Zucchini Pizza Crust (Gluten Free, Paleo, AIP)
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This zucchini pizza crust is the perfect veggie pizza crust! It’s grain free, gluten free, dairy free, and egg free.
Now the summer is almost here, I’ve been getting really excited with all of the ways to use zucchini! Zucchini is one of those really versatile vegetables. You can make into pasta, zucchini bread, zucchini fries, and more.
I’m forever craving pizza, so after making a cauliflower pizza crust for my cookbook, I decided to give zucchini pizza crust a try. It was a good decision! This pizza crust is lightly crispy and has an extra hint of nutrients from the hidden veggies. Plus, it’s paleo, AIP, grain & gluten free, dairy free, and can be made egg free and AIP.
How to make Zucchini Pizza Crust
- Peel and shred the zucchini (with a box grater or a food processor) and squeeze out the excess water. You want to have 1 cup after you squeeze out the water.
- Mix the zucchini with the coconut flour, tapioca starch, nutritional yeast, olive oil, ACV, and other seasonings.
- Prepare the gelatin egg (or sub 1 regular egg) and mix it into the crust.
- Add the crust onto a greased baking sheet and form into a thin 8-9″ crust.
- Bake in the oven for 18-20 minutes or until lightly golden brown.
- Remove from the oven, reduce the heat and top with desired toppings, and bake for another 5 minutes or so.
What to Put on the Zucchini Pizza Crust
Pizza Sauce Options…
- Tomato sauce
- Pesto sauce
- Nomato sauce for AIP
- Alfredo sauce or Garlic cream sauce (I haven’t tried it with these creamy sauces, but it could be a good option to try out!)
Other toppings…
- Compliant cheese options (see below)
- Red onion
- Mushrooms
- Black olives
- Spinach or arugula
- Basil
- Proscuitto or ham
- Cooked chicken or ground beef
- etc…
The Ingredients for the Zucchini Pizza Crust
Zucchini
You’ll use 1 cup of zucchini after it’s shredded and the water is removed by squeezing out the excess liquid. I used just one large zucchini!
Coconut flour
Coconut flour helps to absorb excess liquid from the zucchini. I haven’t tried to make this crust coconut free.
Tapioca starch
Tapioca starch helps to make the crust more pliable. You can also use arrowroot starch.
Nutritional yeast
I use nutritional yeast in the crust to really get the cheesy flavor throughout the pizza.
Olive oil
You can also use avocado oil.
Gelatin egg (sub one regular egg)
If you’re egg free, you’ll use a gelatin egg (instructions below). If you can tolerate eggs, you can just use one regular egg.
Cauliflower cheese (optional)
I made a full-on cauliflower cheese wheel for my cookbook (coming in September!) that you can slice into and eat with crackers or as a snack on its own. Seriously I am obsessed with the cheese recipe in the book! I then wound up modifying it by scaling it back and making it thinner for both my lasagna recipe and cauliflower pizza recipe that are also in the book.
I’m using a modified version of the cauliflower cheese for this recipe to give this zucchini pizza an AIP cheese option. This cauliflower cheese tastes creamy and cheesy and gets a bit melty, but make no mistake, it’s still not actually cheese and probably isn’t going to fool anyone that it’s real cheese. If you can tolerate cheese and want to add that instead, that’s a great option as well.
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PrintZucchini Pizza Crust (Paleo, AIP)
- Total Time: 45 minutes
- Yield: 2 servings 1x
Description
This zucchini pizza crust is the perfect veggie pizza crust! It’s grain free, gluten free, dairy free, and egg free.
Ingredients
For the pizza crust & toppings
- 1 cup zucchini, peeled, shredded and excess water drained
- 1/2 cup tapioca starch
- 1/3 cup coconut flour
- 2 tbsp nutritional yeast
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1/4 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp sea salt
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 2 tsp apple cider vinegar
- 1/4 cup water & 1 tbsp gelatin (sub 1 egg if tolerated)
- 1 cup sauce of choice (nomato sauce for AIP)
- Other toppings as desired
For the cauliflower cheese topping (optional)
- 1 1/4 cup cauliflower, steamed
- 1 tbsp plus 2 tsp tapioca starch
- 1 tbsp gelatin
- 1 tbsp nutritional yeast
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tsp apple cider vinegar
- 1/4 tsp salt
Instructions
For the pizza
- Preheat the oven to 375 F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper that’s lightly greased with olive oil.
- Combine the zucchini with the tapioca starch, coconut flour, and nutritional yeast, salt, baking soda, and garlic, and mix.
- Pour in the olive oil and apple cider vinegar and mix well.
- Use 1 regular egg if tolerated, or prepare the gelatin egg by pouring the water into a small pot and sprinkling over the gelatin. Allow hardening for 2-3 minutes. Add the pot to the stove top set to low heat and allow to melt and return to liquid. This should take 1-2 minutes. Once liquid, whisk vigorously until frothy. Add to the crust mixture and stir well to combine.
- Add the dough to the prepared baking sheet and form into a thin 8-9″ crust.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 18-20 minutes. The crust should be lightly golden brown.
