Now before you get all crazed, imagining sweet pumpkin pizza, put on the brakes. Read the ingredients. What is missing from what you normally see in a pizza recipe? That’s right, there’s no red sauce anywhere in sight in this recipe. The pumpkin takes the place of the tomato-based sauce and give the pizza an incredible depth of flavor.

Other than that, you’ve got some pretty standard pizza ingredients, such as herbs and cheese. The Havarti cheese is also going to give this pizza its own, distinctive flavor profile. If you want to add some type of meat protein, try crisped bacon or shredded chicken.

 

INGREDIENTS

1 ready-to-bake pizza dough

1½ cups pumpkin puree (15 oz. can)

1 sweet onion, diced

1 tsp. sugar

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 shallot, diced

½ Tbsp. thyme, fresh and chopped

Salt and pepper, to taste

½ cup freshly-grated parmesan cheese (opt for the fresh – it’s totally worth it)

2 cups freshly-grated Havarti cheese

1 cup arugula

Extra virgin olive oil

 

INSTRUCTIONS

Preheat the oven to 350 F. For those that have a pizza stone, put the stone in the oven to warm.

While the oven is heating, heat the stove on medium low heat and cook half of the onions with olive oil. You’ll want to cook them on low heat for…a while. I call it caramelizing them…but they don’t really caramelize. I’m not patient enough…so I just cook them until they are soft, smell fantastic, and are relatively translucent. When they are about halfway cooked, sprinkle 1 tsp. sugar on them. As they cook, continue to stir and move them around with a spatula.

Next, add the pumpkin puree, garlic, shallot, thyme, and the other half of the onion to a mixing bowl. Mix in the parmesan cheese. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Finally, follow the directions on the package for preparing the dough. This is the hardest part for me. My husband is way better at it…so I’ll typically leave this step up to him. Otherwise, we’ll have a lumpy square pizza, and who wants that??

Once your dough is flat and circular, transfer it to your pizza stone and top it with the pumpkin mixture. Sprinkle the arugula and caramelized onions on top of the pumpkin mixture, and then add the grated Havarti cheese. You can add a dash of salt and pepper here, too, if you would like.

The directions on the pizza dough package will instruct you to cook it anywhere from 10-12 minutes, but personally, I like to cook mine for 20-25 minutes. Then again, I’ll eat burnt toast for breakfast, so don’t listen to me.

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Quick Tip:  Having a little trouble grating your creamy Havarti cheese, are you? Stick it in the freezer for 10-15 minutes to allow it to firm up, then you will be able to grate it easily. This little trick works with any soft cheese you would like to grate, such as mozzarella.

Recipe and image courtesy of Lauren at Love Lola