Deep Dish Zucchini and Tomato Pizza

Last week, our CSA box had one tomato in it – the first tomato of the season.  Tomatoes have come a bit early this year (along with many other things) due to the unusually warm spring that we had.  But, i’m not complaining. Each year I wait for the first local tomatoes. You can’t beat the vine-ripened tomatoes that we get from our CSA.

I knew that I had to do something special with the tomato.  Sure, we could have just eaten it on a salad or with some mozzarella and basil.  That would have been delicious.  But, I wanted to make pizza.  I love eating pizza made with fresh slices of tomato instead of tomato sauce. They just taste like summer to me.  I load up our pizzas with whatever fresh veggies I have on hand.  No two pizzas are alike, and I love them that way.

On this particular evening, I opted to make a deep dish pizza in my cast iron skillet. I had leftover pizza dough in the fridge from a few nights before, so I knew that dinner would come together quickly. Along with the tomato, I sliced up some of the zucchini (both green and golden) that were keeping the tomato company in the CSA box earlier that afternoon. Some ricotta cheese and leftover garlic scape pesto brought it all together.

We savored every bite of the pizza, enjoying the first tastes of the summer tomatoes. And, I look forward to many more summer veggie pizzas to come!

Deep Dish Zucchini and Tomato Pizza
Makes one 10-inch pizza

• 1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil
• Pizza dough for one 10-inch pizza
• 1/2 cup pesto
  (I used leftover garlic scape pesto)
• 1/2 cup ricotta cheese
• 1 medium green zucchini
• 1 medium golden zucchini
• 1 tomato
• 1/2 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
• Handful of fresh basil leaves, cut in a chiffonade

Preheat the oven to 400°F.  Rub a 10-inch cast iron skillet with the extra virgin olive oil.  Roll out the pizza dough, and lay it inside the greased skillet, pressing the dough up along the sides of the skillet.

Spread the pesto in a thin layer over the pizza dough, then top the pesto with the ricotta cheese.  Arrange the zucchini and tomato on top of the pesto and ricotta layers.  Sprinkle with the mozzarella cheese.

Bake the pizza for about 18 – 20 minutes, until the crust is baked and the cheese is golden. Remove from the oven and sprinkle with basil before serving.