With all the nasty weather here in NE TN, I was pretty much stuck at home yesterday, and the family wanted deep dish. I usually make sausage pizza, but alas, no Italian sausage, and my rear wheel drive Mazda RX8 had to be left in a parking lot 2 miles from home when I got back from work yesterday after a 24 hour shift, since the secondary roads out here in the boonies had not been plowed (they still aren't). So, I went on a hunting expedition in the freezer and came up with a nice piece of Portuguese sausage, linguica. We were in MA a couple months ago, and always bring some back when we go. So I sliced it up, precooked a bit in the microwave to get rid of some excess fat, and made the pizza as usual. I use a modification of the Cook's Illustrated dough, omitting the cornmeal and using 12% semolina and 8% rice flour. Sauce was the CI recipe using 6 in 1 tomatoes.
It turned out great! I'm not sure I am going to be allowed to use Italian sausage until the supply of linguica is gone! I still think I prefer the Italian but the family disagrees with me. So for those of you who want to try something a little different and live somewhere that there is enough of a Portuguese population to have access to linguica, give it a try!
I didn't take pics but will try to take a pic when I heat up a piece of the leftovers, if there is a camera in the house with a charged battery.
