Hi! I just returned home from Sedona, Arizona from the most relaxing and amazing trip! It was definitely needed by my entire family after working so hard for so long. I am still sifting through pictures and will create a recap post of the trip, the beautiful sights and the delicious food. But for now I have a copy cat recipe of the margarita pizza from David Burke Kitchen, where I interned this past summer. One day they ran out of “family meal” so a few of us were served this pizza. It was so amazing, but what really wow-ed me was the olive mixture that came on the side. It is a combination of olives and panko that was dehydrated. I was lazy and well, without a dehydrator, so I just processed the two in my food processor. I was contemplating toasting it at a low temperature to remove the moisture, but it tasted perfect without doing that!
For the crust, I used the whole wheat crust from Trader Joe’s and rolled it super thin. Rolling it thin prevented it from rising too much. I was going for a thin, cracker-esque crust. But if you are more of a fluffy crust person, I would use your hands to spread it out rather than a rolling pin.
The first time I made this I coated the crust in olive oil and salt, then topped with tomatoes and mozzeralla cheese. The liquid from the cheese and tomatoes was released during cooking and sat on the pizza. After soaking a bit of it up with a paper towel, all was well. It was the perfect appetizer pizza that I served at my graduation party with my family. This time, I used a bit of jarred tomato sauce and then squeezed the juices out of the tomatoes. It worked out much better as there was not any extra liquid.
While the pizza is delicious in its own right, the olive topping is AMAZING. The recipe makes more then needed, so my family and I were using it on all sorts of things all week. Salads, sandwiches, chicken…the possibilities are infinite.
I used a pizza stone to cook the pizza, its the trick to a crusty bottom. To transfer pizza dough to the hot pizza stone, I used a cookie sheet, as I don’t own a pizza peel. It tends to work, but make sure you lightly flour the sheet prior to placing the dough and assembling the pizza so it will slip off easily.
Recipe: Whole Wheat Margarita Pizza
Ingredients
1 package of whole wheat pizza dough (I used from TRader Joe’s)
1/2 cup tomato sauce (Victoria’s or Rao’s are my all-time favorite)
3 Roma tomatoes
1/2 ball of mozzarella cheese, sliced super thin
Basil leaves
Kosher salt
1 can whole pitted olives
1 1/3 cup of Panko bread crumbs, I used whole, pitted black pearl olives
For the wonderful olive topping, process I can of pitted black olives with 1 1/3 cup of Panko bread crumbs. I used whole wheat because I like the nutty flavor and prefer whole grains. Process until crumb-like texture and adjust bread crumbs if needed. Stores for two weeks in the fridge.
For the pizza, preheat the oven to 400*. Then rolled out the dough as thin as possible, or what will fit on your pizza stone or pan. Then top with 1/2 cup of sauce. Next, squeeze out the juice of the tomatoes. To do this, cut off the top portion with the stem grows from and then gently squeeze to remove seeds and juice. After, cut about 1/4 inch thick and layer on top of the sauce. I lightly salted the tomatoes as I find that all tomatoes must be salted, but if you are watching sodium, feel free to leave out that step. Then top with basil leaves and cheese. Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until the crust is fully cooked and the cheese is golden brown. Serve with the olive topping in the side and dig in!
Makes 1 pie.
