The Sweatshop of Love Blog

A couple weeks ago I shared PT’s plans to move to NYC. Things have been moving pretty fast since then; he is packing up and driving east Friday already. It takes a ton of guts to quit a safe but unsatisfying job and pack up all your belongings to start new in a city you’ve never live in before, and I couldn’t be more proud of him. Despite how much I’m going to miss him.

But in the mean time we are doing all the fun things PT wants to do before he leaves the city. The PT Chicago Bucket List.

PT and ME

Biking around the lake in matching sun glasses.

Douche Lunch!

Faron Douche Lunch!

Eating Douche Lunch – where we go to a douchey bar and eat douchey food with douches!

PT Pizza

ME Pizza

Making our favorite foods, like these delicious pizzas. Mine is caramelized onion, corn, pineapple, artichoke heart, mozzarella and Parmesan. PT’s is all that plus bacon and olives.

And yes! I portioned. Because I can’t be a fatty and find a new boyfriend.

Left on the list? Just a lot more eating. Handlebar, Margies; all our favorite places. It will be a fun week! Then PT will be off to NYC and I will be holding down the fort, and probably unable to go out to eat ever again because of my new live-alone budget.

If you were moving, what would be on your bucket list specific to your city?

I talk about pizza a lot. I eat pizza a lot. I make pizza a lot. I love it. If there were a breakfast pizza option it would be the perfect food.

That is why it came as a shock to me that I have never put my pizza crust recipe on the blog. What gives, Allyson? I use this recipe so much it’s taped to the wall in my kitchen.

Seriously Well Used Pizza Crust Recipe

Makes 2 9″ round cake pan sized individual pizzas, or 1 regular pizza pan’s worth of pizza. It is easily double-able if you are planning on eating a ton of pizza.

Ingredients

1 1/2 tsp yeast

1/2 tsp salt

Pinch of sugar

1 1/2 tbsp olive oil

Scant cup of nearly boiling water

1 cup white flour

1 cup whole wheat flour

1/4 cup cornmeal

1. Heat water on the stove until warm but not boiling. Move to small bowl and dissolve yeast, salt, and sugar. Let sit until foamy, about 10 minutes.

2. Mix flours and cornmeal in large bowl. Make a well and pour in yeast mixture and olive oil. Make sure the water has cooled before you mix it up with your hands! Kneed until mixed.

3. Cover with damp towel and let rise for 30 minutes. Meanwhile mix up your sauce and cut your veggies! If after 30 minutes your dough doesn’t look any different don’t worry! It turns out great whether it rises or not.

4. Preheat oven to 425. Press out dough into whatever pan you are using. Dress pizza and cook for 15-25 minutes depending on how thin or thick it is, and how crispy you want it. Just keep an eye on it!

Enjoy!

I don’t like leaving the house when it’s cold, and if there is football on forget it. So this weekend was the perfect storm: sub 0 temps, college bowl games, and week 17 of the NFL.

I got home New Years Day at about 2am and didn’t leave again until 8 this morning. That is 78 hours! By far a new hermit record for me.

A long standing tradition in the Allyson household is ridiculous amounts of pizza eating and football watching on New Years Day. PT and I continued this tradition in style.

Caramelized Onion and Pineapple

Olives, Bacon, and Pineapple

Artichoke Hearts and White Cheddar

Caramelized Onion and Artichoke Hearts

Am I right?

And somehow Saturday night we were feeling up for more drinking so we invited some friends over for game night!

Caitlin and Keith and Mexican Train Dominoes

Frank and Dan Love Each Other

Jamie and David Love Their Iphones More Than Games

Caitlin is Harnessing the Power of the Deer Leg

PT is Too Fast for the Camera

I got a lot of work done, too. My January Sweater is coming along swimmingly! I had a lot of knitting to do in preparation for my Winter Class Schedule that will be published on Wednesday, and I had a TON of sewing to do. But more about that later.

I better go get working on that schedule. I like to tell people when I’m going to get things done in the hopes of then actually accomplishing them.

