Quinoa Flour Pizza Dough
Speed - 95%
Simplicity - 97%
Tastiness - 98%
97%
Tasty!
The quinoa crust came out earthy and crisp. Really impressed how this crust held up to my fairly heavy choice of toppings.
Ingredients
For the Quinoa Flour Pizza Dough
- 1/2 Cup Quinoa Flour
- 1 Cup Brown Rice Flour
- 3/4 Cup Warm Water
- 1 Teaspoon Honey
- 1 Tablespoon Yeast
- 1/4 Teaspoon Salt
For the Toppings
- 3 Strips bacon chopped
- 2 Pieces Roma Tomatoes thinly sliced
- 1/2 Cup Mozzarella Cheese
- 2-3 Tablespoons Sri Racha
Instructions
- Combine yeast, honey, and warm water in a bowl. Leave to bloom for 10 minutes.
- Whisk together the quinoa flour, brown rice flour, and salt in a bowl.
- Stir the yeast mixture into the dry ingredients until a smooth dough is formed.
- Set the dough in a lightly oiled bowl to rise for an hour.
- Press the dough onto a pizza pan.
- Parbake the cust for 8-10 minutes at 425F.
- Top your pizza.
- Finish baking the pizza at 425F for another 10 minutes.
How about having all the goodness of quinoa in your pizza? Yes, all the protein, fiber, and essential amino acids in a crust that's totally gluten-free. Enjoying a pizza ain't supposed to come with guilt after all. These are all features of baking with quinoa flour.
Interested? Read on. Believe me, this crust is tasty, crisp, and really simple to make.
Let's begin by activating some yeast in warm water with some sugar, honey, or even maple syrup if you want to go all vegan. Leave it until it turns all foamy – about 5 to 10 minutes.
Meanwhile, get your flours ready. I didn't find any ready-to-use quinoa flour by the store so I took a bag of whole grains instead and ground them myself using a coffee grinder. Didn't bother me a bit. These grains took no time to grind.
Sift the quinoa flour to make sure you don't get any grits in your dough. Those grits will make your crust to crumbly in the end.
Combine the flours in a bowl – quinoa and brown rice flour. Add in the salt for seasoning and whisk until thoroughly combined.
Stir the active yeast mixture into your dry ingredients. It won't take too much stirring until your dough comes into a smooth ball.
The dough came together really smooth – much more than I was expecting, given the quinoa flour's relatively rough texture.
Set the dough in a lightly oiled bowl and leave it to rise for about 40 minutes to an hour. If you've proofed the yeast properly, this dough will certainly rise.
The dough will come out a bit on the wet side after rising, no need to worry. Set it on a lightly oiled and flour-dusted pizza pan and press from the center out to the edges. Try to keep the thickness even throughout the whole pan.
Bake this crust for about 8-10 minutes at 425F.
Take the pan out of the oven and put your toppings on. Not much to do with quinoa but rather to satisfy my craving for something classic, I went for a quick topping of bacon, chili, and cheese. I used Sri Racha for the chili simply out of preference.
The crust came out really tasty and crisp. Not crumbly at all.
This crust can easily hold up should you choose to go for heavier toppings.
Are you excited for summer and making pizza? Definitely check out my review of KettlePizza Gas Pro, a very cool device that lets you turn your gas barbecue into an outdoor pizza oven! Great for parties and events when making pizzas indoors just doesn't make sense.
Quinoa Flour
Quinoa has gained an amazing reputation as a superfood, partly because it is an ancient grain and also due to its nutritional profile. Most of the time, quinoa is used like a grain but quinoa flour is also popular as a wheat flour alternative. And, why not?
This is a great way to get all the nutritional benefits of quinoa while using it in an entirely different way. At the same time, the flour is very easy to use, especially when used as part of a gluten-free flour blend. In the recipe above, I relied on brown rice flour as my second flour choice, which helps to create the right texture for pizza dough.
Now, as I showed in the recipe above, you can easily make quinoa flour by grinding quinoa and sifting the finished product. The nutritional profile and color of the flour will vary slightly depending on which type of quinoa you use and there are multiple options out there.
But, the flour will tend to behave the same regardless of the specific quinoa you choose. So, you can go with whatever is convenient.
Quinoa flour works well as it has a slight nutty flavor that isn’t too prominent. There is a hint of bitterness as well but any strong flavor will hide that entirely. At the same time, the nutritional advantages alone make this an amazing flour to use.
There are many different recipes that take advantage of quinoa flour, such as Quinoa Pumpkin Pancakes, Blueberry Blondies and Quinoa Recipe Bars. Honestly, the options are endless and quinoa flour does work well in many types of dishes.
Dietary Implications Of Quinoa Flour
Nutritionally, quinoa flour is interesting and this is often the reason that people use it. However, it is known as a pseudo grain or pseudo cereal. This means that quinoa is not technically a grain but it is used in a similar way and has many of the same properties. As a result, many people consider pseudo grains to have some (or all) of the disadvantages associated with grains.
With this in mind, your use of quinoa flour would strongly depend on how you view grains and pseudo grains. For example, if you’re simply wanting a nutritious flour and/or are trying to avoid gluten – quinoa flour can be a powerful choice. In fact, it is a flour that I strongly recommend.
However, if you are following a specific diet approach, you may not be able to eat quinoa. One example of this is paleo. Even though quinoa isn’t really a grain, it is still excluded from the paleo diet. Well, at least, it is by most people.
Realistically, there are many variations to paleo and people do differ in what they specifically include and exclude. With that in mind, you may have to decide for yourself whether or not to include quinoa. But, as a general rule, it does tend to be excluded.
Additionally, quinoa is fairly high in carbs, which means that you won’t see quinoa flour on a keto or a low carb diet either.
Ingredients
For the Quinoa Flour Pizza Dough
- 1/2 Cup Quinoa Flour
- 1 Cup Brown Rice Flour
- 3/4 Cup Warm Water
- 1 Teaspoon Honey
- 1 Tablespoon Yeast
- 1/4 Teaspoon Salt
For the Toppings
- 3 Strips bacon chopped
- 2 Pieces Roma Tomatoes thinly sliced
- 1/2 Cup Mozzarella Cheese
- 2-3 Tablespoons Sri Racha
Instructions
- Combine yeast, honey, and warm water in a bowl. Leave to bloom for 10 minutes.
- Whisk together the quinoa flour, brown rice flour, and salt in a bowl.
- Stir the yeast mixture into the dry ingredients until a smooth dough is formed.
- Set the dough in a lightly oiled bowl to rise for an hour.
- Press the dough onto a pizza pan.
- Parbake the cust for 8-10 minutes at 425F.
- Top your pizza.
- Finish baking the pizza at 425F for another 10 minutes.
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