Gluten Free Pizza Recipe
Jul 6th, 2007 by Mary Frances
Friday night in our house is a date night of sorts. We often put the babe to bed and then make homemade gluten free pizza while sipping on a cold gluten free beer. When the pizzas are done, we top them with Parmesan and red pepper flakes and head to the den to watch a movie together.
I usually save my longer gluten free recipes for Friday or Saturday nights because I find it very relaxing to putter around in the kitchen making yummy food. Although, now that I’ve made this particular recipe…hmmm, it must be around five times now, it’s getting a lot easier, and I could probably make it on a weeknight. But, then what would I look forward to all day on Friday while I’m at work?
Gluten Free Pizza Crust
(Yield: Enough pizza for two adults, if your goal is to be very full. This may be enough for three or four if you’re serving salad as well)
1 Tbsp. yeast
1 1/3 c. milk (soy, cow, or rice)
1 tsp. sugar
1 1/3 c. brown rice flour
1 c. corn starch
2 tsp. xanthum gum
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp. fennel seed
1/2 tsp. rosemary (dried)
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 tsp. oregano
2 tsp. olive oil
2 tsp. cider vinegar
Pizza Sauce
1 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes (w/ Italian seasonings)
1/2 of a 6 oz. can of tomato paste
1/2 tsp. oregano
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 tsp. fennel seed
1/2 tsp. rosemary
6 fresh basil leaves, minced
1. Start by putting all of the ingredients for the pizza sauce, except for the basil, into a saucepan and heat over medium low. The sauce should simmer while you make the crust and prepare the toppings. We’ll come back to it when later after the spices have had time to get happy.
2. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
3. Heat the milk in the microwave so that it is warm (not so hot that it would burn your finger, just warm). Combine the milk with the sugar and yeast in a small mixing bowl. If you stir the mixture while you slowly pour the milk, then it should all dissolve very nicely. Let this sit while you proceed to the next step - it needs to have time to get bubbly.
4. Combine the brown rice flour, corn starch, xanthum gum and spices in a larger mixing bowl. If the rosemary is not crushed, then I usually chop it up a bit with a knife before I put it in the bowl.
5. Add the oil and vinegar to the yeast mixture, which should have some air bubbles by now. Then pour all of that into the flour mixture and stir well. Once you’ve done this, the dough will be somewhat sticky, and now is a good time to sprinkle some extra rice flour on it. Now that the rice flour is cutting down on the stickiness, form the dough into a ball and let it sit while you get your pans ready.
6. If you’re using pans or a cookie sheet to cook the crusts, you will need to grease them, so that the pizza crust does not stick. Spread butter, olive oil, shortening, or cooking spray on the pan and then sprinkle a bit of rice flour on top of that. ( I use one round and one square cake pan for the pizzas. To me, it’s easier than rolling it out so that I can use my pizza stone. But if you have a pizza stone, feel free to use that, or a cookie sheet.)
7. Split the ball of dough into two pieces - one for each pan. Starting from the middle of the dough, use your fingers to press down on the dough and spread it out towards the edges of the pan. I usually work my way from the center to the edges in a circular pattern. When you get the dough to the edges, continue to push the dough up onto the side of the pan, so that you will have a nice crust. Here are some pictures of me making the crust last weekend.
8. Pop the crusts into the hot oven for 8 minutes. While they are cooking, add the basil to the sauce and prep your pizza toppings. Tonight we used diced onion, diced bell pepper, mushrooms, and black olives.
9. Take the crusts out of the oven. While they cool for a second, use your stick blender to puree the pizza sauce if you do not want it to be chunky.
10. Drizzle some olive oil onto your crusts and spread it over them evenly. (This will keep the pizza sauce from making your crust soggy.). Now add the toppings starting with the pizza sauce and ending with the cheese.
11. Pop the pizza back into the oven for 10 - 15 minutes. The time is not specific, you just want the pizzas to stay in the oven until the cheese starts to brown a bit. Pull the pizzas out, cut, and serve.
