Hi Friends!

So many of you know that I have given up meat, dairy and gluten until Easter. This journey has been going pretty well so far but I messed up a little last night. I thought I was making vegan, gluten free pizza. As it turns out, I actually just made gluten free pizza.

Last night was a lesson in remembering to read ALL labels of EVERY ingredient.

I set out to make pizza after my husband suggested we find some gluten free bread and put some tomato sauce with mushrooms and spinach. Poor thing was craving pizza so bad, and I figured I’d help him out.

My initial plan was to make my own crust, but I was perusing through the Kroger clearance shelf and saw a box of gluten free pizza dough. It was premixed and it said GLUTEN FREE in big beautiful letters. That box was saving my life and my time, so I grabbed it and continued on the get the rest of my ingredients.

After we finished dinner I decided to read the box to see what the ingredients were. I was searching for ideas for my own gluten free dough. And I realized that while the mix had no gluten, it wasn’t free of dairy. That’s right folks. We made a mistake and had eggs and milk when we ate that crust. Father, forgive me.

This recipe is still worth sharing.

What you need:

• Gluten free pizza crust (I used a generic premixed brand and just followed the instructions on the box)
• Your favorite tomato sauce
• Garlic & Herb flavored TreeNut cheese (This stuff if like heaven to me)
• 1 can mushrooms (You can also use fresh mushrooms and saute them, but clearly I was being lazy this particular night)
• Whole, pitted back olives
• Vegan meat crumbles. Now as you know, I am not a huge fan of fake beef, but I did find some that I love.

• Small bunch of spinach
• Seasoning salt, lemon pepper, garlic powder to taste

What you do:

• Prepare your dough and preheat the oven according to the box instructions
• Roll it out in a baking pan. It’s not going to look very pretty. At least mine didn’t

• Spread on your pizza sauce. Feel free to spice your sauce up with seasonings. I didn’t because this night was a super lazy night. Once I saw the box of premixed gluten free dough, it was pretty much downhill from there.
• Drop spoonfuls of your TreeNut cheese on top of your dough. It’s not very spreadable, but it’s OK. DO NOT try to heat it up to make it spread more easily. This isn’t real cheese so that won’t work. Use as much as you like. I used a ton because I love this stuff.
• Now you can add your toppings. Add as much or as little as you like
• Sprinkle your seasonings on top
• Put it in the oven and bake according to the box
• Take it our and ENJOY.

This recipe actually was really good. It wasn’t super reminiscent of pizza as the dough had a bit more of a crunch to it. That TreeNut cheese is life though. It’ so creamy and tastes so delicious with the fake meat crumbles. This recipe was a hit in my house.

Now, does anyone have a good recipe for a vegan & gluten free crust?