Pizza... Without Cheese

I have family visiting from out of town next week and the pizza oven will be hot. My brother-in-law, however, has recently suffered a heart attack and is on a low-fat, low-sodium diet, and asked if I can make pizza without cheese.

Not much of an issue, we often make a pie with tomatoes, olives, anchovies, garlic, and Calabrian chiles, but it’s a salt bomb.

There’s always pizza marinara, but canned tomatoes means loads of salt, and I’m trying to come up with some more creative ideas.

I was thinking something middle-eastern, like with eggplant and yogurt, along these lines: Grilled Eggplant with Yogurt Mint Sauce Recipe | Bon Appétit

Any suggestions or ideas would be appreciated.

My first impulse is Just make pizza with your own tomatoes, go light on the sauce and cheese. He might just have a different idea of normal pizza depending on where he’s from. A NY slice is much different from a typical cheesy midwestern pie health-wise.

That said, you can do a great white pie using oil and garlic with roasted potato and rosemary. A light sprinkle of pecorino or parm would really add a lot of fat, but you could leave it off. Another Fall white pie idea would be roasted butternut squash and sage leaves.

This is a winner. Thanks Chris.

Grilled chicken & hot honey?

How about a “salzone”?

I never put cheese on my pizza.

Try a clam pizza: chopped quahog clams (cheap but lots of meat), caramelized onions and garlic, parsley, pepperoncini, and lemon zest…all atop a pre-baked crust brushed with olive oil and lemon juice. The pre-baking means that the crust is done but the clams are not over-cooked.

Mushrooms seem like an easy answer.

Thanks. This is an idea Lori and I talked about last night. I usually put some parmesan and cream on my clam pizza, but I know some do it without. In my oven I don’t think overcooking this clams will be an issue. Undercooking probably more of a worry. 60-90 seconds at 1000ºF.

Great ideas already. Another thing we like, is avocado.

Jason

Wow! So many possibilities!

This week, we made a turkey, butter bean, and white bean chili and put it over a crust that we prebrowned with olive oil, then topped with the chili. People could add their own cheeses.

We also like crust, oil, peas, corn, browned fingerling potatoes, and roasted beets.

Lastly, boring but classic, tomatoes of choice, basil, oregano. Mmmmm.

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A local bakery makes something they call Pizza Rossa which is little more than thick pizza crust topped with broken up whole tomatoes (uncooked I think) and chili oil. It’s very good, especially when you dial it up to just short of too spicy.

I’m a big fan of pissaladiere as well. Caramelized onions and garlic as a base, anchovies, olives and sometimes tomato slices on top.

Lastly anything with a healthy dose of roasted garlic would work well. It’s creamy and brings some similar flavor components to cheese.

I just pulled the last of my tomatoes from the garden and it’s enough to do a pie or two. I like the roasted garlic idea.

I’m thinking something like:
1 - roasted eggplant with yogurt/curry sauce
2 - roasted squash with caramelized onions, roasted garlic, fennel root, and sage
3 - fresh tomatoes with garlic, basil, oregano, Calabrian chilies.

give him a cheese pizza and 20 mg of Crestor. Can’t stop living.

Maybe true doc, but one thing I’m not dishing out this holiday season, is medical advice.

First trial run tonight was with caramelized onions, garlic, and fennel root, fire-roasted delicata squash, sage, walnuts. With a pre-bake drizzle of EVOO it was too dry. A post-bake drizzle of honey really woke it up. In all, not bad for a first try on a new recipe.

roasted cauliflower, garlic, anchovy and parsley or skip the anchovy and add plumped golden raisins. drizzle with honey and sprinkle some parmesan on top after baking

New Jersey has a longstanding tradition of the Tomato Pie. It is not referred to as a pizza. I’d say go a little easier on the toppings.