P.S. After I put the crusts into the oven tonight, I realized that I had left out the oil and the vinegar!!! Everything turned out fine though, so if you want to reduce the fat in this recipe, feel free to leave out the oil.
I’ve been looking for recipes for gluten-free baked goods that don’t contain xanthan gum, which is a migraine trigger for me. Any idea if it is possible to make bread, cakes or cookies without both gluten and xanthan gum?
Thanks for your comments on my blog. I’m enjoying poking around on your blog. Looks like some great recipes.
Hi Kerrie,
I have seen recipes that use guar gum and/or unflavored gelatin as a subsitute for xanthum gum. I haven’t used either, but if you want to give it a try replace the xanthum gum with twice the amount of unflavored gelatin powder, or 1.5 times the amount of guar gum. Please let me know how it works out if you give it a try =)
Mary Frances
Thanks! I’ve just found a gingersnap recipe without any sort of gums or gelatin, so I’ll try that next. I’ve also just discovered a polenta cake recipe that sounds fabulous.
BEST PIZZA CRUST !!! Thank you for making my Christmas complete. Every year I have a big pizza blast for my extended family (20+ people) — a great time of pizza making and eating and catching up. How to do it when I must now be gluten free ?? .. and my 8 year old and my Mom as well??? I have tried 5 other pizza recipes in 2 months — all very compicated and not user friendly. Yours is great and fast to make. Thank you so much.
PianaMom…that is awesome! I’m so glad that you were able to continue your pizza tradition! I’ve actually been playing around with the recipe recently and am now rolling it out and cooking one large crust on our pizza stone. We’ve found that when we go back for seconds the crust has gotten super crispy from sitting on the stone. Once I’ve figured out how to get the first slices that crispy, I’ll update the recipe or post a new one.
Yes — bakeware makes a big difference. For this recipe, metal…not so good; glass…great. I used a glass 10×14 (?) on New Years Eve — one big pizza, and it was great.
I am still looking for a great bread recipe. I tried MANY and found a few that are okay…any suggestions? My top priority right now is finding a good sandwich bread for my 9 year old son for school lunches. Cookies, brownies, muffins — all easy. Bread — still searching for that really great recipe…can you help?
I get very consistent results from my recipe for “Finally, Really Good Sandwich Bread”. We make it at least once a week for sandwiches and find that it holds up well in a lunch bag.
Mary Frances — I made wonderfully crispy thin crust pizza last night!! I substituted about 1/2 cup quinoa flour for the other flours (don’t know if that made a difference or not). I pressed it into a very heavy metal pizza pan (17-18″diameter) quite thin –let raise for 20 min, baked at 450 degrees for 10 min, put toppings on, then another 10 min. The edges were brown, and so was the bottom — out of the pan right away so it would not steam…..so beautifully crunchy and crispy!! High temp, heavy pan, and press it thin! My gluten-eating family members said it was fabulous (they do not sugar coat their reviews) and my celiac son said he wished he could bottle the taste because it was so good.
And your bread recipe is a staple in my house now — superior result, and the easiest recipe I’ve tried — rises beautifully and does not collapse in the middle when removed from oven! THANK YOU
Can someone please tell me if a recipe calls for gluten, can you just leave it out or do you have to substitute or change other ingredients in the recipe with something else?
I know that gluten is often used in low carb recipes. It basically boosts the yeast, and kind of binds the bread together so you get a higher volume. It is helpful when dealing with heavier, whole grains, which may crumble. However, (in my pre celiac days) when I have used it in 100% whole wheat bread recipes, I did not think it made that much of a difference - maybe a bit , but not really. I really think you can just replace it with whatever flour you are using and get a pretty good result.
I’ve been looking for a good and easy gf recipe for Swiss Steak, I tried using the soy flour and it was horrible.
