Pesto Pizza for your Bambinos, Buon Appetito

This is a fantastic and healthy meal that can be whipped up in minutes and devoured even quicker. This is especially good if you have a pizza stone on a grill.   One of the best things about this recipe is that it can be made with kids.  They love putting together their own little pesto pizza and watching them cook.

Servings: 4-6

Prep Time: 15 min

Cook Time: 15 min per pizza

Ingredients

• Pizza Dough
  • 3 cups flour
  • 2 tablespoons sugar
  • 2 tablespoons yeast
  • 1 tablespoon salt
  • Warm Water
• Pesto
  • 2 cups fresh basil
  • 2 tablespoons roasted blanched almonds (pine nuts work)
  • A few parsley sprigs
  • 2 cloves of garlic
  • Olive oil
  • 1 1/2 cups of Parmesan Cheese
  • Kosher Salt
  • Black Pepper
• Other Toppings
  • Chicken (great use for left over grilled chicken)
  • Eggplant (broiled optional)
  • Fresh Mushrooms
  • Sun Dried Tomatoes
  • Feta Cheese

 

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Pizza Dough

Mix all the dry ingredients. Then add water til the dough sticks together. It is better to make it a little sticky, it seems to rise better. Then break it into 8 or so even sized balls. Let them sit for 1/2 hr. Roll them out to 1/8 inch thick or so.  To thick and you’ll get raw and doughy pesto pizza, no on wants that.

Pesto

Using a food processor mince the almonds and the garlic. Add the basil and parsley and chop to a fine texture. Slowly add olive oil until a good consistency is reached. Add the Parmesan and chop, season to taste with salt and pepper.  Once the pesto was done spread it on uncooked pizza dough, that’s what makes it a pesto pizza.

Add feta crumbles, followed by baby bella mushrooms, sun-dried tomatoes, grilled eggplant  and grilled chicken. The grilled chicken and eggplant were seasoned with Greek Seasoning and a little olive oil before grilling.

The options for toppings are limitless: artichokes, zucchini, sausage, olives, etc.  Really anything you would like to try on it would be great.  Bake your pizza for about 15 min, or until the crust starts to brown slightly.   Then serve warm with fresh Parmesan and act like you made this whole thing up.  Always,  I mean always take all the credit.  Your family will think your pesto pizza are the best and no one will be the wiser.

 

PS I  will cook these on a pizza stone also.  If you use one cook at 500 and preheat the pizza stone then lower the cook time to about 5-7 min depending on the oven.  Check out these awesome tools to use.