whole wheat pizza with spicy vegetarian meat & vegetable sauce

This pizza was kind of a half-thought in my brain as I was purchasing groceries this weekend, but it actually came out incredibly delicious so I figured it was worth sharing.

My newest thing (if you couldn’t tell) is arrabbiata sauce.

I put it on everything.  My baked pasta dishes, my pizzas, my ravioli…okay, well I guess not everything seeing as I ran out of examples after giving three…but you get the point.  It’s really good and it’s a nice change up from regular old marinara (not that there is anything wrong with regular marinara!).

 

So anyway, when contemplating what to do with the leftover arrabbiata sauce with sautéed tri-color peppers, zucchini and trader joe’s beefless ground beef at the grocery store, I absent mindedly grabbed some fresh whole wheat dough figuring at the very least, I had sauce and cheese and could make something out of it.

It turned out to be a really good idea because in doing so, this was born:

And as far as I’m concerned that up there (/\) is a pretty darn good thing.

There’s also something to be said about the vegetables being IN the sauce rather than on top of the pizza.  It just makes eating it all together easier.

{whole wheat pizza with spicy vegetarian meat & vegetable sauce}

makes: 1 pizza

ingredients:

• Store-bought fresh whole wheat pizza dough (or, if you want to make it at home, I love this recipe)
• 1 jar of spicy arrabiata sauce
• 6 oz. beefless ground beef (I used Trader Joe’s brand but any vegetarian crumbles would work…or if you prefer, lean ground turkey, beef or even chicken would work wonderfully in these too)
• 1 green zucchini, sliced then quartered
• 3 tri-color peppers de-seeded and chopped
• Reduced-fat mozzarella cheese
• Oregano to taste
• Canola cooking spray

directions:

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees
2. Spray a non-stick pan with cooking oil
3. Add chopped vegetables to a non-stick pan over medium heat and allow to simmer until just soft
4. Once vegetables are soft, add beefless ground beef crumbles (or ground meat that has been cooked in a separate pain).  Mix well to combine so that all ingredients are heated through thoroughly.
5. After about 3-5 minutes, add the jar of arrabiata sauce to the pan, stirring occasionally until the sauce just begins to bubble (about 5 minutes)*
6. Let sauce sit until cool and in the meantime roll out the pizza dough and place on a baking sheet that has been sprayed with oil
7. Once sauce has cooled, top fresh dough with about 1.5 – 2 cups of vegetarian meat and vegetable sauce followed by 2 handfuls of mozzarella (add more or less as you please!).
8. Top with oregano to taste and place in oven.  Bake until the cheese just begins to bubble on top.

*Note: you will have leftover sauce but it keeps well and goes wonderfully over pasta!

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