Also, any recipes out there for gf fried chicken or fish?
Roylene,
I often use brown rice flour for breading foods that I’m going to fry. You could also use an all-purpose gluten free flour mix, if you find you don’t like the texture of the brown rice flour by itself. It’s been a while since I’ve made fried chicken, but I think I just used my gluten free flour mix (there’s a link in the sidebar) and added the seasonings that were called for in the recipe. It fried up just like my Grandmother’s and we couldn’t tell that it was gluten free.
Has anyone tried freezing these? How does it work and how would you reccomend doing it?
Great pizza crust recipe! I subbed potato starch for the cornstarch and doubled the recipe for two giant pizzas. We will definitely be using this recipe from now one!
MagickMomma, I froze one a few weeks ago and it came out fine when I thawed it. I wrapped it up in many layers of saran wrap to freeze, then thawed it by putting in the refrigerator for a day. I crisped it up on my pizza stone, and no one realized it had been frozen.
Liz,
I’m so glad that you liked the pizza crust. What toppings do you use on yours?
Hi everyone,
The Dr’s are testing my husband for CD, he has suffered with pshyrasis (ap) for years. They did find a med when he went to Mass General which cleared it up, but totally messed up his insides, severe anemia, bad chills etc. So they took him off it a few months ago, but will not give him anything else until they get his blood back to where it should be. He takes iron pills 4x’s a day and it is still not coming back to normal fast enough. So this is the next step. If it comes back posative on Fri I will be looking for recipes. I love to cook so making things homemade for him is not a problem for me. Any suggestions will help. (sorry for the spelling errors, I do math not spelling)
Debbie
Hi,
Does anyone have a recipe for pizza dough that is gluten free, yeast free, dairy free. Can’t seem to find a recipe.
Mich
[...] From Mich (left as a comment on Gluten Free Pizza Recipe) [...]
I love how quick it is to make this pizza dough. My 3 year old was sad all morning, because Daddy ordered a pizza while we were gone yesterday, and was eating leftovers this morning. Sometimes he doesn’t think things through very well (my husband, I mean). So I hopped on your website to save the day. Its just finishing up in the oven now, so the rest of us will have gluten, dairy, and egg free pizza for lunch
So far, my husband has been the only one to not like the recipes I’ve tried. He’s spoiled and picky, and knows he doesn’t “have” to be gluten free, as long as he hides the evidence.
guar gum - a product from a bean plant - I have used this gum for years because it is so much less expensive than xanathan gum - and I have had no problems with it no matter what I am baking
Pizza for an even faster version, use instant yeast or bread machine yeast, same quantity as in your recipe. I have only used metal pans and have successfully frozen unbaked crusts, thawed, topped and baked without problems. These quicker acting yeasts also work very well in bread recipes - there is only one rising - just mix the yeast with the flours.
I was diagnosed in 1965, living in a small hamlet in northern Saskatchewan - no gluten-free products were available then and there were no doctors locally who were familiar with celiac disease. So, life was indeed a lot more complicated then! I was given gluten free bread in the hospital and was not able to find gluten free bread for several years, yes, years later. No gluten free pasta products were available either so you can just imagine how very simple my dietary choices were!
I’m just wondering if this is freezable- or rather I think I’ll make a double batch, try freezing half, and post the results back here! My housemate is gluten free and I like the idea of being able to cook as quickly for her as for the rest of us, which means doing the preparation in advance and having portions in the freezer ready to go. My only concern is that the yeast won’t respond well, but we’re pretty comfortable with thin, flat pizzas, so we’ll see how that goes!
Pizza is something I really miss — I have to walk by the Pizza stands all the time — a million varieties staring back at me. The closest I’ve come to making my own pizza was to take gluten free white bread, top it with sauce, seasonings and cheese and bake it in the oven. I can’t wait to try this!
Karen, I hope you like it. We have pizza almost every weekend now and our non gluten free guests have like it too.