Cauliflower Pizza Crust (Gluten Free)

Boy oh boy do I love pizza!  What I don’t love are the carbs, the white processed flours and preservatives in the crust.  Plus I’m always looking for a way to make something more nutritious without sacrificing flavor.

I posted a recipe for Cauliflower Cheese Sticks a little while ago and with the leftover cauliflower made myself a delicious cauliflower crusted personal pizza.  The technique is slightly different though and this recipe is for a medium size pizza.

The steps are really easy, there are just a few of them.  But it’s well worth it to me because I like knowing exactly what’s in my food and more importantly, what is not.

You’ll be impressed with yourself with what a delicious, nutritious and satisfying pizza crust you made.  Let’s get started shall we?

Ingredients:

• 1 medium size head of cauliflower (you’ll make “rice” with it)
• 1 egg (room temperature)
• 3/4 tablespoon italian seasoning
• 1/4 tablespoon dried onion flakes
• 1/2 teaspoon olive oil
• 3 tablespoon finely grated parmesan (like the kind that comes in a shaker)

Directions:

HOW-TO make cauliflower rice.  This is so easy peazy, it’s ridiculous.  I took my head of cauliflower, trimmed off the big green stem and the leaves and took it to the grater.

I grated it just like cheese and it magically became cauliflower rice.  So genius.  I didn’t grate all the down to the stems, I just did all of the florets.  If you have a food processor you can put the “rice” in it for a few pulses to make it even finer.  Now that you have your “rice”, the rest is even easier.

• Place your cauliflower rice in a microwave safe bowl and cook on high for 5 minutes.  Don’t add any water, just the cauliflower.  This will release a lot of the moisture in the cauliflower.
• After the 5 minutes are up, lay out a clean dish rag and put 2 paper towels on top of it.  Place your cauliflower on the paper towels.
• Let it cool down just a minute and wring out the water from your mixture.  I ended up using 2 more paper towels for a second wringing just to make sure I got as much water out as possible.

• In a bowl, mix the cauliflower, italian seasoning, onion flakes, olive oil and parmesan cheese.
• In a separate bowl whisk the egg like you were making scrambled eggs.  Now add the egg to the cauliflower mixture.  Mix everything well.
• Almost done.  Now form your mixture into a ball and place on a greased parchment paper lined baking sheet.  Flatten dough out to (about a 1/4 inch thick) make a round pizza crust.  You can make it any shape (heart, square, etc.) as long as it’s only about a 1/4 inch thick.  The thinner it is, the crispier your crust will be.

•  Bake crust for 12 – 15 minutes.

• You’ll want to see some browning around the edges before flipping.  A little more than I show in my photo above.  I flipped a little too soon (as you can see in the photo below).  It didn’t matter though, it will end up cooking more when the toppings go on.

• Once you’ve flipped it, it’s time for TOPPINGS!!!!  Add some sauce, veggies, fruit, meat, cheese, whatever you want and cook for another 5 – 6 minutes depending on how well you like your pizza done.
• Word of caution, it will be hot so if you can stand it, let it cool off a couple of minutes before cutting.

This pizza was amazing!  Make it a family fun night and divide up your cauliflower crust mixture into mini-pizzas that everyone can personalize.  Shape it into a heart crust for that someone special or do like I did and make it for yourself and don’t share with anyone 🙂