Provencal Goat Cheese & Vegetable Pizza

The flavors and herbs of Provence France inspired me to make this Provencal Goat Cheese and Vegetable Pizza. After watching an episode of The Barefoot Contessa I was motivated to try my own version of Ina Garten's zucchini goat cheese tart.

Since the grocery didn't have any zucchini and I have no idea how to make a gluten free tart crust, I decided to improvise. I used a gluten free Red Mill pizza dough. I've used this pizza dough before and I was confident it would work well. (It makes two crusts, one can be refrigerated for later in the week). I also chose to use different vegetables and herbs.

Prepare your pizza dough according to the instructions on the package, cover and set aside out of drafts to rise. Meanwhile soften 8 ounces of plain soft goat cheese like Montchevre goat cheese.

To the softened goat cheese add fresh thyme leaves removed from the stems, fresh lavender buds removed from the stems and broken apart, 1/2 teaspoon dry ground rosemary, zest of one lime, 2 teaspoons of lime juice, and 2 tablespoons of Marsala wine.

Preheat your oven to 425 F. Crookneck squash was still available so I decided to use that squash plus three small roma and three mushrooms.

I used this hand multi slicer to slice the squash. After slicing the squash, lightly salt and arrange the squash on paper towels to remove excess moisture. Be careful the slicer blades are extremely sharp. An item to hold the vegetables is provided with the set and I recommend using it.

 I sliced the tomatoes and the mushrooms by hand as thin as I could manage.

The pizza dough recipe recommends baking the pizza for 7 minutes without toppings. I agree since you'll end up with a  nice crisp crust and optimum rise out of the dough precooking the crust. After about 7 minutes baking at 425F preheated oven, remove crust and spread your goat cheese mixture over the crust 1/2 inch shy of the edge.

Arrange your squash slices over the top and lightly brush with olive oil and sprinkle with salt, pepper, and additional thyme.

Arrange the tomatoes and mushrooms in a pleasing pattern over the squash slices and lightly brush with olive oil and sprinkle with salt, pepper, and more thyme. Bake the pizza for another 15 to 18 minutes. Remove pizza and let cool for 5 minutes on a elevated drying rack to prevent crust from getting moist. Not only is this pizza absolutely delicious, the air here is filled with the fragrances of Provence France. Thanks for reading and for all your comments.