KETO Pizza into the Pizza-Porta - Spinach, Sausage, Mozzarella, Garlic and fresh San Marzano tomato sauce.

Let me start with a disclaimer. I have a long-standing and mutually respectful relationship with gluten and carbohydrates. I have had many strong-willed people approach our booth and turn down some pretty fantastic pizzas. I wanted to understand the suffering that these people face eating a non-traditional, KETO pizza so I made some. The suffering is not as bad as I thought, they were actually very good. Here is how we went about making KETO pizza in the Pizza-Porta.

I searched recipes and asked for techniques and magic ingredients that could be used to avoid cardboard KETO pizza. A couple folks offered great advice. Shoutout to Renee crazycookinglady.com for explaining the intricacies and to Joanne at https://www.fifteenspatulas.com/fathead-pizza/ for the basic recipe. See her recipe for great photos of the process. I modified the recipe and technique a bit for the PIzza-Porta.

Ingredients: (Totally weird to a pizza guy.)

170g part-skim shredded mozzarella cheese

30g full-fat cream cheese

90g blanched almond flour

4g salt

10g nutritional yeast

1 large egg beaten

+ Additional almond flour to dust

Technique: Mix the Shredded mozz and the cream cheese with a spatula until fully mixed. Pop this into the microwave for 30 seconds to slightly melt the cheeses. Keep mixing with a spatula until this becomes a white consistent paste. Microwave 30 sec again if is it not blending. Next, mix the flour, salt and nutritional (not regular) yeast in with the cheese. Kneed this with the spatula until this mixture becomes a dough ball. You may need 30 sec more in the microwave - but do not overheat. Once this is mixed add the egg and kneed it into the “dough”. I didn’t think this was going to blend in. It is easier to use your hands at the end to get the egg to incorporate. - Be careful because the cheese can be hot.

Roll this dough out between 2 sheets of parchment until it is a uniform 1/4” in thickness and arrange or cut the edges to a circle. Add an additional dusting of flour to the outside of the dough while rolling to reduce the stickiness of the dough. I would recommend cutting this quantity into 2 dough balls for ease of handling. Dust a wooden pizza peel with almond flour and place the dough on top before decorating. Shake the raw dough around to ensure that it is not sticking and then dress with your favorite ingredients. Cook the pizza directly on the pizza stone so that it will brown.

I placed the first KETO pizza in the Pizza-Porta when the stone had reached about 400F and the dome was 500F. I was worried about the dough scorching, but it took this stone temperature very well, cooking for about 4 minutes. I did dome (held it high in the dome on the metal peel) the pizza for a few minutes to give the top a little more color.

After cooking other pizzas I cooked another KETO pizza with the stone at 600F and the dome at 650F with better results - I watched it very closely. The almond flour dusting seems to keep the bottom of the pizza from sticking and scorching. You must be diligent about peeking under the bottom to ensure that is does not burn.

The final result was a crust with a softer character, but a great flavor. The slices will not be stiff like a traditional flour based dough, but the pizza had e a nice overall taste.

Keto pizza - Fresh Mozzarella, Prosciutto and Old world Pepperoni

If you are KETO inclined, I hope this recipe is informative. I am glad to see that there is a pizza that is enjoyable for those who want to manage their carb levels.

Let me know how yours turns out.

Enjoy!

Cortlandt

KETO pizza recipe in a Pizza-Porta