And I know the blog has been a little cat heavy lately, but I just spent 78 hours with the little guys so you can’t really blame me for taking pictures, right?

Pudge Rodriguez

Could you die? With the tongue out! Ohh she just kills me.

Holy Grocery Shopping!

Upon arriving back in Chicago from my week long Michigan hiatus, it appeared to me that I had bought out the entirety of West Michigan. PT and I buy all of our groceries at one time, having no car, but the state of our kitchen table yesterday was out of control.

$24 Microwave!

In addition to the beets I picked up Black Friday, I also snagged this handsome microwave that tells the time even when you use the timer! Holy technology!

$13 Sheets!

AND I got these flannel sheets for crazy cheap, too. Velma and Pudge Rodriguez approved and made it very hard to make the bed at the same time.

Banana Pepper, Caramelized Onion, and Pineapple Pizza

Sunday also reprized Pizza Sunday! Despite all the groceries we bought we are seriously lacking some fresh vegetables, so we had to dig around the pantry for pizza toppings.

Mark and PT are PUMPED

Mark and PT were in football/pizza heaven, with a Minnesota Vikings victory over the Bears and amazing, bacon topped pizzas.

Mark+Pudge=LOVE

Then Pudge snuggled up! Pudge is in love with Mark, who is a little allergic to kitty lovin’. So tragic!

Naturally as soon as I had a moment to let all that lack of sleeping and eating only pie catch up to me I was down for the count! My body rejected movement of any kind yesterday and I’m pretty sure I slept 18 of the last 24 hours. Just sitting up at my desk right now is taking a lot out of me! Coming back from that Eastern time zone is sure rough.

The best thing about working from home?

Pasta Lunch

All I could think about all morning was a mushroom and broccoli pasta lunch. So I made it! And am eating it right now.

I don’t know if it was the amazing weather we had here in Chicago this weekend or if I was just a girl on a mission, but I rocked this weekend so hard.

Costa Rican Fiest

It all started when PT and I couldn’t stop talking about Irazu. For some reason our solution was not to just go to Irazu but to try to replicate Costa Rican food at home.

The problem is that we think the burritos we make are way better than any burrito out there. That is funny, I know, living in Logan Square where there is a dude on every corner making burritos from his family recipe.

(Note to self: Write up burrito recipe to post on blog.)

So we started with a regular burrito I always make and set out to make some Gallo Pinto and Cabbage Salad.

Gallo Pinto and Cabbage Salad

This recipe for the Cabbage Salad is dead on. It is exactly like Irazu’s amazing salad! We halved the recipe and we still had salad left over for Saturday. This recipe for the Gallo Pinto is close, and I think with a little tweaking we could get it. We made about a third of the recipe, it still made a ton. And there is a critical flavor missing from this recipe that Irazu’s rice has and I’m determined to figure it out.

Amazing!

We had to have fried plantains, too, naturally. My favorite part of this meal was plating it! I love when there are many aspects to a meal that you can chose from. I’ve got a dinner party in the works for Friday, so stay tuned for try #2.

Sunday Pizza

Mushroom, Artichoke Heart, Caramelized Onions

And our Sunday pizzas were amazing! Mine was fresh mushrooms from the Logan Square Farmers Market, artichoke hearts, and caramelized onions.

PT's Pizza, with Bacon

Bacon-licious

PT’s pizza was the same as mine, only with bacon.

I was productive on the knitting front, too! I knit the two (Eric) Man-Hats, wrote the pattern up for them and posted it on Ravelry. I knit two elephant bodies and finished knitting PT’s Christmas Present (pics later). I know I haven’t done a Christmas Present Update for PT in a long time because, while I was working on it, it was painfully boring. I didn’t want to subject myself to it, much less you.

The Black Tape!

OMG!

And I managed to leave the house! We went to see The Black Tape Saturday night. I’m going to be writing their press kit so we had to go get the live experience. I’m an old lady and didn’t even realize it was possible to start doing anything at 12:30am, but I made it somehow!

I think I earned a little time to relax, but I’ve got some elephants to finish and some seeming to do. (And probably a trip to the gym to make!)