Meat Crust Pizza

Every now and again I wonder what it would be like to eat a slice of pizza, and then I remember the words…don’t do it Sandi, you WILL get stuck on the crust.  Here is a meaty way to enjoy the visual, triangular (unless you are way into deep dish or Sicilian pizza squares) slices, loaded with meat and dripping with cheese and stay well within your calorie range while getting lots of protein.

Ingredients:

• 1 pound 95% lean ground beef
• ½ packet of dry onion soup mix
• Fresh ground pepper
• 1 egg
• 1 cup of pasta sauce that is 45 calories per half cup or less
• 8 ounces part skim shredded mozzarella cheese
• ¼ cup grated parmesan cheese
• 17 discs turkey pepperoni

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Mix ground beef, dry soup mix, pepper and egg in a large bowl until well blended
3. Place a large piece of plastic wrap on your counter
4. Remove the giant meatball from your mixing bowl on to the center of the wrap and fold the plastic wrap over the meatball
5. Using a rolling pin, or tall glass, or wine bottle (red preferably, remember it’s pizza) roll the meat into a disc that is about ½ inch thick
6. Spray a cookie sheet or pizza baking pan with non stick spray (I use olive oil in my Misto)
7. Carefully removing the plastic wrap place your meat on the baking pan
8. Bake the meat for 30 minutes.  This should cook it through
9. Remove pan from oven and top with pasta sauce, then cheese and pepperoni
10. Return the pan to the oven and bake another 10-15 minutes until the cheese is nice and melted
11. Remove from oven and cut into eight slices

Enjoy!

Nutrition:  Makes 8 servings, each serving is around

• 200 calories and
• 20 grams protein.

You can spice this up by adding dried red peppers to it after it comes out of the oven, or add mushrooms, olives, bell pepper slices or any topping of your choice before you put it in the oven.  Remember to adjust the calories/protein accordingly.