Conquering your baking challenges feels like a huge feather in your baker’s cap. Gluten free pizza dough tasting like the real deal was a goal. My husband misses pizza, and gluten free crust pizzas can be twice the price in restaurants. If the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, then pizza is the bullet train.

I was lucky to score on my second try.  After my attempt to make gluten free pasta, a train wreck, I wasn’t sure how long the pizza dough would take. The first recipe I tried ended up soft, like a cakey dough.  It felt like biting into a sponge - who wants that with your tomato sauce and cheese?  I was searching for crisp!

Pizza is not considered “healthy”, but I have never forgotten my college nutrition teacher Paul Saltzman stressing on the first day of class how pizza was a nutrient dense food. Better than an apple!  He was a beloved teacher, and that was one of his taglines. So let’s go with that!

In gluten free baking, your flour blend is everything. You can’t always plug in what you already have available and expect it to work.  So I searched specifically for Bob’s Red Mill’s one to one baking flour pizza dough recipe.  After reading a bunch of recipes, I settled on one with a combination of flours.  This recipe had the aforementioned Bob’s Red Mill, almond flour, and psyllium husk powder.  The latter is an ingredient found in many gluten free bread recipes to give the bread texture.  I bought some in lieu of the perfect occasion, and it finally arrived.  If you already have whole psyllium husks in your pantry (used for fiber), you can put some in a blender to make a powder. 

The recipe was very easy to bring together.  All one bowl, mix, and let rise for 90 minutes.  The beauty of this dough is you only need to knead it for a minute. While kneading the dough, I was starting to have my doubts. It was runny, soupy, and sticky. I was having failed gluten free pasta trauma flashbacks. Was it happening again?  It was shocking for it not to come together like traditional dough, but I kept calm and kneaded on.

I let it rise for 90 minutes.  I took a third of the dough out (it makes 3 pizza crusts and can be frozen). It was still sticky with little bubbles. I took it from the bowl directly to an oiled piece of parchment paper, a bowl of water ready to help me with the shaping and the stick.

With my pizza stone sadly cracked a couple days before from thermal shock, (perhaps offended by the spongy dough it baked upon it). I used the bottom of a sheet pan inside to heat up within the oven as suggested in the recipe.  It bakes at 550 degrees F.  My oven goes to 500 F, so I used convection at 500 F to generate more heat and crispy dryness. I used a cookie sheet instead of a pizza peel, and slid it in the oven with a hope and a prayer.

It par bakes for 13-15 minutes, then toppings on (sauce, cheese, then a veggie mixture), and back in.  My husband cannot do dairy either.  I mean… nothing can really sub out cheese, but the shredded almond cheese at Trader Joe’s is the next best thing.

Although you can remove the parchment at this point, I kept it on. I found it easy to handle the cooking dough working in such a hot oven.  I easily slid it off before serving.  

The results were phenomenal.  I couldn’t believe how great it was, and such a fantastic crunch and texture.  Overall, it was just as easy to make as regular pizza dough. So if you want a bullet train straight into your gluten free loved one’s heart, give this recipe a try!