The past few days here in San Francisco, have been hot hot hot. Luckily, we had a surfeit of lemons about the house, making for all sorts of tasty ways to cool off:

1. Tasty lemon cocktail

My cousin, Molly, and her fiancee Steve got me a bottle of Creme de Violette as an early birthday present (I’d been searching for it ever since I read about it while looking for New Year’s Eve cocktail recipes). So last night, with the temperature still havering around 80, we decided to give it a try:

Blue Moon

2 ounces gin
1/2 ounce fresh lemon juice
1/2 ounce crème de violette

Shake in cocktail shaker with ice, strain into martini glass and garnish with two thin lemon slices left over from:

2. Lemon Pizza (from this month’s Martha Stewart Living):

Makes one 12-inch pizza

* 1 round pizza dough
* 3 ounces Piave cheese, shaved (I substituted Parmesan, and it was tasty)
* 6 very thin slices lemon, seeds removed
* 1/4 red onion, very thinly sliced
* 1 tablespoon small sprigs fresh rosemary
* Freshly ground pepper
* Extra-virgin olive oil, for drizzling

Directions

1. Arrange cheese evenly over dough, leaving a 1-inch border. Top with the lemon and onion slices. Sprinkle with rosemary, and season with pepper. Drizzle with oil.
2. Bake pizza in 500 degree oven for 10 minutes or so.

Once we get this week’s veggie box, I’m going to try this with orange slices instead of lemon and fennel instead of onions. And then I’m going to move to Italy and become a vagabond pizza chef.