The Talisman No. 13 Pizza

When we travel to visit my family we head west from Sydney to the country side. We like to plan our trip so we can stop at our favourite little cafe on the way located at Little Hartley just after you come down from the Blue Mountains. The Talisman Gallery features some amazing metal work and a cafe with a wood fired oven. 

When the weather is clear you can look across at the cliffs of the mountains

We always order the number 13 pizza and a nicoise salad, the latter being for my 3 year old daughter who for some reason does not love pizza. 

Well we have not made it out there for a while and so I decided to make my own. The base sauce is tomato based so I cooked some onion, garlic and a tin of tomatoes down and pureed. I rolled my pizza dough nice and thin.

The toppings are sweet potato (I baked one whole until very soft), eggplant (I baked some slices), capsicum (I roasted in the oven), artichoke (I used marinated from a jar) and bocconcini. Sadly I don't have a wood fired pizza oven so i just placed it on a hot pizza stone to cook in a hot oven.

This photo of our garlic pizza my daughter took!

It was quite yummy but not as good as the original. The main problem being the pizza wasn't cooked in a pizza oven! But I suspect they use eggplant that is marinated and their pizza also has mozzarella which would work nicely. Actually I am relieved that ours wasn't as good because I know where I can go for the best. I really enjoy stopping in and eating excellent food, drinking nice coffee and soaking up the atmosphere.

This is a photo I once took when eating the original.