A Yummy Gluten Free Pizza?

Yeah! School's out for the Summer! 

Now I get to be a bit more creative in the kitchen, craft room and the garden--Or just sit on the front porch and read a book and drink iced tea...

Tonight it was the kitchen--

I know that many people think that bean flour is wonderful. More power to them. I don’t. I love a good bean soup but please don't make beans into flour. Ugh! Odd tasting--and worse still, I'm one of the folks that when eating foods made with bean flours gets a weird metallic taste in my mouth--Not Pleasant at all!

We have a few local pizza places and at least one chain pizza location that do offer a gluten free pizza on their menus. Unfortunately, all most all of them use the same pre-made crusts from the same company and they use….bean flour as a main ingredient. Why?  I think that it is the protein in the bean flours that they think is necessary. 

I think there are enough other flours out there that have quality proteins to help with the elasticity issue of gluten free pizza crust.

We had home made pizza for dinner tonight. 

Gluten Free pizza--Chicken Apple Sausage with caramelized onions and sauteed apples.

I started playing with a pizza crust recipe, my darling husband (A GLUTEN EATER AWAY FROM HOME BUT NON-GLUTEN AT HOME) said this is the best one I have come up with so far.Pretty good praise. :)

I liked that it could be rolled out or patted like regular (wheat) pizza dough. I’m also happy that I have more real grains than starch in this recipe too. This crust has a nice chew to it without any of the –Gluten Free- grittiness. He liked that it didn’t fall apart, or get soggy with all the toppings and that the crust was crispy on the edges and still chewy and didn't have any weird flavors or after taste.

Gluten free par-baked pizza crust

Oh, It can be rolled out really thin for a cracker like crust or thicker if you roll that way too.

If you are interested, try it out and see what you think and let me know.

Stephanie’s GF Pizza Crust

Directions--

In a medium size bowl put:

1/3 C brown rice flour

1/3 C sweet sorghum flour

¼ C millet flour

1/3 C potato starch

1/3 C tapioca starch

2 T ground flax seed

2 t xanthan gum

1 T sugar

1 t salt

2 t yeast (instant, rapid rise, active-what ever you have)

Stir dry ingredients together well.

In a liquids measuring cup put:

¾ C warm water

1 egg beaten

2 T canola or olive oil

1 t apple cider vinegar

Add liquids to dry ingredients slowly. Hold back about 2 T of liquid. Stir well, you should have dough that is soft, but firm enough that if you pick up half of it with cornstarch on your hands it can be made into a ball and not be sticky. If it is too dry add more of the liquid.

Cornstarch (or starch of your choice for rolling out the dough)

Corn Meal (or brown rice flour to dust the parchment)

Now, take a piece of parchment paper or silicon mat dusted with cornstarch (or other starch of your choice) put half the dough on the parchment and roll it around to lightly cover with starch. Pick up the ball and dust the paper with a bit of corn meal or rice flour. Put the ball of dough down and pat it out into a circle. If you want a thick crust pat out the dough to about a 9-10 inch circle, if you want thinner crust pat out larger.

Do the same with the second ball of dough.

Let the dough circles rest while you pre-heat the oven to 425 degrees.

You are going to par-bake the crusts for about 5-8 minutes they will look a bit puffy but no really big bubbles. The bottom of the crusts will not be brown yet.

Take out of the oven and top with your favorite toppings. (Go light on what ever sauce you are using to keep the crust from getting soggy.) I topped ours with caramelized onions, sautéed apples and slices of chicken apple sausage—Oh My!

Bake until the toppings are heated, the cheese is starting to brown a little and the bottom of the crust is golden about 10-14 minutes—I cooked on a parchment paper on top of a baking stone for the par baking and then slid the pizza onto the baking stone without the paper to do the second baking