{"id":18267,"date":"2012-11-27T12:52:21","date_gmt":"2012-11-27T17:52:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nomeatathlete.com\/?p=18267"},"modified":"2019-10-24T13:41:00","modified_gmt":"2019-10-24T17:41:00","slug":"vegan-pizza-recipe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nomeatathlete.com\/vegan-pizza-recipe\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Make Simple Vegan Pizza from Scratch (Plus a Big Announcement!)"},"content":{"rendered":"

For four straight days, my kitchen has been completely destroyed at the end of the day.<\/p>\n

Food processor, Blendtec, Dutch oven, and every pot and pan we own completely filthy. The sink piled so high we started calling it Mount Dishmore.<\/p>\n

And right now, every time you turn on the front left burner of our stove, it fills the house with toxic plastic fumes, thanks to my accidentally setting a Ziplock bag on it while it was hot.<\/p>\n

The above can only be the result of an insane amount of recipe-testing, which is, of course, what my big announcement is all about:\u00a0I signed a contract with a publisher to write the first No Meat Athlete print book!<\/p>\n

I can’t share too many details yet (and likely won’t have many until spring), but of course it’s about the same topics No Meat Athlete is about, and with lots of recipes. Hence the kitchen that every night looks like a mad scientist’s laboratory that has been carpet-bombed.<\/p>\n

Anyway, much more news on the book to come. Now, to the fruit of my labor …<\/p>\n

Vegan pizza!<\/h3>\n

For several years, my dad and I have been on a quest to make the perfect homemade brick oven pizza — without a brick oven.<\/p>\n

I tend to value simplicity a lot, so I’ve also tried to pare down the techniques and ingredients to the bare essentials (I know I said I wouldn’t give more details about the book yet, but this “simplicity first” philosophy is what I’m taking with almost all of the recipes — it just seems to fit with the way I do everything else).<\/p>\n

Homemade pizza is so easy and so good, it’s a shame more people don’t attempt it. I’m hoping this pizza recipe will appeal to those who have never dared to try it.<\/p>\n

The basics of homemade vegan pizza<\/h3>\n

Here’s the overview of the most streamlined process I’ve found for delicious vegan pizza, homemade from scratch:<\/p>\n

1. Make the dough in a food processor. It takes no more than five minutes to prepare, and needs only an hour to rise.<\/p>\n

2. While it rises, make the sauce from a single can of whole peeled tomatoes, some olive oil, and some sea salt. No other ingredients necessary, and only about three minutes of active time are required.<\/p>\n

3. Also while the the dough rises, make the cheesy topping. You could use Daiya if you want, and it’s not bad, but I said “from scratch,” right? What I’ve found works best is a pourable cheesy sauce made from raw cashews that goes on after the pizza is mostly baked.<\/p>\n

4. Construct the pizza and bake it, ideally with a pizza stone if you want that perfectly crisp, just-slightly-charred crust.<\/p>\n

Here are the details of each part.<\/p>\n

Although every one is as simple as possible, I realize that it still looks like a lot when it’s all listed at once. If it’s overwhelming, feel free to use canned sauce (I’m a big Don Pepino fan) and Daiya cheese, and just focus on getting comfortable making dough. Then take on the other parts later.<\/em><\/p>\n

(Oh and by the way,\u00a0I’m not sure if this recipe will end up in my book. It’s possible, but it’s still a work in progress so I imagine I’ll improve it some more by then.)<\/p>\n

Before you start …<\/h3>\n

Two things need to happen.<\/p>\n

First, the cheesy sauce requires soaking the raw cashews four to six hours in advance, and you’ll need a food processor to make it.<\/p>\n

Second, you need to preheat your oven. If you have a pizza stone, position a rack near the bottom of your oven and place the stone on it, and position another rack several inches above it. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees about an hour before you’re going to bake if you’re using a stone (probably right when you start making your dough). If you’re not using a stone, you can preheat much closer to when you’re ready to bake.<\/p>\n

Step 1: Food-processer pizza dough<\/h3>\n

Unlike a lot of health foodies and athletes, I still believe that whole wheat is a healthy food for most people. Some have a sensitivity to it, and it’s worth going for a week or 10 days without any gluten in your diet to see if you’re one of those people.But if, like me, you’re not, then wheat is a perfectly good source of carbohydrates as long as you’re not eating it at every single meal (like many people inadvertently do).<\/p>\n

If you do have a gluten allergy or sensitivity, there are lots of good options (I’ve heard cornmeal does well as the base for a pizza crust), and you’ll want to use one of those — either a recipe or a store-bought gluten-free crust — instead.<\/p>\n

As for whole wheat flour versus white — obviously, whole wheat is the healthier choice, the exception being if you’re using it as a carbo-loading meal the day before a race, in which case I’d probably go with 100% white flour.<\/p>\n

You can go 100% whole wheat, but your pizza crust will turn out denser than most people like. I’ve found that a 3:2 wheat-to-white ratio works pretty well, and that’s what I suggest here.<\/p>\n

If you don’t have a food processor, you can use essentially the same process to knead this dough by hand or in a stand mixer, but neither is as fast as the food processor.<\/p>\n

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