My family is doing a bit of a pantry challenge right now, since I realized that my stockpile was really full of some stuff that I just wasn't getting around to using, so now I'm trying to use those up.
I had a bunch of quinoa that I bought at a terrific price on sale, but, to be honest, my kids aren't exactly fans of quinoa- they'll eat it grudgingly smothered in lots of ketchup...
So I'd heard of making a vegan quinoa pizza crust, using whole quinoa (not quinoa flour) and decided to give it a try, since I might as well see if the kids like that method of quinoa preparation better than the others, and it was a huge hit.
My older son, Lee, who loves gluten pizza but hasn't been the hugest fan of gluten free pizzas, absolutely adored this quinoa pizza crust, said that it was the best gluten free pizza crust I ever made (6 year old Ike agreed), and Lee even said that the quinoa pizza crust was almost as good as gluten pizza.
I'll take this as a winner.
As for myself, I'm still trying to figure out if this pizza crust agrees with my body, but if the kids love it, that's what matters most.
While this isn't the most frugal recipe, since quinoa isn't super cheap, I bet it would work just as well with green buckwheat, millet, or other gluten free grains as well as gluten grains. I'll be experimenting with this recipe and let you know which other grains it works with. Additionally, since it doesn't use any gluten free flours, which gets expensive if you don't have a grinder like I do, and since it doesn't use any xanthan gum, compared to other gluten free pizza crusts, it actually is relatively cheap.
This recipe makes one pizza crust the size of a large baking sheet. My family devours that in no time and is still hungry, so I prefer to double this recipe.
This crust is so tasty that I want to try it out as the basis for other dishes, such as my
vegan mini "meat pizzas", and to try making it as the base for pissaladieres- French anchovy and onion tarts. I can see so many ideas in my head forming- just need to make them all!
(P.S. I usually give credit to any author who inspired me to make a certain recipe, but there are just soooo many versions of this quinoa crust recipe out there that I can't find who specifically was the originator of the idea, so instead I'll thank my friend Jenni who clued me in to the idea that this was even possible.)
Homemade Quinoa Pizza Crust Recipe- Vegan, No Flour Needed