Seriously Easy Gluten Free, Vegan Pizza Crust Recipe

GF, vegan, gum-free pizza dough just pressed out.

Sometimes you just come up with a recipe that works the first time and you have to share!! This was one of those recipes. Ever since The (Not-So) Gluten Free Pizza Crust Debate (awesome article Alta!) regarding Domino's pizza started last week... I've been a little obsessed with pizza. Honesty, I don't make a lot of pizza. A lot gluten free pizza recipes I've tried over the years are a bit complicated and have a lot of ingredients... and these days I just don't have time for complicated. 

If it's got more than 5 ingredients, I just haven't been too interested in trying it lately. So after hearing about Domino's gluten free crust, trying Domino's gluten free crust and then being sick for two full days from the "gluten free crust" (yep... I got sick), I decided no more Domino's. 

I needed a recipe for QUICK pizza at home. I personally cannot use corn tortillas as a base because corn doesn't agree with me. So what else could I use... 

Hubs had regular cheese, I had daiya cheese.

I started remembering recipes for quick pizzas I had seen lately: Alta's Easy Quinoa Pizza, Socca Pizza, Gluten Free Day's Quinoa Pizza, Almond Flour Pizza, etc... I liked different aspects of each of these pizzas... but I wanted something super easy I could put together in just a few minutes. 

This weekend my gluten free support group had our May meeting. We had a meeting geared towards kids so we made pizza! GalloLea Organics of Asheville, NC sent me samples of their amazing pizza crust kits. I was so intrigued with their gluten free crust mix. All you had to do was mix the dry ingredients with water, pat out on a pan and bake. That's what I wanted to do. (PS... if you want an awesome pizza crust kit that you don't have to make and that you can keep in the pantry, BUY the GalloLea Organics kits! We LOVED those pizzas!) 

Par-baked crust! It's darker due to the teff & quinoa flours.

I wanted to use quinoa flour for the pizza because it's very high in both protein and fiber. Quinoa is also slightly lower in carbohydrates than other gluten free flour options, so it's a better option for my pizza cravings! I thought I had a bag of quinoa flour in the pantry, but realized all I had was regular quinoa. So I used my vitamix! I love my vitamix... I added the quinoa in small batches to the vitamix and ground it into flour. It worked perfectly! To make the pizza completely grain free (as quinoa is technically a seed) use all quinoa flour or add almond flour in place of the teff.

Easy Gluten Free, Vegan Pizza Crust Recipe
free of gluten, soy, dairy/casein, gums, eggs
adapted from Gluten Free Day's Quinoa Pizza
printer-friendly version
makes one 12" thin-crust pizza

Ingredients: 
3/4 cup quinoa flour
1/4 cup teff flour
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon rapid rise or bread machine yeast
1/2 teaspoon sugar (optional)
1/2 cup warm water (+ additional if necessary)
1 tbsp. olive oil

Directions:
Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Place a sheet of parchment paper on a pizza pan or cookie sheet. In a medium-sized bowl whisk together quinoa flour, teff flour, salt, yeast, and sugar. Pour warm water into the dry ingredients and stir together with a fork. Stir together until a ball of dough forms. If a half cup of water is not enough to create a stiff ball of dough, add 1 tbsp. of additional warm water at a time until you have a ball of dough. Cover bowl with a kitchen towel and allow to rest for 10 minutes. Prepare topping while dough is resting. When ready to pre-bake crust pour 1 tbsp. olive oil onto the parchment paper and spread over paper into about a 12" circle. Place ball of dough onto the oiled parchment paper. Place a piece of plastic wrap over the ball of dough and pat out with your hands into about a 12" circle as seen in pictures above. Remove plastic wrap and place pizza crust into the preheated oven and bake for 10-12 minutes until golden brown and crisp. Remove from oven. Add desired toppings and bake for an additional 10 minutes until toppings are heated through and cheese or cheese-substitute is melted.

Enjoy!! :-)

Our fav toppings: 'shrooms, green peppers, pepperoni

Gluten Free Dairy Free Pao de Queijo -- "Cheese" Bread Recipe

Last week we had a potluck at work. I needed something quick to share that I could also eat. We have a small deli/sandwich shop where I work and they are constantly making garlic bread and rolls. The aroma is killer and really makes me crave garlic bread!

I decided on Pao de Queijo, a Brazilian cheese bread. It's super easy to make, only uses one flour and a few simple ingredients. The problem was the cheese. I really don't need to eat cheese. Dairy just doesn't like me and as much as I miss it, I know better.

I wondered how these rolls would turn out using a cheese alternative like "Daiya", a soy free, dairy free
"cheese" product. In general I think it's best just to stay away from processed foods, but sometimes it's nice to still feel like I get to eat cheese! Daiya is the only "cheese" alternative I've found that doesn't contain soy and it melts and gets gooey, just like real cheese. It makes an awesome grilled "cheese" and it's what I put on my homemade pizzas at home.

Turns out it works like a charm in these rolls too! I altered my friend Jaime's recipe to make them casein free and they were a hit. Make these with cheese or with Daiya. Either way I think you'll love them! :-)


Pao de Queijo aka Gluten Free "Cheese" Rolls 
adapted from Just a Gluten For Punishment , by Carrie Forbes at Gingerlemongirl.com
free of gluten, dairy/casein, soy, and grains
printer-friendly recipe

Ingredients:
1 1/4 cups tapioca starch
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons garlic powder (optional -- good, but not necessary)
2 cups shredded cheese -OR- Daiya "cheddar-style" or "mozarrella-style" shredded "cheese"
2 eggs
1/4 cup melted butter, ghee, or melted coconut oil

Directions:
Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silpat mat. In a large bowl whisk together tapioca starch, baking powder, and garlic powder (if using). Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add shredded Daiya "cheese", eggs, and melted butter or oil. Stir together with dry ingredients until you have a thick, wet batter. Using an ice-cream scoop or large spoon scoop 12 balls of dough and drop them onto the lined baking sheet about 2 inches apart. (Alternatively you could scoop them into paper-lined muffin tins). Bake for 8-10 minutes or until they are crusty and golden brown. Serve hot.

Carrie's Notes:

• This is one of the few recipes using tapioca starch that I actually like. I think the shredded cheese & eggs, and oil remove the tapioca starch flavor. And tapioca starch is probably key in the crispiness of these rolls. If you try the rolls with another starch please let me know how they turn out! 
• This dough would also make a REALLY good pizza crust patted out and baked. Granted you'd use a lot of cheese just in the crust, but if you wanted a super easy, low maintenance, crispy, yeast free pizza crust, this dough would be awesome! Just roll it or pat it out onto parchment paper and prebake it for about 10 minutes before adding your toppings!! Enjoy!
• I buy my Daiya cheese online from Cosmo's Vegan Shoppe out of Mariette Georgia. Cosmo's has wonderful customer service and fast shipping. They are super nice folks, tell 'em I sent ya!