Fridge Pizza
Anything goes! Unless you’re Gwyneth, obvs.
It was an epic slog of a winter and now we’re in an absolute slog of a spring, waking every morning to below freezing temps and the fire still going most evenings. The usual pattern here is one picture perfect day every two weeks or so, just long enough to renew your faith in humanity, have your first bbq, maybe your first ocean swim (check!), or wearing bare arms to school pickup without bringing an extra layer. SPRING IS HERE EXCEPT HAHA IT’S NOT because you blink and it’s right back to two degrees and RDF (rain drizzle and fog for those not yet initiated) and every year we’re affronted and act surprised and it’s all, “Can you believe this weather?” (I can) and “My God, I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemy” (oh I goddamn would, plus worse, I mean it’s 2026 come ON), until the first heatwave when it’s a chorus of, “Jesus, I’d take a pile of snow over this humidity.” That, my friends, is Newfoundland spring in a nutshell and I love it and wouldn’t change a thing.
Meals are also a slog, because I’m still kinda caught between comfort food and bbq season and it’s getting to the end of the school year and all the planning and activities and work and ugh, too much takeout and I should have taken out the slow cooker this morning, or thawed something from the freezer and blaaaaaaah, I hate it when dinner is a chore because I love cooking but there are evenings when it’s a chore and I’ll be fine because I have food and life is pretty hard right now for a lot of people so pull yourself together, ingrate.
Pretty much my inner monologue some nights, is what I’m trying to get at. Sometimes I give in and succumb to takeout, but there are some nights when the magic happens and we have everything in the fridge for pizza, hence, FRIDGE PIZZA!!! Which, if you google it (or DuckDuckGo it these days because Google has gone full evil AI warlord on all of our asses) isn’t even a thing? I did a little search out of curiosity and the only things that popped up were “how long does pizza last in the fridge” or the even more disturbing Reddit threads asking if pizza is better left overnight in the fridge or on the counter. Gross, but also unsurprising in an era where teenage boys are hitting themselves in the face with hammers to get better jawlines, so really, what’s a little counter pizza at the end of the day?
In the tradition of fridge cake from a couple years back, here’s fridge pizza: whatever is taking up room in your fridge and freezer can probably go on a pizza. That’s it, that’s the fridge pizza. Unless you’re Gwyneth Paltrow and you think arugula is an appropriate sub for dairy??? WHAT IS HAPPENING. You guys, I can’t lie. I miss Sliding Doors Gwyneth, bone broth Gwyneth is zero fun. Anyway, here’s what was in my freezer: one portion of pizza sauce (helpful!), two portions of homemade flatbread. Fridge: braised Moroccan lamb that had come out of the freezer three days earlier, the last ziploc baggie portion from a leg I made at Christmas that we’ve been eating all winter (I’ll post the recipe sometime it’s so good), a half a block of old cheddar, and a pile of cilantro and mint that was fading and needed to go. Plus a bunch of green onions growing on the windowsill that needed a trim. Rolled out the flatbread really thin, broke out the pizza stone and peel because suddenly I was excited for thin crust lamb pizza. Baked it on a super hot stone for 9 minutes, topped it with chilli flakes, and a handful of chopped green onions, mint, and cilantro. Poof, Moroccan lamb pizza. Justin said it was “shockingly good” and I think it’s the pizza of the year so far, and lemme tell you, it’s had some pretty stiff competition.
Show me your fridge pizzas!! And I’ll show you the real Italian ones I’ll be eating next week. Yeah, you heard me! Another middle aged lady leaving her family to find herself in Italy! Just for a couple weeks, but that’s a whole lotta pizza. I’ll mostly be yoga-ing and writing for a Nova Yoga retreat in Umbria, but there’ll be a couple of UK stops in London and Stratford-upon-Avon beforehand, with some Perugia and Florence thrown in for good measure. Afterwards I hope to return to a Newfoundland of double digit temperatures, but I won’t say that too loud.
Arrivederci, Chickens! See you across the pond! xo