Sometimes you’ve gotta press pause on eating certain foods. That can be for a variety of reasons, from you’re kinda sick of eating a certain food, its making your stomach or skin upset, or its messing with some healing your body needs.
When you press pause, for a while all you can do is think about all the things you can’t eat, or you really start to see how much of what is easy to grab is food you can’t have, especially if you’re pressing pause on gluten, dairy, sugar or all of the above.
One of those foods that you notice everywhere is pizza, especially in certain offices and parties. Pizza, at least for me (being gluten AND dairy free right now) is the epitome of all the things I can’t eat. I have been enjoying variations on the Mushroom Pesto Pizza I posted here a while back, and I also wanted to try something new.
Enter the meatza.
WTF is a meatza? It’s a pizza that has crust made of meat rather than gluten or another carb.
It’s so easy to make, filling, and a great way to add all the veggies (or more meat) to your meal, since the meat is already pretty well taken care of. It’s also pretty quick to make, so you can easily throw one together for dinner, entertaining and on a busy weeknight.
You can customize this Spinach Mushroom Meatza with whatever toppings you like and enjoy. You can even pack on even more veggies and a dairy free cheese, like my cashew ricotta, or real cheese, if you have no issues with dairy.
One of the keys to making a good meatza is seasoning the meat well. Without a considerable amount of spices, it doesn’t taste as pizza-y and it could. It’s a little hard to go overboard with the spice in this situation, especially because you’re folding it into 2 pounds of ground meat.
You can go for a lower fat content with the ground beef, you’ll be separating most of the fat after cooking the crust by itself. If you want to sub that out with ground turkey, chicken, lamb or a blend of ground meat, that’s also great!
This recipe can also easily be halved, this will yield a larger meatza that’s great for using for a few meals throughout the week or entertaining. The meatza crust will also shrink after cooking, so keep that in mind if you half the recipe.
Ingredients
- 2 lb ground beef (grass fed preferred)
- 2 tbsp salt
- 1 tsp pepper
- 2 tbsp oregano
- 2 tbsp garlic powder
- 1 tbsp cayenne or chili
- 1-2 cups fresh spinach
- 1/2 cup marinara sauce (to your preference)
- 3-4 mushrooms, sliced
- 1/4 cup olives, sliced
- handful of micro greens (I use the Trader Joe's kind)
- red pepper flakes
Instructions
Preheat oven to 400.
In a mixing bowl, combine ground beef and all spices and mix thoroughly together.
Once thoroughly mixed, put in a parchment-lined baking sheet and spread with your hands into a thin layer. This should fill an entire standard-sized baking sheet.
Lightly sprinkle a little bit of each spice over the whole surface of the crust, then bake for 15 minutes.
Once the oven is done, carefully take the meatza crust out. The crust will be slightly smaller and the pan will be filled with liquid fat. Holding the baking sheet in one hand and a paper towel in the other, press the paper towel into the crust and drain the fat into a bowl or jar. Drain as much off as you can (have someone help you if needed).
Spread the marinara over the pizza crust and top with the spinach, mushrooms and olives.
Bake for 5 minutes, then transfer to a cutting board to slice. Garnish with micro greens and red pepper flakes and enjoy.
Notes
Adapted from Stupid Easy Paleo