CHEESEBURGER PIZZA, ROUND TWO
Last November, I toyed around with the idea of making a cheeseburger pizza, with a small degree of success. It was okay, but I knew that it could definitely be better. So last night, armed with my own homemade pizza dough and the knowledge of what to improve from last time, I recreated the recipe and was much more satisfied with both the look and the taste.
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- The whole pie, fully decorated with colorful toppings.
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- A good shot highlighting the different components of the pizza.
Cheeseburger Pizza
Makes 14″ pie
Pizza Toppings:
~ 3/4 lb. ground beef
~ 1 cup chopped lettuce
~ 1/2 cup diced tomato
~ 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
~ 1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
Sauce:
~ 1/3 cup mayo
~ 1/3 cup Thousand Island dressing
Burger Seasoning:
~ Salt
~ Pepper
~ 1/4 tsp garlic powder
~ 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
The instructions about how to work with the pizza dough can be found over on my other pizza blog post (found here), so I’ll primarily talk about preparing and cooking the toppings here as well as final assembly of the pizza.
Before starting any prep, begin preheating your oven to 400 degrees. Take a large skillet or frying pan to brown your ground beef on medium / medium-high heat. You only need to brown the outsides of the meat since the rest of its cooking will be done in the oven. Once that is finished cooking, set it aside for now.
Next, make the mix for your sauce base on the pizza. Normally, I go with a 3/4 cup sauce to 2 cup cheese ratio, but I thought that 3/4 cup of the dressing/mayo mixture would be too overpowering, so I opted to cut it back to 2/3 cup instead. If when you’re putting it onto the dough you still feel it’s too much, reduce back even more to 1/2 cup. Once you’re finished making the sauce, go ahead and roll out the pizza dough, shaping it to fit your pizza pan / oven pan.
Layer down the sauce first, followed by the ground beef. Add on the shredded cheese next. I opted for a 50/50 blend of cheddar and mozzarella; however, if you want a more bold cheddar flavor, consider switching it to a 75% sharp cheddar / 25% mozzarella blend. I used some mozzarella since it is generally a smooth cheese when it’s melted down on a pizza.
Throw that guy into the oven (and place an oven pan on the rack above to prevent toppings from cooking too quickly) for 18 minutes. While that is cooking, prep your lettuce and tomato toppings by doing a rough chop on the lettuce and dicing the tomato. Remove the oven pan after the time is up in order to brown the topside of the pizza a little for about 3 – 5 minutes. Once that comes out of the oven, sprinkle the lettuce and tomato over it and let everything rest for about two minutes. After that, cut it into slices and enjoy the fruits of your labor.
Categories: Recipes
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