Roasted Garlic Pizza with Heirloom Tomatoes

Need a fresh new idea for your pizza topping?  I am officially starting a new craze – roasted garlic on your pizza.  You heard it here first.  And yes, it tastes as good as it sounds.  Plus, the smell.  Ridiculous.  Just you wait – you will soon be seeing this added to the “Toppings” option at every pizza joint around.

Roasted garlic has been highlighted by The Wooden Skillet before. There is good’ole regular roasted garlic that is spreadably delicious or roasted garlic hummus, which is just as delectable.  But I am throwing you guys for a loop here – roasted garlic…. on a pizza?!  Yes. Yes. Yes.  Everything is right with this combination.  The salty, butter, roasted garlic with roasted heirloom tomatoes, fresh mozzarella cheese, arugula, shallots, olive oil and a sprinkling of kosher salt….. serve with your favorite glass of wine.

For the dough, I wanted to try something different.  I sent the hubs to the store and asked him to grab a couple good lookin pizza dough mixes. While I am not a big gluten-free person, the Bob’s Red Mill – Gluten Free Pizza Crust Mix looked quite appealing, and I thought I would give it a try…… Actually quite good!  In being totally honest, if I had the choice between a gluten-free crust and a regular crust (gluten included) I would have me some gluten-included crust…. but, I know a lot of people have not-so-fun reactions to eating gluten (my mom included), so I thought I would try it out.  If you are looking for a gluten-free option for pizza dough, I would recommend giving this a try.  The dough definitely gets sticky, so I would advise rolling it out (or flattening it with your hands) directly on your pizza pan (spray it first with non-stick).  Other than the stickiness, it tasted great – the crust is a little on the more dense side, but very tasty.  Again, if the options for you are no-pizza or gluten-free pizza dough, this stuff is amazing.

The First step of this recipe, is to make the roasted garlic, since that takes a good 45-60 minutes to roast.

Once you take the roasted garlic out of the oven, you can just let it sit in its foil or parchment paper until you are ready to use it.  Depending upon what dough you are using, you by no means need to use the gluten-free option – any kind will do!  Pick whatever kind your heart desires and follow the applicable directions.  Depending upon how long dough needs to rise, you may want to start working on that when the garlic starts roasting.

The other toppings you need to prep are: heirloom tomatoes – I found the most beautiful dark red/brownish heirloom tomatoes! Slice them so they are about 1/2 inch thick; Shallots – you can dice them or, what I did, which was cut a shallot in half and then starting with the smallest inner layer, pull out one at a time and use the smallest ones first; Mozzarella – have your fresh mozzarella ball ready and waiting; Arugula – clean and have ready to go.  The other ingredients, olive oil (the good stuff) and kosher salt, need no prepping.

Once your dough is ready for its toppings, place one whole tomato, one whole garlic head, as much mozzarella has your heart desires,  and about a 4-5 slices of shallot.  Place in the oven and continue to cook according to your package.  For Bob’s gluten-free, I believe once the toppings went on, you baked for an additional 7 minutes at 450 or so.  I baked for an additional 7 minutes, but then put everything under the broiler on high for another 3 minutes, to let everything brown a little bit.  Remove from broiler and top with a sprinkling of arugula, about 2 Tablespoons of olive oil and a sprinkling (1/4 Teaspoon) kosher salt.  Serve immediately.

Hope you enjoy the recipe!  Let me know what your favorite pizza topping is or if you have questions?  Enjoy!

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