzeria for around 4 years. While I've since pretty much stopped eating pizza altogether after my experiences with low carb dieting, it's safe to say that I've tried a large percentage of every combination of toppings and sauces known to man. I've tried everything from a macaroni and wiener pizza with cheese sauce to a mussel and mushroom pizza with clam sauce, as well as other pizzas that might actually be considered edible. After all of my experience eating pizza, I'm still certain that this is the greatest pizza in the entire world. I could franchise an entire pizza chain based on this pie alone! OK, that is probably not true, since the original pizza I am trying to emulate was dropped from the menu within the first year of business, but I'm certain it's only because people were not adventurous enough to try it.

I'm not sure if you can do this just anywhere, but where I worked we would sell pizza dough to people. The process of making your own crust takes as long as making bread (several hours) and I wasn't feeling ambitious enough, so I simply got a dough ball from the pizzeria and tossed it at home. I've done my best to recreate the pizza as I remember it. The only differences are that I left out sun-dried tomatoes because I didn't have any and was afraid they'd terribly burn in the barbecue anyway and I just sort of made up the sauce based on my recollection since I really have nothing else to go by.

As for the results, I think the flavor was extremely similar to what I remember. Making a pizza in the barbecue is probably not the greatest idea, especially without proper equipment (I put the pizza on a metal pie plate with tinfoil overtop it). It became extremely crispy (read: burnt) around the edges. Despite this it was surprisingly edible, so I consider it a success. Since it's been ages since I've had this particular pizza and I already consider it a favorite, I think I did a decent job of recreating it. It was not as good as the calzones, but there's definitely a nostalgia bonus in it for me.