This Pesto Pizza with Mozzarella and Goat Cheese is the creamy, tangy, mediterranean-with-a-twist pizza pie of your dreams.
We love a homemade pizza, a frozen pizza, a takeout pizza, classic red sauce pizza, white sauce – we’re firm believers that no pizza is bad pizza. This recipe, though, is perfect for when you want a meal that has an extremely high reward but fairly low effort. Pesto brings an herby, tangy, and umami profile which beautifully layers with fresh mozzarella and goat cheese, and is topped off with very thin red onions, nutty pine nuts, and a balsamic reduction drizzle.
This Pesto Pizza with Mozzarella and Goat Cheese calls for prepackaged dough, premade pesto, and packaged balsamic reduction. It would be absolutely delicious with homemade everything, but we’re realists – most of the time we are looking to maximize flavor and minimize effort. We love to use the premade pizza dough that is available at Trader Joes, but any pizza dough or pre-made baked crust works well. The balsamic reduction is also available at your local grocer, or can be found online here. (pro tip – keep this on hand and use the balsamic reduction on pizzas, pastas, avocado toast, and much more)
If you’d like to go above and beyond and make some components of this pizza from scratch, you can check out our favorite dough, pesto, and balsamic reduction recipes, which are coming soon.
For this pizza recipe, begin with a base of green pesto, and then layer your dough with fresh mozzarella, creamy goat cheese, and freshly sliced tomato. Finish with thinly sliced red onions, pine nuts, and a balsamic reduction. This veggie recipe is loved by vegetarians and carnivores alike.
Pesto Pizza with Mozzarella and Goat Cheese
Ingredients
- 1 ball pizza dough
- ⅛ red onion thinly sliced
- 2 tomatoes thinly sliced
- 1 chub mozzarella thinly sliced
- 2.5 oz goat cheese (about 1/2 of a package)
- ¼ cup pesto (more or less to taste)
- 2 tbsp pine nuts
- drizzle balsamic reduction
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees F, or the specified temperature for your dough.
- On a prepared baking sheet, prebake the pizza dough for 6 minutes.
- Prepare your produce: thinly slice tomatoes, mozzarella, and red onion.
- Spread a moderate layer of pesto onto the crusts (more or less to preference). Layer tomatoes, then mozzarella, then top with onion. Add dollops of goat cheese on top of the pizza.
- Bake the pizza for 8 minutes
- Add pine nuts and bake for an additional 4 minutes
- Allow pizza to cool, cut, and drizzle with balsamic reduction, and enjoy!
