Stuffed Pizza - Gluten-Free + Vegan Options
Chicago style stuffed pizza! Yum! My mouth waters just reading and saying it. My mom grew up in the Chicago area and when we were kids she would make this amazing recipe only once or twice a year. As an adult it’s a recipe I have longed to make. However, when I learned of my sugar issue (It makes me sick to eat it and most sausage/ pepperoni and tomato sauces contain sugar.), gluten sensitivity and dairy sensitivity, well,… even regular pizza seemed hard to figure out at first. A stuffed pizza seemed especially challenging. One of the main hurdles I was struggling to figure out was the crust. Most gluten-free crusts are fragile, don’t rise much, are too soft as a dough, or too brittle or tough once cooked. That's when my experimenting and searching led me to this sweet potato based dough. It’s a great recipe. Easy to work with and very pliable lending it to a variety of applications. One of those being my mom’s Chicago-style stuffed pizza!
So enjoy, and continue to say YES to health and happiness with The Yes Lifestyle!
Ingredients:
Dough:
-2 C all-purpose gluten-free flour
-1 cup cooked and mashed Sweet Potato (I prefer boiled but roasted works too)
-⅓ C Tapioca starch / flour
-1 tsp Salt
-2 TB Extra Virgin Olive Oil
-⅓ C Water
Filling:
-1-2 TB Tomato paste (From the can used in the sauce. See below)
-Meat: sausage, pepperoni etc (vegan option below)
-Vegetables: onions (I use green onions), green pepper, mushrooms, olives, etc. Use
your imagination!
-2-3 Cups Mozzarella (vegan option below)
Additional Dairy free / meat free filling options:
Vegan ‘Sausage’:
-Two Beyond Burger patties thawed
-½ tsp Sage
-¼ tsp Rosemary
-¼ tsp Thyme
-⅛ tsp Ginger
-¼ tsp Salt
Vegan Cheese:
-⅓ C vegan Parmesan shredded cheese
-8 oz Vegan Mozzarella cheese shreds
Tomato Sauce:
-1- 14.5 oz Can DIced Tomatoes- drained
-1- Can Tomato Paste minus 1-2 TB. See above.
-1 TB Garlic Infused Olive Oil
-1 tsp Oregano
-1 tsp Basil
-½ tsp Salt
Directions:
Preheat the oven to 475 degrees.
Make Dough.
Dough:
Stir together dry ingredients.
Add sweet potato, oil, and water and stir to combine.
Once the ingredients have mostly been pulled together you can finish mixing it by kneading it with your hands.
Divide it into two halves. Cover one with plastic wrap until you are ready to use it.
Roll the first half out on a piece of parchment paper dusted with arrowroot flour. Make it into a circle large enough to cover the bottom and sides of your pan with a little extra hanging over the edges.
Filling:
Take 1-2 Tablespoons of tomato paste and spread them over the bottom of the base crust. You only need enough for a thin layer or light coating.
Add your sausage, pepperoni, and vegetables of choice.
Spread cheese on top of your other filling.
Roll out the other half of your dough on a piece of parchment paper dusted with arrowroot flour. Make it into a circle large enough to cover the top with a little extra around the edge. Top pizza with this portion and seal the edges together folding the extra down over the bottom edge and gently squeezing the two parts together.
Poke 8 to 10 holes across the top of the pie crust to help release any air.
Tomato Sauce:
Combine the remaining tomato paste, can of diced tomatoes (drained), garlic infused olive oil, oregano, basil and salt and stir together in a bowl.
Spread sauce out over the top of the stuffed pizza.
Bake!
Place pizza in the oven on the middle rack to bake for 30 minutes.
Since the dough around the rim is quite thick, you can cover the whole thing with a sheet of foil and continue to cook for another 7-10 minutes. I baked it without doing this and the thickest parts of the crust were still a little soft in the middle.
If the top does start to puff up, pierce it with a knife. You can also cover the top with foil if it starts to brown too much. ( Definitely do this if you're baking it for the additional 7-10 minutes.)
Enjoy and say YES to health and happiness with The Yes Lifestyle!
