Last night Penny told me “This is the best dinner you ever made!” That’s pretty high praise from a child who refuses to eat any kind of pasta. All of the kids who tried it had seconds or thirds. (One still wasn’t willing to try. Isn’t that always the case?) Anyway…
What if I told you that you could have homemade pizza on the table in 30 minutes, including making the dough? It’s crazy, but you can! This recipe is a new favorite at our house. If you’ve been following us for a while, you know that while I eat a plant-based diet, the rest of my family does not. The kids love their pizza night, and I like that it’s a fast and easy option on busy school days. But I’m not one to make my own pizza dough (or really anything involving yeast and a lot of time), so we usually go for take-out or pizzas from the freezer section, and that can get expensive when you are feeding a large family! We usually need to buy 3 pizzas to feed our family of 7 one meal. But now I can make pizza from scratch at home much more affordably and it takes less time than ordering delivery. And there is no rolling, kneading or proofing the dough! None. That batter is a liquid. What?! I know, it’s crazy, but you really can make thin crust pizza from a liquid batter. If you can make pancake batter, you can do this. Promise. Except it’s actually easier than pancakes because you don’t even have to flip it.
I love that this recipe is so versatile, I can use up our leftovers like I did this time with BBQ chicken from earlier in the week. But you could make this pizza and kind you want. This one is obviously a BBQ chicken pizza, but you could do broccoli and ranch, traditional Italian, buffalo cauliflower, white pizza, or even make it a breakfast pizza with sausage and cheese and crack a few eggs on top in the final step. Also, it’s BIG! One pizza can easily feed 4-6 people. And the crust is thin and crispy. Also? It’s easy and you don’t have to prep a single thing in advance.
I based my recipe on this video from Whippoorwill Holler. Watch to see how she makes hers in a cast iron skillet. Yum.
We made ours in a sheet pan because we have a lot of kids to feed. Spread thin, these measurements covered the entire pan. It’s called “crazy crust” because it feels insane that the crust is liquid.
To make a thin-crust BBQ Chicken pizza…
Step 1: Start with the batter
- 1 cup of all-purpose flour
- 2 eggs
- 2/3 cup of milk (I needed to add a bit extra)
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tablespoon if Italian seasoning
- salt & pepper to taste
Mix all of the ingredients in a bowl and stir to combine. It will be runny. That’s a good thing.
Now heavily grease a sheet pan and spread it on.
Step 2: Weirdly, add your cooked meat.
Yes, on top of the liquid batter. Plop on your cooked meat, if you’re using it, evenly throughout. I used shredded BBQ chicken because I made crockpot pulled chicken sandwiches earlier in the week.
Step 3: The First Bake
Bake the crust with meat in a 425 degree oven for 15-20 minutes on the bottom rack. Mine only took 15 minutes. Pull it out when it’s getting darker on the edges and the batter in the middle has set (isn’t liquid). Magically, it has started to turn crispy on the edges. Remove it from the oven. There will be some bubbles. That’s fine.
Step 4: Add sauce, veggies, and cheese.
This step is pretty self-explanatory. Spread whatever sauce you are using (I used store-bought BBQ sauce straight from the bottle). If you want veggies or cheese, add them now as well. For this pizza, I used a bit of both shredded mozzarella and shredded cheddar because that’s what we had in the fridge.
Step 5: Second Bake
Put the pizza back into the 450 degree oven for about 10 minutes, only this time move it to the top rack. That’s the hardest part of the whole thing, remembering to switch racks. But you did it! Now just bake until the cheese is nice and melted.
All done!
We served ours with some homemade soup, but a bagged salad would make it a super easy weeknight meal.
My family liked it much better than frozen pizza from the grocery store, and it was even cheaper while still being just as fast, plus it didn’t have any of the nasty chemicals and preservatives.
If you’re teaching kids to cook, this is an easy beginner meal to make.
I hope you try it! Let me know what flavor combinations you use if you do.
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