As a kid, you could not pay me to eat cauliflower!

So this past week I made two pizzas, and neither of them contained bread in any form. I decided that I wanted to try a cauliflower crust pizza. I noticed about a year ago on Pintrest that it was becoming the popular gluten free pin and at the time I pinned it, like many other things, with every intention of trying it. Nearly a year went by before I re-entered the foray of pinning; shocking I know! My pin was still there however this time I decided that I was going to give it a go.

I went to the Halifax Seaport Farmer's Market last weekend and I made sure that I bought a good sized cauliflower from Elmridge Farms. It is funny but I would say that cauliflower in the last number of years has become my go to vegetable. I always throw it in a stir fry or steam it with broccoli and carrots or just dip it into hummus. I refused to eat it as kid and would pick the broccoli out from around it and eat the broccoli only if Mom steamed them for roast beef dinner. How times change. Now I want to use it as my pizza crust.

I found this really good recipe on Nutrition Stripped by McKel Hill, a dietician. I had every single ingredient needed and I even had nutritional yeast in my cupboard. I can't believe that I just admitted that but it's true. I needed it for a recipe last year and it called for it. The only thing I didn't have was the cauliflower, so I put it on my list when I went to the market.

When I got home I gave it a rinse and proceeded to grind up my cauliflower as the recipe directed. I put some cheese cloth in a bowl and dumped the cauliflower in as I ground up small batches in my food chopper.

One medium cauliflower ground up



I then let it sit over night and let any water drain out of it. The next day I squeezed off any excess and started to assemble the crust as per the directions in the recipe. As the crust was pre-baking as per the instructions, I chopped the rest of my ingredients. I had decided to make a Margherita-style pizza with fresh Basil from Riverview Herbs, Onion, Plum Tomatoes and Sweet William's Turkey Pepperoni all drizzled with Olive Oil and lactose-free Mozza.



Margherita-style

This pizza gave me four meals at one slice per sitting along side a various salad bought from either Fruition or Little Red Kitsch'n. So midway through the week, I still had cauliflower left and a need for another pizza because the first one was so good. This time, however, I decided to make a regular pizza with tomato sauce, Turkey Pepperoni, Bacon and Onion alongside the lactose-free Mozza. I decided I wanted to make a bigger pizza this time, so I doubled the crust and I had just enough cauliflower left for it. The only adjustment I was that I combine 2 eggs with a 1/2 cup of eggs whites instead of using 4 whole eggs and it worked.

#2 in less than week

 Although you have to pre-bake the crust, it really does stay quite moist but does not become saturated with the sauce to the point of becoming a gooey mess. I have become a fan of this crust in short order. You would never really know that it isn't bread until you bite into it. The nutritional yeast gives it a slightly yeasty smell when you are mixing the "dough." Best of all you are not left with a heavy, weighted down feeling in the pit of your stomach. I find that even a gluten-free crust can sometimes be too much for me. I like the fact that I can have my pizza toppings on a vegetable and I am satisfying my craving for pizza with less carbs than a regular pizza.

A slice paired with Broccoli Salad from Little Red Kitsch'n

All by itself