Meatza (Paleo Pizza!)

This is a recipe that I found on The Antihousewife website. I pretty much followed it exactly as she has it and she has some GREAT step-by-step photos included. I tweaked her recipe a little bit to suit my taste. My "tweaks" are noted beside the original recipe in red. This was extremely easy to make and took about 10 minutes to throw together (not including cooking time of about 15-20 minutes).

My 4-year old daughter LOVED it and gobbled up a pretty good sized piece. My lovely husband to be, who has no problem letting me know his true opinion on things I cook...well...the first words out of his mouth, after he'd already eaten about 5 bites was: "I never want real pizza crust again!" So, this was a hit in our house!

As far as serving sizes go...I really don't know. I go by my body...I eat until I am full. Not until I am stuffed, but until I am full. This fed all three of us and there was enough left over for Tim's lunch and my lunch today. The "crust" was made on a 11 x 17 pan and shrunk to about 9.5 x 14.5 in size.

Cost wise--It was about $8.00 for the lean ground beef (I have seen it cheaper, but where I happened to stop and buy it at was a bit more expensive), I had all of the spices and the Parmesan cheese (it's about $2.50 for a canister, so let's say I used about $0.75 worth), the pizza sauce was $1.70, the cheese was $3.50, pepperoni was $2.50, and the bacon pieces were $1.59.  So, about $18.00 to make this, which, again, fed three people for dinner and two adults for lunch as well. In all fairness, I only used half of the package of pepperoni, bacon pieces, and half of the can of pizza sauce, so it really comes out to about $15.15, which is about the same price as a large pizza these days. I plan to use the leftover ingredients for something else (unless Tim wants another Meatza!)

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
• 1-3 tsp salt (adjust for taste)
• 1 tsp parsely (I used 1 tsp of Italian seasoning instead)
• 1 tsp oregano
• 1 tsp garlic powder (I used 2 tsp instead of 1 because I didn't have any onion powder)
• 1 tsp onion powder (I left this out because I didn't have any!)
• 1 tsp celery salt
• 1 tsp coarse ground pepper
• 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes (more if you like it spicy!) (I used 1 tsp, but to me, it was still unnoticeable)
• 2 lbs. ground beef (I used 93/7...the lean stuff...to try to avoid as much "shrinkage" as possible..I also only used 1.7 pounds)
• 2 eggs
• Toppings: cheese, pizza/pasta sauce (check for added sugar if you purchase it) more meat, veggies and the like.  I cut everything small so it crisps quickly.

Hardware

• 1 11″ x 17″ (or larger) cookie sheet or half sheet pan (must have edges!)
• 1 large bowl
• 1 small bowl
• Aluminum foil  (optional but highly recommended)
• Latex gloves (again, optional but highly recommended)
• Safety gear – oven mitts and pot holders or a towel

Procedure
1. Preheat your oven to 450 degrees F.

2. Line your pan with the foil.(She explains and shows why on her site. It's simply to make clean up easier and it worked like a charm!)

3. Mix the parmesan and seasonings in the small bowl.  I read this on another blog and it was a great tip!  You don’t want to clean off your hands after mixing the meat to measure up, then mix again.  This way, you can just dump it in and get going.

4. Put on your gloves – they keep the meat out from under your fingers and make cleaning your hands much easier! More sanitary.  Then, mix the meat and the 2 eggs.  If you add the seasonings now, they’ll just clump up into the meat and you’ll have a hard time getting them mixed in evenly.  That’s the “why” of the 2 step process.  Just like making meatloaf!

5. Once the meat and eggs are mixed, dump the cheese/seasoning mix in.  Mix it around again to combine.  By the way, don’t worry about squeezing the mix.  It’s actually a good thing for the texture of the “crust”.

6. Dump the meat mix onto the pan and spread it evenly to cover all the corners.

7. Place in the over and bake for 10 minutes.  Since the meat is spread so thin, it will cook quickly.  While it bakes, if you haven’t prepped your toppings, you should!

8. Remove it when the timer goes off.  Drain the grease from the pan and pat off the goop on top (unless you like the goop, of course).  This is what you’ll have – the meat shrinks quite a bit.

9. Turn on the broiler in the oven, and top your pizza while you wait. (I used pizza sauce that had no sugar added, pizza blend shredded cheese, pepperoni, bacon bits...I bought the Hormel brand that is in a plastic ziploc type baggy...onions, bell peppers (on Tim's half!). But you can pretty much use any toppings you want!)

10. Place under the broiler.  Leave the door cracked so the element stays on the entire time – it will crisp up your meatza really well!  Keep an eye on it, but mine was ready in about 5 minutes.

Let it rest a minute so the cheese is firm enough to cut.