Something special happens when you mince and roast mushrooms - they lose two thirds of their weight as the liquids evaporate and you're left with an intensely flavoured, slightly crispy mixture that is an ideal as a pizza topping and as a replacement for mincemeat in dishes like spaghetti bolognaise and lasagne. Mushrooms are a great source of iron and zinc and preparing them this way makes it easy to get a tonne of them into your diet.
The cheese is based on The Curious Chickpea's vegan mozzarella, with the oil dialed back a bit. I find this gives a satisfying experience but you can experiment with more oil, and can try using refined coconut oil as Eva does, for a creamier mouthfeel.
This amount of dough is good for six large pizzas and a matching amount of cheese sauce - though if you have any leftover cheese sauce it will keep in the fridge for a couple of days, or can be frozen in individual portions. The pizza dough will keep for three days in the fridge, just let it warm up a bit on the bench before you try to roll out it.
I like to max out my pizza with the mushrooms, and the rest of the family gets free reign with their (omnivore) toppings. This amount of mushroom is perfect for two medium sized mega-mushrooms pizzas as shown in the picture, or can be spread more thinly and shared amongst the family if you're more generous than me.
Looking for a shortcut? Don't bother making the tomato sauce, substitute a jar of seasoned tomato sauce from the supermarket.
Ingredients
1 medium onion, peeled and quarterd
1 head of garlic
6 large tomatoes, stalks removed
1 T olive oil
salt and pepper
1 kg king oyster mushrooms
2 T olive oil
2 T soy sauce
500 g plain flour
10 g salt
5 g instant yeast
2 T olive oil
325ml warm water
1 C raw cashews*
1 C water
1 t apple vinegar
½ t salt
2 T nutritional yeast
2 T tapioca / arrowroot starch
¼ C olive oil
+ your other favourite pizza toppings - olives, marinated artichokes, grilled capsiscum etc
Method
Preheat the oven to 200 C (395 F).
Add the onion, garlic and tomatoes to an oven-proof pot and toss with the olive oil, a pinch of salt and a grind of pepper. Roast uncovered for 30 minutes.
Roughly chop the mushrooms and, in batches, pulse in a food processor to achieve a fine mince. Add the oil and soy sauce into the minced mushrooms and mix well. Spread onto a lined baking tray and rough up the surface as much as possible to increase the surface area exposed to the heat.
Put the mushrooms in the oven - they need to cook for about 40 minutes until much of the liquid has evaporated. Scrape them up and toss them over a bit and give them 5 minutes to finish off and get some crispy corners.
Unless you took absolutely forever to process the mushrooms you'll have two things in the oven at the same time. Just track the times separately, or lose track and make a judgement call based on how it looks and smells.
While the vegetables are cooking prepare the dough by mixing the ingredients and kneading for 10 minutes until you have a silky and elastic dough. Don't be tempted to add too much flour if its sticky - you want the bare minimum required to make it a manageable dough. Put it in an oiled bowl and cover it, leaving it to rise in a warm place for about 1 hour.
Remove the tomato mixture from the oven after its alloted 30 minutes (give or take) and remove the head of garlic to let it cool. When you're able to, chop of the tops of all the cloves and squeeze the garlic out into the pot. Then hit this mixture with stick blender, or let it cool further and process it using a high speed blender. Return to the pot and let it simmer over low heat to deepen the flavour while the dough rises.
After the mushrooms are cooked and the dough has risen you're ready to cook pizzas - put a pizza stone in the oven and increase the temperature as hot as it will go. Split the dough into 6 pieces for medium sized pizzas, or 12 pieces for mini size. Keep the balls in the covered bowl as you prep each pizza in turn.
Roll out the dough to a thin, even disc and place it on a sheet of baking paper. Spread the base with a thin layer of the tomato sauce, then the mushrooms and other toppings, finishing with ⅓ C of the cheese sauce. Use a baking sheet or thin wooden chopping board to transfer the pizza to the pizza stone and bake until the dough begins to blister and the toppings are toasted. Check the base is cooked by lifing a corner and then remove from the oven. Let cool slightly, slice and repeat.
Nutrition
Makes 6 medium sized pizzas, 737 kcal per pizza
Macros Per Pizza - 33g protein, 24g fat, 111g carbohydates
Key Nutrition Per Serve - 13.6mg Iron, 6.5mg Zinc, high in B Group Vitamins, the exact amount depends on the brand of nutritional yeast
Notes
* You can soak the cashews for few hours if you have time, but a high speed blender often does the trick without pre-soaking.
