Member
Central Maine
We've been limiting our pizza intake to 1 Little Caesars thin crust pizza* per month due to my diet. As it turns out the newest dietary info refutes the fraudulent data that everyone had been going by for decades. But low carb is definitely in.
*It gave me the pizza flavor that I craved with reduced carbs, so it worked for me.
But after the last one I decided, "I can do that!", and decided to figure out how. It took awhile to get it right and repeatable with the hardest part being just to ditch the timer and go by eye. Once I got to thinking about it that made sense since no 2 ovens are the same. This is what I've come up with.
Brians’ Low Carb Thin Crust Pizza
How did this come about? I had been buying Thin crust pizza from Little Caesars and one night I decided, “Hey, I can do that!” and went ahead and did it. My version is as healthy as one wants to make it since they’re the ingredients you choose. Want it low(er) sodium, just use no salt added tomatoes for the sauce. Feel free to make it your recipe, but the following is mine.
So far all I’ve used is a flour burrito shell for the crust, but would other flat breads work? I think it’s worth a try. I can see an herb infused flat bread working. But keep it thin and low carb to stay within the concept of the recipe. (But it’s your pizza)
The sauce I make is herby and garlicy, but that’s to my taste, make your sauce the way you like it, to taste. I also use mine on pasta, but it is NOT spaghetti sauce. The sauce comes together fairly quickly (quicker with experience) and definitely can be made ahead.
The recipe consists of 3 parts, at least one of which can be done ahead and maybe 2 parts can be; sauce, crust(s), and then the finale - the pizza itself. Any times given are approximate, basically pizza making is hands and eyes on, so don’t walk away from it.
Sauce:
Ingredients:
1 28 oz can of crushed or diced tomatoes.
1 28 oz can tom’ sauce
1 6 oz can tom’paste
dry or fresh basil
dry or fresh oregano
roasted or fresh garlic (minced or put through a garlic press) Roasted garlic is milder in flavor and fresh would be harsher, could you use gran’ garlic? Of course.
Crushed red pepper (optional)
a few TBLs of red wine vinegar if sweetening is required (NO, put the sugar away! Trust me! I learned this from an old Italian 45 years ago and he knew what he was talking about!)
Put the 1st 2 ingredients into a saucepan and over med’ low or lower heat bring to a very gentle simmer. Add the herbs and spices to your taste. I find that as a general rule 2x the basil should be used as compared to the oregano (both being dry, fresh basil would use MUCH more), but you have your taste buds and I have mine. Give the heat a bit of time to do it’s magic on the flavor additions, so don’t taste immediately. Taste and adjust flavors as needed. If the sauce needs sweetening use some red wine vinegar to sweeten. That's correct, not sugar. The vinegar will sweeten it and add a bit of complexity. Trust me on that. Allow the heat to do it’s thing on the flavors again, taste and adjust again after a time. You get the drill. Add the tom’ paste at the last minute right before it’s done to thicken it and goose the tomato taste. With experience this sauce will be made in under an hour. It can be cooled and refrigerated for a week or more. More if kids aren’t continually opening the door to see if anything has changed in the last 5 minutes.
The shell:
Ingredients:
1 Lg burrito shell, we use ChiChis and they are roughly 9" in diameter.
A bit of olive oil, it doesn’t need to be the good stuff
Pre-heat your oven to 450-500°+F. But you want to bake it with bottom heat and not use top heat from a broiler.
Put a sheet pan in to also heat up. You need a good quality pan that won’t warp. A flat sheet of metal will also work. In our toaster/broiler I use a 14" diameter piece of 1/16" aluminum. After the oven comes up to temp’, put a small quantity of olive oil on both sides of the shell. The quantity will be drops and not even a drizzle. Use your fingers and spread it out on the shell, do both sides. Use a fork and dock it, that is, puncture the shell to prevent it from bubbling up. You’ve done it too much when it looks like confetti, so somewhat less than that. Slide it onto the hot sheet and prebake slightly past the point where it begins to show signs of bubbling up. The burrito shell should show slight signs of browning on the bottom. Flip and do the other side for a short time also. If you want it to be cracker like do it longer, but we find that just too crispy for us.
