You might have noticed the large pizza recipe collection we’ve been building! It’s honestly one of the easiest things to make with veggies you have hanging around, kids can help make it, everyone likes it, what’s not to love! We even have a video in the works with more great pizza-making tips! This spicy pizza with fennel and radicchio is easy to put together and the results are fantastic. Toss in some Italian sausage if you like or serve as is.
We make dough in the farm kitchen, and have the recipe down. If you’d prefer just buy some! Lots of pizza restaurants sell their dough or even most grocery stores carry good quality dough. Gluten free doughs can be bought ready-made or try this recipe. If you’re looking for ideas for fennel and radicchio, this pizza is perfect. The flavors balance out radicchio’s bitterness and then the quick pan-frying mellow the fennel. This pizza is thicker than a lot of the flatbread style pizzas we like to make, and cheesy.
I liked the presentation of the fennel slices, so I just removed the tops, sliced it in half crosswise and into thin slices. If you want to you can use some of the fennel fronds to garnish the pizza later. For the sauce we learned this great tip from Chef Emma Frisch – the co-star of our pizza video! Pick up a carton of “Pomi” strained tomatoes. We got ours at Greenstar Co-op in Ithaca. Just simmer, add garlic, and fresh basil. It’s perfect sauce.
I haven’t made a thicker crust cheesy pizza like this in a while, and assembling it honestly brought me back to my first job at a pizza chain. The results here are much more flavorful! Layer the cheese over the sauce, then the vegetables, and end with the parm. I wanted a really spicy pizza, so I sprinkled the crushed red pepper right over the sauce. You can skip this step if you don’t want spicy.
Spicy Radicchio & Fennel Pizza
1 fennel bulb, tops removed, and sliced into 1/4 inch slices
1 cup radicchio, chopped into bite size pieces
1 1/2 – 2 cups grated aged mozzarella
1 cup grated parmesan
1/2 tablespoon butter
Pizza Sauce
1 carton strained tomatoes
2 minced garlic cloves
a few leaves fresh basil, minced
Pizza Dough
For the crust:
3 cups flour
1 cup warm water
1 tablespoon sugar
2 tsp yeast
1 tsp sea salt
2 tablespoons olive oil
Make the crust. Sprinkle yeast and sugar into warm water. Set aside for 15 minutes. Place flour and salt in mixer and whisk together. When yeast is bubbly and expanded add 2 tablespoons olive oil to the yeast mixture. Combine flour and wet ingredients in mixer. Mix on low speed (2 on a kitchen aid mixer) for 4-5 minutes. Dough should be in a ball chasing itself around the mixer. If dough is too dry add warm water 1 tablespoon at a time. If it’s too wet add flour 1 tablespoon at a time. Place dough ball in an oiled bowl and cover with plastic wrap for one hour. Dough should be doubled in size.
Make the sauce. Pour the carton of tomatoes into a sauce pan. Bring to a simmer and add remaining ingredients.
Heat the butter in a skillet. Arranged the fennel in an even layer and cook a few minutes per side until golden at the edges.
Make the pizza.
Preheat oven to 450°F.
Oil a baking sheet or pizza pan and sprinkle with coarse ground cornmeal.
Turn the dough out of the bowl onto a floured surface. Flip the dough a few times so that each side is floured. Roll the dough out a bit with a rolling pin, then lift it up with your hands and use gravity and your knuckles to gently stretch the dough. Place onto the baking sheet.
Ladle about a cup of sauce over the pizza, then add the mozzarella. Top with the fennel slices then radicchio, and cover with parmesan. Bake for 20 minutes until pizza is golden and bubbly. Let cool before slicing.
