Eat Fit Not Fat – Cauliflower Crust Hawaiian Pizza

This week's post is dedicated to Ms. Adrienne Bard. She forwarded this recipe along to me last week and said I should try it, so I did. She also came over to the Bohlson kitchen on Monday evening to help create and indulge in a healthy pizza makeover. I was a little skeptical about making a pizza crust out of cauliflower and not adding any flour to the crust whatsoever. I decided to suck it up and get over my fear of white vegetables and gave this recipe a whirl. By using cauliflower as your main ingredient you eliminate many of the carbs you ingest with a typical pizza and you slash hundreds of calories. I would say our creation was more of a flat bread, eat with a fork type pizza versus your typical pick up and shovel into your mouth and feel incredibly bloated and full after 2 greasy pieces- type pizza. (Don't get me wrong, I do love a good slice of cheesy pepperoni pizza from time to time!)

The Ingredients

Makes two 9-12inch pizzas.

We made one pizza Monday and the second for dinner on Tuesday.
If only making 1 pizza, halve all ingredients.

CRUST:

• 1 LARGE head cauliflower (or 2+ cups shredded cauliflower)
• 2 large eggs
• 2 cups finely shredded mozzarella cheese (or try another kind!)
• 2 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1 teaspoon dried minced garlic (or fresh garlic)
• 1 teaspoon onion salt

TOPPINGS:

• 1 cup tomato-basil marinara sauce (or pizza sauce)
• 1 cup finely shredded mozzarella cheese
• 6 slices Canadian bacon, cut into strips
• 1 cup pineapple tidbits

                 

Cut pineapple into small chunks. Check out this website on how to slice and dice a pineapple.

                 

Crust:

                  

1. Shred the cauliflower into small crumbles. We used a cheese grater. Cut head of cauliflower into florets and grate the head of each floret. You can use the food processor if you'd like, but you just want crumbles, not puree. You'll need a total of about 4 cups or so of cauliflower crumbles (which is approx. 1 head of cauliflower). Place the cauliflower crumbles in a large bowl and microwave them (dry) for 8-10 minutes. Give the cauliflower a chance to cool. I ended up sticking my bowl of cauliflower in the fridge for about 10 minutes to cool it faster. I was hungry!

                         

2. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F. Spray a cookie sheet or pizza pan with nonstick spray (or use a nonstick surface). We used a pizza stone and coated the stone with corn meal. In a medium bowl, mix the cauliflower crumbles with 2 eggs, 2 cups mozzarella cheese, 2 tsp oregano, 1 tsp garlic and 1 tsp onion salt.  I divided the dough into 2 equal parts and placed 1 ball of dough in the fridge to use for leftovers.

3. Pat the "crust" into a 9 to 12-inch round on the prepared pan. Spray the crust lightly with nonstick spray  or a couple spritzes of olive oil and bake for 15 minutes (or until golden). Remove the crust from the oven and turn the heat up to broil.

             

4. Spread the sauce (1/2 cup) on top of the baked crust, leaving a 1/2-inch border around the edge. Sprinkle 1/4 cup cheese on top. Add the bacon (3 slices per pizza)  and 1/2 cup of pineapple, spreading it out around the pizza. Sprinkle the remaining 1/4 cup cheese on top.

5. Broil the pizza 3 to 4 minutes, or until the toppings are hot and the cheese is melted and bubbly.

6. Cut into 6 slices and serve. Enjoy with a fork. Although the crust doesn't completely resemble the consistency of a pizza crust, it did very much taste like pizza. So go ahead dig in, guilt free! 🙂 I encourage you to experiment with other ingredients and create your own healthy pizza makeover.

                 

The Calorie Break Down:

Eat Fit Not Fat- Cauliflower Crust Hawaiian Pizza- 151 calories, 7 grams of fat per slice

California Pizza Kitchen Hawaiian Pizza- 380 calories, 13 grams of fat per slice

Papa John's Hawaiian BBQ Chicken Pizza- 350 calories, 12 grams of fat per slice

Domino's Honolulu Hawaiian Pizza- 250 calories, 11 grams of fat per slice in medium pizza