Remove the crust from the oven.
Can pre-baked shells be made ahead for individual serving size pizzas for a family? I suspect so, but I haven’t tried it (yet).
The pizza:
Ingredients:
The prebaked shell
the pre-made sauce
shredded melty, pully cheese. We like Galbani domestic provolone, but mozzarella, fontina, Monterey Jack could also be used.
Optional: A small amount of pecorino romano, parmesan, or aged provolone to goose the cheese flavor, but used quite sparingly. You don’t want it to taste like pasta, or at least I don’t.
Optional: thin sliced pepperoni, anchovies, pre cooked veggies, pre-heated meatballs, pre cooked hamburger, additional crushed red pepper, hard Italian cheese, anything you like on a pizza, but go easy, don’t overload it, after all, it’s thin crust, the oven is smokin’ hot and it’ll only be in the oven for a short time.
Optional: really good EVOO as a final addition on top of the pizza after it’s on the plate.
Put sauce on the shell sparingly leaving at least ½" of unsauced edge crust if you plan to cut it into wedges and eat out of hand (It locks the cheese to the crust), otherwise go close to the edge, put on the other toppings and the cheese goes on top. Use less cheese than you think it needs, because as it melts it will spread out*. Slide it onto the hot pan in the oven and leave in until the cheese is melted, bubbly, and browned to your preference. This happens quite fast, maybe 6 minutes in our oven (that’s why chunky things need to be preheated), but you don’t have our oven so keep an eye on it. When it’s done slide it onto a plate and either cut into wedges, or since our pizzas are single serving we just use a knife and a fork. But before consuming give it a few minutes to cool down a bit.
*I have yet to produce what I would consider to be a pizza with less than extra cheese and I have been trying to keep the cheese “normal”.
Enjoy!
Could you make a Margherita pizza this way? Since it uses slices of cheese and tomato I doubt that the cheese will have time to melt, and the tomato will barely warm before the crust is cracker crisp. But maybe if the crust isn’t pre-baked it could work. You’re on your own with that.
*It gave me the pizza flavor that I craved with reduced carbs, so it worked for me.
But after the last one I decided, "I can do that!", and decided to figure out how. It took awhile to get it right and repeatable with the hardest part being just to ditch the timer and go by eye. Once I got to thinking about it that made sense since no 2 ovens are the same. This is what I've come up with.
Brians’ Low Carb Thin Crust Pizza
How did this come about? I had been buying Thin crust pizza from Little Caesars and one night I decided, “Hey, I can do that!” and went ahead and did it. My version is as healthy as one wants to make it since they’re the ingredients you choose. Want it low(er) sodium, just use no salt added tomatoes for the sauce. Feel free to make it your recipe, but the following is mine.
So far all I’ve used is a flour burrito shell for the crust, but would other flat breads work? I think it’s worth a try. I can see an herb infused flat bread working. But keep it thin and low carb to stay within the concept of the recipe. (But it’s your pizza)
The sauce I make is herby and garlicy, but that’s to my taste, make your sauce the way you like it, to taste. I also use mine on pasta, but it is NOT spaghetti sauce. The sauce comes together fairly quickly (quicker with experience) and definitely can be made ahead.
The recipe consists of 3 parts, at least one of which can be done ahead and maybe 2 parts can be; sauce, crust(s), and then the finale - the pizza itself. Any times given are approximate, basically pizza making is hands and eyes on, so don’t walk away from it.
Sauce:
Ingredients:
1 28 oz can of crushed or diced tomatoes.
1 28 oz can tom’ sauce
1 6 oz can tom’paste
dry or fresh basil
dry or fresh oregano
roasted or fresh garlic (minced or put through a garlic press) Roasted garlic is milder in flavor and fresh would be harsher, could you use gran’ garlic? Of course.
Crushed red pepper (optional)
a few TBLs of red wine vinegar if sweetening is required (NO, put the sugar away! Trust me! I learned this from an old Italian 45 years ago and he knew what he was talking about!)
