I love cauliflower. I reckon it’s the king of vegetables. Ever since I discovered cauliflower rice and cauliflower puree I’ve got my creative on. Some bright spark suggested on my blog’s Facebook page that I have a crack at making Cauliflower pizza base. Alright, game on! If you haven’t heard of this slightly odd sounding combo, you use grated cauliflower to make the pizza base, as opposed to using flour which is typically used. Add your favourite toppings and you are good-to-go.
My verdict? Big ups to the original person who came up with this idea – I love it! Not only is cauliflower pizza base super tasty and fun and easy to make: It’s a definite game ;changer for people who are gluten intolerant, or cutting down on carbs. It’s also great for those wanting to lose weight, or simply if you want to up your vege intake!;Those who don’t eat dairy can simply omit the cheese… It’s fair to say the recipe is quite adaptable.
I spent a long time scouring the internet for suitable recipes. There’s a tonne out there. In the end I used this recipe by Tasty Kitchen as the base for my inspiration. I think the secret is to add herbs, Parmesan cheese, sesame seeds and a good amount of seasoning to the base for flavour. Lots of recipes just call for cauliflower and beaten egg, but that didn’t sound particularly appetising to me!
Cauliflower Pizza Base Recipe
Ingredients (for two pizzas)
1 small head of cauliflower (end result: You need about three cups of cauliflower rice/couscous)
3 teaspoons sesame seeds
1 teaspoon linseed or black sesame seeds (or add extra sesame seeds)
1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1/4 cup soft-easy-to-melt cheese, e.g. Mozzarella, Edam, Colby
1 tsp oregano (I used dried)
1/2 tsp garlic powder or granules
1/2 tsp salt
Good grind of fresh black pepper
1 egg
2 tablespoons ground almonds
Spray oil
- Preheat the oven to 230 degrees celsius (normal bake).
- Strip the cauliflower of its leaves and stems and cut into small florets. Place this in the bowl of your food processor and blitz until the cauliflower looks like rice. If you don’t have a food processor, simply grate the cauliflower instead. You should end up with 2.5 – 3 cups of ‘rice’. You’ll make a mess (!) but this will work fine.
- Place the cauliflower rice in a large microwave proof dish with a lid. Cook in the microwave for four minutes. Don’t add water: Cauliflower is naturally high in water as it is!
- Tip the (now cooked) cauliflower out onto a clean dry tea towel. Spread it out a little. Leave to cool down.
Once it’s cool enough to handle, gather up the edges of the tea towel and wring the heck out the cauliflower. You need the cauliflower as dry as possible to make the dough, so go hard! I wrung 1 cup of water out my cauliflower. You should now have cauliflower that resembles a dough-like consistency. - Place your ‘dough’ in a large bowl and add all other ingredients. Mix it all together. You should have a fairly malleable dough. Mine was quite sticky, but it held it’s shape when I squeeze it together like a mini meatball to see if it would hold (and it did).
- Divide the mixture in half and shape it into a large ball.
- Get two pizza trays and line with cooking/baking paper (if you have a pizza stone: Use that!). Spray both sides of the paper with spray oil.
- Place your dough ball onto the tray and using your hands, press it down and shape it into a large circle. I like my pizza bases quite thin so I spread mine out to nearly fit the pizza tray (it was about 7mm thick, but you could definitely make them thicker).
- Place the pizza bases in the oven and bake for 15 minutes (approx) until lightly golden brown all over – the edges will go quite golden.
- Remove from the oven, add your favourite pizza sauce and toppings. Return the pizza to the oven for another ten minutes or so, until the cheese is golden brown.
Have you tried cauliflower pizza bases? What did you think?
