Summer Pizzas w/ pesto, greens, zucchini, peach, tomatoes & mozzarella

Summer Pesto Pizza Two Ways

This post is also available in: Suomi (Finnish)

There are a few things in gluten-free baking that I find rather challenging: the perfect toast bread, fluffy bread rolls, traditional cinnamon buns, and pizza crust. A lot of the times my bakings turn out really nice, but I’m not there yet with these challenging fellas. However, when it comes to pizza, I’m very flexible and eat all kinds of crust whether or not they resemble a traditional crust at all. I’ll also happily eat cauliflower pizza or any other more experimental crust. So it has turned out that actually the true pizza critic in this house happens to be my man…

And so a few months ago I bought him a pizza stone as a gift, hoping that we could find the perfectly crispy gluten-free pizza crust. So far this process has been going well, as the stone really makes a difference, but the dough… Well, it’s not perfect yet. I tend to try something new every time and now I’m really not sure whether I should add the olive oil or not, use an egg or not, or which flours to use in order to get that perfect crisp and a flavor that’s delicious and not ‘too healthy’.

So believe me how happy I am to tell you that I’ve had very many perfectly crispy pizzas in the last few days.

Summer Pizzas w/ pesto, greens, zucchini, peach, tomatoes & mozzarellaSummer Pizzas w/ pesto, greens, zucchini, peach, tomatoes & mozzarellaSummer Pizzas w/ pesto, greens, zucchini, peach, tomatoes & mozzarella

The secret? It would be so great to tell you that all my testing finally came through, but this time the honor goes to my little Danish sous-chef Urtekram. A few weeks back I got a couple of their new gluten-free flour mixes in the mail and all the mixes happen to be naturally gluten-free, organic, and don’t contain any nasty stuff.  I rarely use store-bought flour mixes but I had to try their baking mix, as it was supposed to work really well in a pizza crust. The mix contained brown rice flour, teff flour and psyllium, which I use a lot but haven’t tried them together in a crust before so I was eager to try. And I did not disappoint. The crust was super easy to mix up and the end result was great: crisp with a very mild flavor so that the toppings were the highlight of the dish, as I think it should be.

And the toppings are the thing I’m really excited about! I decided to skip the tomato sauce and try pesto instead. Pesto pizza! What an amazing invention. And on top of the pesto I added my usual favorites: spinach, zucchini and spring onions. Half of the pizzas I topped with cherry tomatoes and the rest with peach, and added some mozzarella to both. And both turned out de-li-cious!

And just so you know, this isn’t just me talking and praising the recipe, as my trusted test audience (aka my man and my mum) repeatedly told me that the pizzas were so good. So good. So this is a tried and tested recipe and I’m sure I’ll make it tons of times this summer – and will serve it to my friends too when something easy and delicious is needed fast :)

So turn your ovens on and enjoy your pizzas, friends! And hey, if you’ve got any good tips to share about pizza crust, toast or cinnamon buns, or anything, leave a comment and share the goodies! xo

Summer Pizzas w/ pesto, greens, zucchini, peach, tomatoes & mozzarella


Summer Pesto Pizza

notes: I used a pizza stone while baking the pizzas and it might influence the baking time required. so just keep an eye out on your pizza if it needs a bit more time in the oven.

makes 6-8 small pizzas

Crust:

1 cup Urtekram’s baking mix
1 tsp sea salt
3/4 cups lukewarm water

Toppings:

4-5 tbs pesto (I used store-bought vegan basil pesto)
about 100 g baby spinach
6-inch / 15 cm piece of zucchini
a handful of cherry tomatoes
1-2 peaches or nectarines
2 spring onions
2 balls of organic mozzarella
fresh basil and sprouts
salt & black pepper

METHOD:

1. Preheat the oven to 500°F / 250°C. Measure the flour and salt into a large bowl and mix. Add the water and mix well with an electric mixer. Shape the dough into a large ball by hand and divide it into 6 to 8 small balls. Roll out the balls into a thin layer between two baking papers. Share the dough to 2 or 3 baking sheets. Pre-bake for about 5 minutes.

2. While the pizza base is in the oven, slice the zucchini into thin slices. Chop the tomatoes. peaches and summer onion into thin slices too.

3. Take the crusts from the oven and spread a thin layer of pesto on top of them. Add baby spinach, zucchini, cherry tomatoes OR peaches (or both if you like!) and spring onion on top. Finish with the mozzarella. Bake for about 8-10 minutes, until the tomatoes and peaches have softened and the cheese has melted a bit. Top the pizza with fresh basil, sprouts, and finish with some salt and black pepper. Serve and enjoy!


This post was created in partnership with Urtekram. All opinions are my own, as always in here. Thank you for reading! :)

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