Spinach Mushroom Pizza Pie

Mushrooms sauteed in a bit of butter (or olive oil) and lots of garlic, mixed with wilted spinach, fresh herbs, Italian seasoning and ricotta cheese then spread in a thick layer over a lovely, crunchewy thin crust and topped with marinara sauce and mozzarella cheese, this spinach pizza pie will win your heart!

Many many years ago when my son was little and my daughter was a baby, I used to make a spinach stuffed pizza pie, except back then I wasn’t too concerned about things like carbs or calories, I just wanted to make something delicious that my family would eat! So back then I used bread dough to make two crusts and I wasn’t concerned about how thick the crusts got. My son loved it, which was pretty amazing because it was the ONLY thing I could get him to eat that had spinach in it. I think the inspiration for the recipe actually came out of a Cooking Light magazine. I was a subscriber to Cooking Light for many many years and every time it came, I would sit down on the couch and page through it and pick out recipes I wanted to try. The photos and layout were just gorgeous, a work of art with food, and I treasured every single one of those magazines, carried them with me in boxes for years, never looking back through them, but unwilling to part with them.

Well, I’ve since parted with my Cooking Light magazines, realizing that it just wasn’t practical to keep them around, but I still treasure the memories and all the great recipe inspiration I got from them. These days I browse the internet with my phone to find recipes … how times have changed!

Now that I’m in a sourdough craze, I often find myself with extra starter, so I decided to make pizza crust. The first sourdough crust I tried was a thin crunchy cracker-like crust, which I made with whole wheat and rye flours. My first pizza with that crust turned out quite yummy and it’s unfortunate I didn’t get any photos of it because on the second try with that thin whole grain crust, I let it sit on the counter too long and it got all tough and leathery. I tried making this spinach stuffed pizza with that crust and just couldn’t bear it. The filling was delicious, but the crust really needed some work.

So I scraped out the filling and saved it for later, tossing the failed crust in the trash, and started a new batch of pizza crust, this time with bread flour and using King Arthur Flour’s recipe. I figured if I make a THIN white crust, it should have a nice crunchewy texture, but not TOO many carbs, right? I only had 1/2 cup of leftover starter to use this time, though, so I made just half the recipe, and since I wanted a thin crust, I cut the dough in half and rolled and stretched out my dough to a super thin crust, put it in my cast iron pan, pushing the dough up the sides of the pan to make a nice lip (to hold all the toppings), let it rise in the oven for about 15- 20 minutes, pricked it with a fork and then baked it at 450 F. for roughly 7 – 8 minutes. The crust wasn’t browned yet, but it was cooked.

While the crust was baking, I heated up the filling I’d scraped off the failed crust. When my new crust was ready, I spread the spinach mixture over the hot crust, topped with a bit more marinara and cheese and put it in to bake. Because of the thick layer of topping, it took about 15 – 20 minutes to cook, but it came out PERFECT! The pizza was nice and hot, with the cheese lightly browned and the bottom of the crust nicely browned as well. I scarfed down a big piece before heading to the gym to work out with my son.

You don’t have to use a sourdough crust for this pizza pie … in fact you could use any pizza dough that you like. If you want a thicker crust, don’t roll it out quite so thin and let it rise a little longer. Just make sure to make a good lip on the edges to hold in all the yummy toppings!

Spinach Mushroom Pizza Pie

• Prep Time: 20 minutes
• Cook Time: 35 minutes
• Total Time: 55 minutes
• Yield: 3 - 6 servings 1x

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Ingredients

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For the spinach mushroom mixture:

• 2 teaspoons butter or olive oil
• 8 oz. fresh mushrooms, sliced
• 2 – 4 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped fine
• 8 oz. fresh spinach (or frozen, thawed, with juices squeezed out)

Dough for one 12 inch pizza crust

For the ricotta filling:

• 8 oz. part-skim ricotta cheese
• 1 – 2 cloves of garlic, peeled & chopped fine
• 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning
• 1/2 cup shredded Italian blend of cheeses
• Several fresh basil and oregano leaves, chopped
• A sprig of fresh rosemary, chopped fine

For the top:

• 1 – 2 cups shredded part-skim mozzarella
• 1 – 2 cups marinara sauce

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Instructions

1. Put the butter or olive oil in a medium frying or saucepan and heat over medium heat, using a spatula to coat the bottom of the pan. Add the garlic and saute just briefly until fragrant, then add the mushrooms. Stir and season with salt, pepper and your favorite salt-free seasoning blend. Stir, then cover and cook for several minutes, stirring occasionally, until the mushrooms are tender.
2. Add the spinach, a handful at a time, covering and cooking until wilted, then adding more until all the spinach is incorporated. Remove the cover, reduce heat and let cook a few minutes to let the extra moisture evaporates. Remove from heat and push a clean towel down over the mixture to sop up most of the moisture.
3. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 450 F and roll out the pizza dough to your desired thickness. If you want it thin and it resists rolling, cover it and let it rest for 10 – 15 minutes, then roll it out thinner. Lightly oil the bottom of your cast iron pan, then place the dough in cast iron pan so it covers the bottom and rises up the sides of the pan. Push the dough up the sides a bit to make a good lip. Bake at 450 F for 5 – 8 minutes or until cooked but not brown. Remove from oven.
4. While the crust is cooking, in a small bowl, mix together the ricotta filling ingredients. Stir the ricotta mixture into the spinach mushroom mixture. Keep this mixture warm until the crust is ready.
5. Spread the spinach ricotta mixture evenly over the prepared crust. Top with cheese, sauce, and a bit more cheese.
6. Bake at 450 F. for about 17 – 25 minutes or until the middle of the pizza pie is nice and bubbly in the middle and the cheese is melted and lightly browned on top. The bottom of the pie should be nicely browned too.
7. Let rest for about 10 minutes before slicing and serving. Enjoy!

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Notes

Total time does not include dough prep or rising time.

RECIPE SOURCE: http://www.sumptuousspoonfuls.com/

© Copyright 2019, Sumptuous Spoonfuls. All images & content are copyright protected. Please do not use my images without prior permission. If you want to publish any of my images, please ask first. If you want to republish this recipe as your own, please re-write the recipe in your own words or link back to this post for the recipe.

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