Following making my last batch of my Simple and Rustic Pizza Sauce, I wanted to make a pizza that would really showcase the flavors of the sauce. This obviously meant I needed to be very careful with what to put on my pizza. Enter, the Margarita Pizza.

Margarita Pizza is very simple to make, and, to me, the point of it seems to be showcasing the flavor of tomatoes, fresh cow’s milk cheese, and a little bit of herbs.

Now, I must warn, this is my take on a Margarita Pizza. Many restaurants you go to will put fresh tomatoes on top. Being that I am utilizing a fresh tasting pizza sauce that lets the flavor of tomato shine through and is a little chunky, I decided to not add more tomatoes.

I also have to admit, I did not make my pizza dough. A local company makes fresh pizza dough and freezes it for sale. I am far from perfecting the art of pizza dough, so to ensure a quality end result, I utilized the dough available to me at my specialty store.

Alright, let’s dive in. By following this recipe you will end up with a simple and crispy pizza bursting with fresh flavors and ooey gooey cheese.

Begin by preparing your dough in whatever manner you need. As you can see in my photos, I overstretched my dough so I ended up rolling the edge of the crust up. This turned out okay with a nice handle to hold onto while still having a nice crispy thin crust overall.

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Here most people would think it is time to add sauce. Let me change your mind on that. I don’t know about you, but a problem I often run into with homemade pizza is the center is very saucy and it won’t be crispy. I really don’t like that drooping bite of pizza where you are trying to simultaneously eat, not lose your toppings, and not smack yourself in the face with hot cheese and sauce. In watching different pizzas being made and reading different recommendations for combating this, I found a fairly simple answer. Put a very light layer of finely grated cheese on the crust before your sauce. While you could do a layer of something like mozzarella, I recommend bringing your sharper and more pungent flavored cheeses in here. For me, I used some fresh grated aged Parmesan. I simply sprinkle a light layer over the crust and call it good. The few times that I have done this now it has really helped keep the center of my pizza from being soup.

Alright, now that you have a thin layer of grated cheese down, lets add sauce. I used a large spoon to essentially ladle my sauce out over the pizza. I left patches where there was little to no sauce and I didn’t do much in the way of spreading it. Rather than spread it and move the Parmesan around, I just aimed for leaving thin layers where I ladled it and let the magic of heat + juicy wet ingredients do the rest of the work.

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Now let’s top our Margarita Pizza. For this specific type of pizza a fresh mozzarella is important. It appears to be one of the signature aspects you will find in your favorite pizzeria, so let’s do it at home. I sliced my ball of mozzarella into roughly 1/4″ thick slices. From there I hand tore the slices into smaller chunks and spread it around the pizza. You can just lay the slices down if you like, but I prefer using smaller chunks. This will still leaves areas without cheese, but it spreads the cheese out to be a bit more consistent in coverage.

Once your cheese is down, take some extra virgin olive oil and drizzle a small amount over the pizza. As well, either drizzle or grab a pastry brush and brush some oil on the edge of your crust.

Throw your pizza in an oven set around 450 degrees (varied dependent on your oven) and let it sit rotating once about half way through. After about 10 minutes you should have a crispy golden brown crust and your pizza is ready to go! If you like your crust or cheese well done, keep it in there longer.

Immediately after removing your pizza from the oven sprinkle a small amount flaked finishing sea salt over the top and spread out some hand torn basil. Let the pizza set for a minute or two, slice it up, and enjoy!

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That’s really it. In under 20 minutes you are looking at a delicious, simple pizza bursting with the flavors of tomatoes, cheese, and fragrant basil.