Put the 1st 2 ingredients into a saucepan and over med’ low or lower heat bring to a very gentle simmer. Add the herbs and spices to your taste. I find that as a general rule 2x the basil should be used as compared to the oregano (both being dry, fresh basil would use MUCH more), but you have your taste buds and I have mine. Give the heat a bit of time to do it’s magic on the flavor additions, so don’t taste immediately. Taste and adjust flavors as needed. If the sauce needs sweetening use some red wine vinegar to sweeten. That's correct, not sugar. The vinegar will sweeten it and add a bit of complexity. Trust me on that. Allow the heat to do it’s thing on the flavors again, taste and adjust again after a time. You get the drill. Add the tom’ paste at the last minute right before it’s done to thicken it and goose the tomato taste. With experience this sauce will be made in under an hour. It can be cooled and refrigerated for a week or more. More if kids aren’t continually opening the door to see if anything has changed in the last 5 minutes.
The shell:
Ingredients:
1 Lg burrito shell, we use ChiChis and they are roughly 9" in diameter.
A bit of olive oil, it doesn’t need to be the good stuff
Pre-heat your oven to 450-500°+F. But you want to bake it with bottom heat and not use top heat from a broiler.
Put a sheet pan in to also heat up. You need a good quality pan that won’t warp. A flat sheet of metal will also work. In our toaster/broiler I use a 14" diameter piece of 1/16" aluminum. After the oven comes up to temp’, put a small quantity of olive oil on both sides of the shell. The quantity will be drops and not even a drizzle. Use your fingers and spread it out on the shell, do both sides. Use a fork and dock it, that is, puncture the shell to prevent it from bubbling up. You’ve done it too much when it looks like confetti, so somewhat less than that. Slide it onto the hot sheet and prebake slightly past the point where it begins to show signs of bubbling up. The burrito shell should show slight signs of browning on the bottom. Flip and do the other side for a short time also. If you want it to be cracker like do it longer, but we find that just too crispy for us.
Remove the crust from the oven.
Can pre-baked shells be made ahead for individual serving size pizzas for a family? I suspect so, but I haven’t tried it (yet).
The pizza:
Ingredients:
The prebaked shell
the pre-made sauce
shredded melty, pully cheese. We like Galbani domestic provolone, but mozzarella, fontina, Monterey Jack could also be used.
Optional: A small amount of pecorino romano, parmesan, or aged provolone to goose the cheese flavor, but used quite sparingly. You don’t want it to taste like pasta, or at least I don’t.
Optional: thin sliced pepperoni, anchovies, pre cooked veggies, pre-heated meatballs, pre cooked hamburger, additional crushed red pepper, hard Italian cheese, anything you like on a pizza, but go easy, don’t overload it, after all, it’s thin crust, the oven is smokin’ hot and it’ll only be in the oven for a short time.
Optional: really good EVOO as a final addition on top of the pizza after it’s on the plate.
Put sauce on the shell sparingly leaving at least ½" of unsauced edge crust if you plan to cut it into wedges and eat out of hand (It locks the cheese to the crust), otherwise go close to the edge, put on the other toppings and the cheese goes on top. Use less cheese than you think it needs, because as it melts it will spread out*. Slide it onto the hot pan in the oven and leave in until the cheese is melted, bubbly, and browned to your preference. This happens quite fast, maybe 6 minutes in our oven (that’s why chunky things need to be preheated), but you don’t have our oven so keep an eye on it. When it’s done slide it onto a plate and either cut into wedges, or since our pizzas are single serving we just use a knife and a fork. But before consuming give it a few minutes to cool down a bit.
*I have yet to produce what I would consider to be a pizza with less than extra cheese and I have been trying to keep the cheese “normal”.
Enjoy!
Could you make a Margherita pizza this way? Since it uses slices of cheese and tomato I doubt that the cheese will have time to melt, and the tomato will barely warm before the crust is cracker crisp. But maybe if the crust isn’t pre-baked it could work. You’re on your own with that.
Brian. Lover of SE razors.
. I wasn't complaining. ![[Image: Pizza-burrito-shell.jpg]](https://i.postimg.cc/gjDq0BgM/Pizza-burrito-shell.jpg)