During our Spring Break vacation in Costa Rica some friends of the Hammons, Joel and Liz Merriman, and their sons, Cooper and Felix Cooper, joined us all for the day at Los Suenos. (Cooper is a classmate of Hudson.) Everyone was having so much fun that we lost track of time and neglected to decide on a place for dinner and make reservations. By the time hunger struck, we were a crowd of 13 in wet bathing suits with patience for little more than drying off and eating. What to do?
Pizza! Said the lady with the alligator purse.
Michael did some fast research and hustled out to Pura Provisions just a couple of miles from the resort. Pura Provisions in Herradura is a tiny place, a hole in the wall. And it’s not actually a pizza place. They sell pizzas, of course, but what they mainly do is cater the big sport fishing boats that congregate in the Los Suenos Resort and Marina, a short stroll from our resort. By fishing boats I don’t mean trawlers. I mean the 80 foot yachts used in competitive sport fishing. Pura Provisions stays in business by satisfying diverse and demanding sophisticated palates.
Michael returned with four pizzas. Cheese, of course,
pepperoni, of course,
vegetables, of course,
and ham and pineapple, not of course.
These were all New York style pizzas with a thin crust that held up to the weight of the toppings. Everybody loved them, and the songs of praise were a chorus. I’ll admit to a strong partiality to Neapolitan pizza with its puffy outer crust, but that’s not to say that I didn’t eagerly enjoy more than my share.
I was surprised by the ham and pineapple, as you may have been, but some among our number had spent some years in Australia, where ham and pineapple are go-to toppings. That may come from spending their lives in the Southern Hemisphere where everything is upside-down. Okay, I have a prejudice that, much like other food prejudices (scrapple, raw oysters, sweetbreads, etc.) comes from never actually having tried the food. For example, I may not have ordered this salad if I’d known the ingredients (scroll down), but it proved to be delicious.
All of those much-derided foods are delicious if treated as they deserve. I do think it would have been better had the pineapple gone under the broiler for a few seconds of caramelization, although that might just enhance the sweetness I avoid on pizza. That’s a minor issue, and I have no idea how much trouble it might be. But then nothing is impossible for the person who doesn’t have to do it.
So I tried the ham and pineapple, and I have to say it was pretty good. I don’t plan to change my policy of not ordering it, but I understand why others enjoy it. Regardless of your views on pineapple, Pura Provisions is a fine place to go for a New York style pizza. Give them a try.
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