A Gluten Free Pizza Crust?
Here is something I never thought I would be making – a gluten free pizza crust! Honestly, Dan and I love bread. Dan’s best friend is an amazing baker and we truly appreciate good bread because of it. Dan especially. Sourdough bread, pizza, and pasta are among his favourite foods. Unfortunately, Dan has recently been told to try a gluten elimination diet (*gasp*). So alas, here we are, giving that #glutenfreelife a shot. However, not totally willing to give up pizza, we decided to try out a cauliflower pizza crust. Because I’m not sure if you’ve heard but basically anything can be made out of cauliflower these days.
Ingredients for Cauliflower Pizza Crust
- 1 cauliflower
- 3/4 cup shredded cheese (I used equal parts parmigiano and romano)
- 1 egg
- salt, pepper, garlic powder, italian spices
How to Make Cauliflower Pizza Crust
First, break up your cauliflower and place it in a food processor to make tiny little pieces. I actually purchased a bag of chopped cauliflower (caulilettes they call them on the bag…cute!). These were the perfect size that I was able to skip the food processor step (thank goodness, would have been a tedious task with my terrible blender!). If you go this route too, use 3 cups of caulilettes.
Once your cauliflower is broken down, bring a shallow pot of water to a boil on the stove. Add in the cauliflower bits and allow them to simmer for about 5 minutes. Cooking your cauliflower will make it release moisture as opposed to it releasing moisture later when it is being baked (ie. turning your crust into a soggy mess).
Once your cauliflower is cooked, use a mesh strainer to drain the water from the cauliflower. From here, you will need to even further remove the moisture. Using a clean dishcloth (or cheese cloth), place your cauliflower in the centre of the cloth and wring out the cloth around the cauliflower to let out all the moisture left from boiling the cauliflower. Trust me, there is a lot! In the end, you will have a dry ball of cauliflower ‘dough’. Perfect!
In a bowl, combine your dried cauliflower with one egg and 3/4 cups of shredded cheese. I used equal parts romano and parmigiano cheese. The cheese is kind of like the glue for this recipe but also adds delicious flavour. Combine all of the ingredients completely. Add in your desired spices for flavouring – salt, pepper, garlic powder and some Italian spices were my choice.
Baking your Gluten Free Pizza
On a lined baking sheet, place your mixture in the middle. Using your hands, spread the mixture out evenly on the parchment paper until it is at your desired thickness (about 1/4″ is good). Place your crust in the oven to bake at 400 degrees for about half an hour or until slightly crispy and brown on the edges.
Your crust is now baked and ready to dress up with the toppings of your choice. Once you apply your pizza toppings, bake it as your normally would bake a pizza – for about 15 minutes or until the cheese and toppings are all cooked. As a word of advice, I made 2 pizzas – one used a pesto base and the other used a tomato base. Pictured here is the pesto base but the oil from the pesto can make the pizza quite oily. If oily pizza isn’t your thing then I suggest sticking to a tomato sauce base.
Enjoy!
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