One thing that many of us low carbers really miss is pizza. There's a place in Chicago's, Gino's East, that offer a fabulous sausage pizza that only has one piece of sausage. It's basically a sausage patty the size of the pizza. The meatza is based on that concept, except their is no dough crust, the pizza is built directly on the sausage.
This definitely satisfies my pizza craving, it's even good the next day cold for breakfast.
Still undergoing some refining around the sausage 'crust'; I switched sausage brand for this one, previously have used Jimmy Dean plain & sage flavors, wanted spicy and the only spicy was Bob Evans. Seemed like there was more crust shrinkage and fat in the Bob Evans, next attempt will be with Jimmy Dean to confirm difference.
The Meatza
Kitchen Equipment
- Preheated 350°F / 177°C Oven
- 9x13 baking pan
- 10x15 baking pan
Ingredients
- 1 lb bulk (roll) sausage
- 1 lb mozzarella cheese, grated
- 8 oz tomato sauce
- Italian / pizza seasoning
Optional
- 4 oz black olives
- 4 oz sliced mushrooms
You can easily use 8 oz of prepared pizza sauce and save some time. I use no salt added sauce since there are tons of sodium in the cheese and sausage.
Simmer together seasonings and tomato sauce, stirring occasionally. The traditional "Italian Seasonings" are oregano, rosemary, thyme, basil & marjoram. I found a jar of Whole Foods pizza seasoning in my spice cupboard that I use. Season to taste, I use about a teaspoon.
I like to simmer my sauce for at least an hour, so I use a little water to rinse out the tomato sauce can and add that, maybe 1 - 2 oz. Turn on the oven to start it pre-heating.
Spread the sausage as evenly as you can in the larger 10x15 baking dish, then cook in 350° oven for 30 minutes. Using the Jimmy Dean sausage it shrunk to perfectly fit the 9x13 baking dish. The Bob Evans shrunk a bit more and was not as even - I probably didn't spread out the sausage as evenly as before.
Place the sausage "crust" in the smaller 9x13 baking pan and finish as you would any pizza - spread the sauce, scatter the olives and mushrooms if using and top with the mozzarella.
Then cook for 25-30 minutes until the cheese bubbles & browns a bit.
Then slice & serve
Nutritional Info:
This is going to be highly dependent on the brands you use, this is based on the ingredients pictured above.
The numbers are listed for the entire pizza with a 1/8 pizza slice following the slash.
Calories: 2868 / 358
Total Fat: 226g / 28.3g
Saturated Fat: 98g / 12.3g
Transfats: 0 / 0
Cholesterol: 500g / 62.5
Sodium: 5833g / 729g
Total carbs: 42g / 5.3g
Fiber: 6.5g / 0.8g
Sugars: 10g / 1.3g
Protein: 176.5g / 22.1g