My fabulous friends over at DeLallo sent me product to use in this recipe today. We’re using their Simply Pesto for this recipe!
Merry Christmas Eve!! Good golly, do I just looove this time of year!
So, it’s kind of hysterical that I chose to post a pizza recipe today. Like, I totally didn’t plan it this way, but it totally makes sense when I go back and revisit my Christmas as a kid.
Watch out, ladies and gents; it’s about to get all nostalgic up in huuurrr.
A couple of years ago, the Peduzzi Household Christmas Day Dinner Tradition was very…special. After unwrapping our presents, after eating our weight in Christmas cookies, and after watching A Christmas Story for like, the hundredth time, we would all sit down together to a pizza feast. ???
I know I know…pizza on a holiday that’s glorified by foodies. Just hear me out:
Don’t get me wrong…we’d totally still have our culinary fun during the Christmas season; Christmas Eve was our show-off night, doing the whole Italian thing, and Christmas breakfast was usually full of Italian goodies like biscotti, struffoli, and panettone. But pizza on Christmas day…yeah, Christmas day was where it was at.
There was a place near our house that sold take and bake pizza; so we’d take it Christmas Eve and bake it Christmas Day for an easy, care-free, and delicious dinner. Seriously, it was the best. Imagine waking up Christmas morning to a house full of presents and family when you know a pizza dinner is right around the corner. I mean, seriously. Can life GET any better than that for a kid?!
This Gluten Free Fennel Pesto Pizza is a little play on one of my favorite pizzas from that little take and bake pizzeria. It’s packed with fresh Italian flavors. It’s herby, garlicky, cheesy, and absolutely everything I want in a Christmas pie! And you can’t tell me those greens and reds aren’t the most delicious festiveness you’ve ever seen!
So, I think a good pizza needs to be judged on three criteria: the crust, the sauce, and the toppings.
The Crust: You can use absolutely any crust you want for this recipe. I used Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free Pizza Crust Mix, and I can safely say that this girl fell head-over-heels over the stuff! The crust bakes up beautifully, with juuust the right amount of chew. For someone who doesn’t have pizza all that often, this mix is definitely something I’ll splurge on every once and a while!
The Sauce: Confession time – pesto may just be my favorite food. If you’ve never had it before…first of all: WHAAAAT?! second: you must! third: traditional pesto is the perfect combination of fresh basil, zippy garlic, creamy parmesan, earthy pine nuts, and luxurious olive oil. It’s pretty simple to make, but when that pesto craving hits in the middle of the dead of winter where a fresh leaf of basil is very very hard to come by, the fact that I can buy high-quality pre-made pesto from DeLallo is a beautiful beautiful thing. DeLallo’s Simply Pesto has just the right balance of that garlicky bite and sweet basil. It’s literally what all of my Italian-fueled dreams are made of. I could eat it with a spoon. Scratch that, I have eaten it with a spoon. No shame. ?
The Toppings: Here’s where you can have some fun! I wanted to play on the whole red and green Christmas theme, so to pair with my green pesto, I decided that roasted red peppers were the way to go. I also saw a giant fennel bulb at the Italian market over the weekend, so it miraculously made its way into the oven to get all roasty-toasty before making its way onto this pizza. It really is the star of the show here; when it’s roasted, fennel tastes like sweet anise (Mark said that it tasted a little like a pizzelle!). And Mark and I like artichokes, so atop the pizza they went. ?
No matter what your holiday traditions may be, I hope that each and every one of you have a fabulous-fantastic weekend filled with family, friends, and food. I’m really looking forward to cooking my way through my much needed break! If you decide to make anything from Fooduzzi, you’re literally the best. Snap a photo, upload it, and tag it with #fooduzzi so I can see your creations!
Merry Christmas, everyone! ❤️
PrintGluten Free Fennel Pesto Pizza
- Yield: 1 12-inch pizza
Ingredients
- 1 bulb fennel, sliced into 1/4 inch slices
- 1 Tbsp. olive oil
- 1 12-inch pizza crust, plus crust ingredients (I used half of Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free Pizza Crust Mix)
- 1/4 cup+ DeLallo Simply Pesto
- 1/4 cup roasted red pepper strips
- 3–4 canned artichokes, chopped small
- salt + pepper
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Add sliced fennel to the baking sheet, and toss with olive oil, salt, and pepper. Roast for about 20 minutes, or until fennel is tender and slightly browned. We don’t want it *just* underdone so that it can finish roasting once it’s on top of the pizza. Set aside.
- If necessary, mix and par-bake your crust per package instructions. The Bob’s Red Mill crust mix says to bake the crust without toppings for 7-9 minutes.
- Spread pesto on the crust, adding more if desired. Add roasted fennel pieces, roasted red pepper strips, and artichokes, and scatter evenly on top of the pesto.
- Bake pizza according to the crust package’s instructions. Remove from oven and enjoy!
A special thank you goes to DeLallo for supplying me with some of their super high-quality products that I love for this recipe! All opinions are my own.
Affiliate links were used in this blog post. “Affiliate” is just a fancy way of saying that I get some money if you click on and purchase the products that are linked! The money I earn will go directly back into Fooduzzi, so I’d really appreciate you helping me “feed” my blogging efforts!!
That’s such a funny tradition! This pizza is to. die. for. Like, say pesto and I’m in!
Thanks, Emilie! I’m the same way – pesto makes EVERYTHING better!
I love that you guys eat pizza on Christmas! Pizza is amazing, well, any day of the year, so why not on Christmas?!? I absolutely adore artichokes and pesto on pizza so I just might have to give this a try! Hope you had a wonderful holiday and a happy new year :)
hahaha agreed! Pizza is perfect all the time :) And you MUST throw some pesto on your pizza when you can – it’s my absolute favorite pizza topper!