 Time to address some unfinished business. There is no doubt you’ve had a nagging question on your mind that is following right behind, “Who killed J.R.?” Like the rest of us, you’ve been wanting to know: Who was the winning poet in the pizza haiku competition? The time to announce the winner is now. EVERYBODY WINS! That’s right, everybody who entered their haiku is a winner. You are going to be in the book. (SIDEBAR: If you're still wondering about the free-for-all pizza blowout in the bayou on October 3 with Chef Ernie Foundas at SG Tiki Food Lab in Pearlington, seating is limited and more intel is right here.) The book is shaping up to be utterly unexpected and glorious in the understated and dopamine-inducing way you expect of a good pizza. Let’s just say it’s going to be far more entertaining and topical than you imagine. That’s because, in order to qualify for publishing it through Amazon KDP, your faithful circumlocutory scribe here needs to execute a high degree of verbal padding to reach printability. A minor detail. It’s also a detail that does not change the fact that, as promised: You are in the book! If you sent me a haiku, I’ll be sending you an email to acquire a few additional details for your inclusion. Here now, the two haiku runners up. The two runner-up poems are very different. One of the verses is very American style in that it's very personal and evokes sensuality. The other of the verses is very Japanese, in that it is impersonal and evokes nature. Each of the runner-up poets has their choice of a copy of either The Lazy Way to Pizza or Free The Pizza, autographed by the knucklehead who wrote them. Here they are those Runners Up in all of their 5/7/5 glory: Tomatoes Tomatoes stain red Mozzarella melts like snow The crust holds it all —Tuan Tran About Tuan Chef Tuan Tran runs a super-secret Miami pizza pop-up called Dough Ma Pizza that draws pizza fanatics from around the country. Despite living in a kitchen 24/7, he remains a hopeless romantic about pizza, as well as the Minnesota Vikings. Morning After Round rectangle square Hot bubbly cold stiff feel Leftover pizza —Clinton Ferrara About Clinton Clinton Ferrara has traveled the world as a merchant seaman, tasting all the exotic foods that were offered to him. He claims that, as a result, he is fearless when it comes to pizza toppings. Now, a drum roll, please for the winner of the first-ever Free The Pizza haiku competition. The judges agreed that not only was the winning verse both amusing and personal, but it included a dare—or was it an invitation? Or both? Ultimately, this was the haiku that kept the conversation going and invited debate. Pineapple Pineapple pizza Is so good with barbecue Come at me, sucker! —Z About Z Z is a lover of pizza in all its forms. He especially loves eating it with his grandma while watching a movie. He will think more about his future career at NASA and whether it includes pizza after he completes third grade. That’s right, friends: The winner of the Pizzaiku Throwdown is 8 years old. We thank Z’s grandmother who’s a follower of Free The Pizza. She shared the original challenge with him. He’d been introduced to haiku through his studies, and is a prodigious poet of haiku already. Bringing his favorite food into the mix only amplified his appreciation for this expressive form. Z wins copies of both books from Free The Pizza, autographed so as to diminish their resale value on the open market. More to come on the progress of our pizza haiku pursuits as they develop. Next week, we’ll be opening the door on some of the exciting R&D that’s happening in pursuit of pizza perplexity at the great big pizza blowout in the bayou hosted at the Suis Generis Tiki Food Lab in NASA Stennis Space Center-adjacent Pearlington, Mississippi. Bloody Butcher heirloom red corn is involved! Hard to believe I’m about to say this, but Chef Ernie has bestowed upon me the best tasting raw cornmeal I’ve ever put into my maw. It was grown and milled by the chef himself on the grounds at the Tiki Food Lab. Talk about zero carbon footprint! I’ve been flirting with the incorporation of corn meal into my dough, and this was the perfect excuse to make it so. Below are photos of each dough, taken in the same light at roughly the same time while I was making these doughs three days ago.  ABOVE: The standard Lazy Way no-knead pizza dough with 20% home-grown, home-milled bloody butcher red corn.  ABOVE: The standard Lazy Way no-knead pizza dough with 20% Bob's Red Mill medium-grind corn meal from the supermarket.  ABOVE: The standard Lazy Way no-knead pizza dough with no added grains as a control.
More on these developments next time. If you've ever wondered about trying cornmeal in your pizza dough, we're going to have some new insight for you. If you’re in the Pearlington/New Orleans area and you’re interested in securing one of the remaining seats for this special pizza dinner, you can learn more by clicking here. ----- The five-star rated The Lazy Way to Pizza is now for sale at Amazon. As it says in the book description there: The only special tool: A pan. The only special ingredient: Patience. (Just a pinch.) The only oven: the one already in your kitchen. Your friends and family won't believe you made this pizza yourself--especially after that incident with the burnt water topped with boiled toast. This is for real: one of the best tasting pizzas you've ever put into your mouth. The cheese, the tomato, the olive oil, the crunch--it's so good, you might never order delivery pizza again. You might even call this pizza "artisanal." "This pizza made as instructed is one of the best pizzas l've had...an artisan-level experience while remaining one of the easiest pizzas to execute." --Kevin Godbee, Chef and creator of Pizza Is My Life (from the foreword to the book) For more info, click here.
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AuthorBlaine Parker is the award-winning author of the bestselling, unusual and amusing how-to pizza book, Free The Pizza. Also known as The Pizza Geek and "Hey, Pizza Man!", Blaine is fanatical about the idea that true, pro-quality pizza can be made at home. His home. Your home. Anyone's home. After 20 years of honing his craft and making pizza in standard consumer ovens across the nation, he's sharing what he's learned with home cooks like you. Are you ready to pizza? Archives
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