Chao Cheese Deep Dish Pizza

I feel terrible you guys. I mean I made this recipe in February and I'm just now getting around to posting it! What kind of horrible person makes the most bomb-ass pizza in the world and then hides it away from the rest of the world? Me. But I have my reasons! I was actually preparing this recipe to submit to Field Roast's recipe competition so I didn't want to share it until I knew I hadn't been selected. Unfortunately, yours truly is not only a horrible pizza hoarding person, but she's also a forgetful one as well. The deadline for the recipe submissions in March totally crept up on me during Midterms right before I left for Portland. Needless to say I was in quite a frenzy and I completely forgot to submit my recipe! That's ok though! Two other fabulous recipes won the competition and now I'm finally getting around to sharing the recipe with you guys.

When I was a kid I would beg and plead for my parents to order Pizza Hut just cause I loved the stuffed crust! Seriously though some of my favorite memories as a kid involved staying up late with my dad nomming on cheesy stuffed crust and playing Crash Bandicoot (yup I'm a 90's kid and proud). When I tried the coconut herb cheese by Field Roast I knew this cheese was begging to be made into stuffed crust pizza and who was I to question it? I am but a humble servant to the will of Chao cheese. It said to me "Emilie make me into something beautiful" and I said... "ok".

Ingredients

1/2 of a batch of my vegan croissant dough (let it go through both risings)

2 packages of Chao Coconut Herb Sliced Cheese

2 cups of thinly sliced mushrooms

1/4 cup freshly chopped parsley

2 tbsp Earthbalance

Pesto

1 cup fresh basil

1/2 tbsp nutritional yeast

6 cloves of garlic finely chopped

1 tbsp olive oil

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees and lightly grease a pizza pan. Pulse all of your pesto ingredients in a food processor for 1 minute.

2. Roll your dough out into a circle about 1/4 inch in thickness then transfer it to your pizza pan. Spread your pesto evenly over the dough leaving about a 1 1/2 from the edge clean for your crust. 

3. Take some of your chao slices and divide each slice into thirds. Overlay the slices in the bare area where you didn't put any pesto on the outer edge of the pizza. Once you have made a little cheese circle on the out edge fold over the ends of the dough and pinch them down to form the stuffed crust. Do this all the way around the entire pizza until all the slices are covered and the crust is formed. 

4. Begin layering your remaining Chao slices over the rest of the pizza. You can have as little or as much overlap as you desire. Once you have laid down all the slices top the pizza off with your sliced mushrooms and parsley, or any other veggies of your choice. 

5. Bake pizza for 20 minutes. Remove pizza from oven and rub Earthbalance over the crust. Bake for an additional 10-15 minutes.