Prosciutto, Arugula & Gorgonzola Pizza

I keep a spreadsheet of every grocery receipt. I have done this since 2003. I will not stop. The week was a summer week, the kind where the light through the kitchen window arrives at a particular angle and the freezer hums in a different register depending on the temperature in the garage. I made notes in my prep notebook on Sunday afternoon, the way I always do: meal name, ingredient list, cost per serving, prep time, freezer instructions. Twenty-eight bags. Two hours and eleven minutes. A little slow this week, by my standards, but Brandon was helping and the conversation was good, and I have learned, slowly and against my own grain, that the conversation is sometimes the point and the time is sometimes a courtesy I extend to my husband for being willing to chop onions on a Sunday afternoon.

The children are doing what they do, which is the central report of every week of my adult life. Ethan is 21, in Manila on his mission, and his last email mentioned a chicken adobo so good he is going to make me make it when he comes home. Olivia is 19, at BYU studying elementary education — the path she chose at age seven and has not deviated from once. Mason, 16, is in Brazil on his mission. His weekly emails are short and full of jokes. He does not write much about the work. He writes about the food. Lily is 14, in high school, asking the kind of questions in Sunday School that make the teachers uncomfortable, which I find difficult and also, secretly, admirable. Noah is 12, the comedian, the performer — the kid who does an impression of my disappointed face in front of company, and gets away with it. That is the family report. I do not have a system for these reports. I just listen and remember and call back when I said I would call back, which is most of the time and not all of the time, and the difference between most and all is the territory of motherhood.

The recipe of the week was dutch oven chili, which I have made some specific number of times in my life and have refined to a system that I now hand to other people in printed form. The version I made this week fed eight, cost under fifteen dollars, and required twenty-six minutes of active prep, which is within my requirements and not a coincidence. I labeled every bag — meal, date, reheating instructions, servings — because future-me is the woman I am writing for, and future-me is tired. I have stopped explaining the freezer-meal philosophy to people who already follow my work, and I have stopped apologizing for it to people who do not. The philosophy is simple: tomorrow is coming whether you are ready or not. You can either be ready or not. I pick ready.

Brandon and I sat at the kitchen island on Thursday night and did not talk much, and the not-talking was a language we built in therapy and have refused to unlearn. We have been married a long time. The arithmetic of it is the arithmetic of my whole life. There were years we missed each other in the same room, and there are years we find each other in the silences, and this is one of the latter, and I am old enough now to know that the latter is the achievement and the former was the cost.

Twenty-eight bags. Labeled. Dated. Stacked. The week, in the only currency that matters in this house.

The chili is for future-me — labeled, stacked, already accounted for. But Thursday night, when Brandon and I were sitting at the island in the particular quiet we have learned to mean something, I wanted to cook just for the room we were in, not the week ahead. This pizza is that kind of cooking: twenty-seven minutes, a handful of good ingredients, nothing to freeze or portion or explain. It is the exhale after the spreadsheet, and after a Sunday like that one, it was exactly right.

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 12 min | Total Time: 27 min | Servings: 4

Ingredients

1 lb pizza dough (store-bought or homemade), at room temperature
2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1 1/2 cups shredded low-moisture mozzarella
3 oz thinly sliced prosciutto
2 cups fresh baby arugula
1/3 cup crumbled Gorgonzola cheese
1 tablespoon balsamic glaze
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes (optional)
All-purpose flour for dusting

Instructions

Preheat. Place a rack in the upper third of the oven and preheat to 475°F. If using a pizza stone or steel, set it on the rack now so it heats fully.
Shape the dough. On a lightly floured surface, stretch or roll the dough into a roughly 12-inch round about 1/4-inch thick. Transfer to a parchment-lined baking sheet.
Build the base. Brush the dough surface with 1 1/2 tablespoons of the olive oil, leaving a 1/2-inch border. Scatter the mozzarella evenly over the oiled surface and season with black pepper.
Bake. Slide the baking sheet into the oven (or transfer the parchment directly onto the hot stone). Bake 10–12 minutes until the crust is deep golden and the cheese is bubbling and lightly spotted.
Top after baking. Remove from the oven and immediately drape prosciutto slices across the hot cheese. Pile the arugula on top — it will soften slightly from the heat, which is the goal.
Finish and serve. Scatter Gorgonzola over the arugula, drizzle with balsamic glaze and the remaining 1/2 tablespoon olive oil, and add red pepper flakes if using. Slice into 8 pieces and serve at once.

Nutrition (per serving)

Prosciutto, Arugula & Gorgonzola Pizza — The Thursday Night Exhale