Guilt-free Pizza

Are you shunning America’s favorite fast food because it’s rich with fat and calories? Good news: You can have your pizza and eat it, too. The caveat: you need to make your own. With the growing availability of whole grain, thin crusts, you can make pizza that isn’t labor-intensive.

Today I took leftover pasta sauce (which I’d made using ground lean turkey, lots of garlic and onions, and San Marzano tomatoes crushed using my Vitamix) and spread it on a store-bought crust. I added a few items (sliced Crimini mushrooms, a bit of green bell pepper, and sweet onion), topped with reduced fat Mozzarella cheese and Parmesan cheese plus a sprinkle of Redneck Pepper Italian. I baked it ten minutes in a preheated 450° oven (but I used a Pampered Chef stoneware baking pan. If you use a metal pizza pan, reduce heat to 425°). After removing it from the oven, I sliced it into six pieces (3 servings).

You can use any combination of toppings you like. There are pizza sauces available. Just read the labels to be sure you don’t get too much fat or sugar. Shred your own cheese or buy it already shredded and ready to use. The two big offenders that make pizza less healthful are meats and refined flour crusts. If you stick to meat-free or lowfat meats like ground turkey, and if you use a thin, whole wheat crust, you can enjoy two slices of pizza without wrecking your diet.

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