Yummy and Quick Plant-based Pizza

Today I am going to share with you one of my favorite foods, pizza. That’s right. Just because I’m a vegan now doesn’t mean I’m willing to give up pizza!

And I don’t have to. Because truth be told, plant-based pizza is just as easy to make as traditional pizza.

Ingredients:

For 1 pizza (20cm diameter)

Dough:

• Hard flour (bread flour – 強力粉) 60g
• Soft flour (cake flour – 薄力粉) 40g
• Salt 1/3 tsp
• Dry Yeast (or instant yeast) 1/2 tsp
• Warm water (about 40°C)
• Olive oil

Pizza Sauce:

• 1/2 a can of cut tomatoes (200g)
• 1 clove of Garlic
• 1/4 of an onion, minced
• 1 tsp olive oil
• 1 tsp sugar (I found ketchup works as a substitute)
• Salt and Pepper (to taste)

Toppings:

Whatever you like! I use a vegan shredded cheese, but you can omit it if you don’t have any or if you’d like to cut back on the fat. I actually quite like a cheese-less pizza. Other nice toppings I’ve tried are green peppers, onion slices, mushrooms, and “Italian-sausage” made from a blend of soy meat, herbs and black pepper.

Both of the below items can be found at some Aeon Supermarkets or online.

Instructions:

1. Mix your two types of flour, salt, and dry yeast in a large bowl.
2. Pour the warm water into the bowl and stir with a rubber spatula or a wooden spoon. It will be kind of tough.
3. Once you have formed sort of a ball, add in the olive oil and mix it in to the dough until it is well-incorporated.
4. Transfer your ball of dough to your kneading surface and knead for about a minute, until the color becomes even.
5. Put the dough back into the bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and place it in your oven on the 発酵機能 (ferment) setting, 40°C for 25 minutes. If your oven doesn’t have a setting like this, you could probably leave it in a warm place for about an hour to get similar results.
6. While your dough is rising, make the sauce. Heat the chopped onion and garlic in olive oil in a frying pan. Add the tomato and sugar/ketchup and cook on medium-low heat until most of the moisture has gone and you have a kind of pasty sauce. Add salt and pepper according to taste. You can also add some dried herbs if you’d like (I like to add oregano, thyme, and basil).
7. If you are going to put veggie toppings on the pizza, I recommend stir-frying them in advance. If you don’t, they might be a bit undercooked.
8. When the dough has risen, remove the bowl and preheat your oven to 200°C.
9. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and place the ball of dough in the center. Gently push the dough starting from the center, going outward, flattening the dough to about 20cm in diameter.
10. Add the sauce and whatever toppings you’d like (vegan cheese, veggies, etc)
11. Bake for about 10 minutes or until the cheese melts and turns golden-brown.

I usually double this recipe and make two pizzas, because honestly, 1 pizza is not really enough for 2 people. But the size of these pizzas are perfect for one person (I usually have 1 or 2 pieces left over, but sometimes my husband eats them too).

I love this recipe because it’s so delicious and I can make it in less than an hour. I hope you enjoy making and eating this pizza as much as I do. Leave me a comment if you try it and let me know what you think. Happy cooking 🙂

I got the original recipe for this pizza from the following link (in Japanese). It includes a video so you can see all the steps if you’d like. https://www.kurashiru.com/recipes/d6dd57ea-3fbd-4801-b64c-c0b20e2967cc