Pizza Party

Surround yourself with people who can cook really, really well — and who love giving dinner parties — and you'll never go hungry for either food or good conversation. And by dinner parties I don't mean fancy ones like you see in movies. I just mean a bunch of people who like food getting together at someone's house to eat.

I'm lucky enough to live near a longtime friend of mine who has a knack for picking great cookbooks and turning out delicious recipes. This girl even makes her own yogurt, grows her own sprouts and bakes her own bread — impressive.

My sister is another such person. Unfortunately, I don't live very near her, but when she visits and cooks at my parents' house, you can bet it's going to be yum.

Last month, she spent the weekend in town and decided to make us pizza. Banish any thoughts of DiGiornos or Papa John's from your minds. This was gourmet pizza.

She made and tossed the pizza dough by hand, and placed superfresh ingredients on each one. The first was an eggplant, basil and tomato pizza with various wonderful cheeses.

Here's a closeup to make your mouth water:

The second pizza was covered in butternut squash and fried sage leaves. Incredibly tasty!

We served the pizzas with this very nice California chardonnay:

My sister and my friend have so inspired me with their cooking that I have invested in another cookbook and am doing my best to replace my habit of eating too much in restaurants with homecooked meals, made by moi.

Speaking of cookbooks, for a great listing of vegetarian cookbooks, check out this post on Gwyneth Paltrow's blog, GOOP.