- Remove from the oven and top with desired toppings like sauce, cauliflower cheese (recipe below), etc.
- Reduce the oven heat to 350 F and return to the oven for another 5 minutes or so to heat the toppings.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool slightly before carefully slicing and enjoying.
For the cauliflower cheese
- While the cauliflower is still warm, strain some, but not all of the excess water.
- Use a food processor to blend all of the ingredients until smooth.
- Spread the mixture into a thin, even layer on the parchment paper. Allow setting in the fridge for 1 hr or in the freezer for 15-20 minutes.
- Once set, use a biscuit cutter or another mold to cut cheese slices and place on the cooked pizza crust before baking for another 5 minutes.
Notes
Nutritional information is an estimation and will vary. Only applies to pizza crust.
- Prep Time: 20
- Cook Time: 25
- Category: Main dish
- Method: Baked
- Cuisine: Italian American
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 3 slices
- Calories: 323
- Fat: 16g
- Carbohydrates: 40.7g
- Protein: 6.5g
Keywords: pizza
AIP
Low Carb
Paleo
Whole30
Made this last night…. delicious. Although my crust was a bit soggy but that may have been from the pesto topping. I did add some Italian seasoning to the crust to give it a bit more flavor.
★★★★★
I’m assuming most of the carbs are fiber? The tapioca starch I think turns into inulin type starch (indigestible) that bypasses liver processing which means no insulin spike, and is great for bowel biodome health.
Tapioca starch still reads to having higher carbs on an actual nutrition label… but all nutrition facts are estimations and always have a lot of conditions per ingredient!
Thanks for sharing this recipe! For the cauliflower cheese: how do you think parsnips would fare? I’m trying to stick with low-FODMAP and AIP, so I’m curious if you would have any suggestions for making the cheese 🙂
Parsnip would probably be a bit too thick, but there are recipes out there for zucchini cheese! 🙂
This recipe was so good! Not only did this taste amazing, but it sparked joy and a warmth during my mealtime- something that I haven’t felt in a while with food. Thank you!
★★★★★
Was very good and easy
★★★★★
I haven’t enjoyed pizza in months and this was a good amount of work but totally worth it! The cheese was almost like a ricotta. Thank you.
★★★★★
Made this twice this weekend and each time it came out delicious! Although, the first time came out slightly soggy… so the second time I made it, I kept the crust in the oven for about an extra 5 minutes, and then I did not lower the temperature when I put the pizza with toppings back in. Much better 2nd time around! Thank you! I have been looking for a GF pizza crust to make from home.
Can you freeze this crust? Thanks!
I haven’t tried, but let me know if you do!
Is there a substitute for nutritional yeast? I am allergic to it.
This was so yummy. I was skeptical about it tasting like pizza. But it really is a great substitute when you can’t have the real thing. I’m so grateful that you have taken the time to experiment and create such wonderful recipes to share with others! You’re one talented lady!
★★★★★
thank you!!
Can we use agar agar instead of gelatin for this?
Not sure about agar agar since I don’t really work with it!
Did you try this with agar agar? Was it successful? Would love to try it! Thanks!
Definitely labor intensive, BUT well worth the effort! This is the first time I’ve had pizza, including cheese in several years! I used chickpea flour as a substitute for the nutritional yeast as I’m allergic to yeast. Worked fantastic! I find chickpea flour is a good nutritional yeast substitute in most recipes that call for nutritional yeast. Thanks so much for sharing your recipe. I love your site and all the help you give us out here in autoimmune and allergy lands!
★★★★★
I’ve made this crust more than a dozen times (mostly last year) in my air fryer and it was just ok. But last night I finally made it in the oven, and holy moly was it delicious. I tend to shortcut things in my air fryer, frankly because it’s easier and I don’t have to heat up the oven, but it really does not do this crust justice. I will only make it in the oven from now on. Even my husband thought it was good, and he almost always dislikes (or tolerates) my AIP meals.
★★★★★
So glad you enjoyed it! The oven is definitely the way to go with this one. 🙂
Is have tried multiple diff paleo pizza crusts and this one is by far the BEST!!! Thank u for the recipe!!!
So happy to hear that!!
Thank you for a great recipe! It’s my go-to base for flatbread now and I make it routinely, often to have for “sandwiches”/wraps. Sometimes I throw in a slightly different mixture of flours, sometimes throw in some extra chopped up fresh greens, like squash leaves that I have in abundance now. And my typical herbs that I throw in are rosemary and sage. I keep a constant supply in my freezer.
★★★★★
So happy to hear that you love it so much!
This is the absolute most amazing thing I’ve found to cook during AIP!!! I’ve made it three times now, and I’ve made double batches twice. And I made pizza with homemade pesto arugula prosciutto and the cauliflower cheese, which was super weird, but surprisingly it was really good! It doesn’t melt a lot in the oven but just smash it with a fork and you have pizza…viola!!
I also eat it as toast in the morning with AIP raspberry jelly. I also make avocado toast with it. I’m going to make this once a week and have it throughout the week. I just stored in the fridge and a plastic baggie with parchment paper in between each crust. My oven definitely takes longer to cook, and I flip it about 3/4 of the way through cooking and then maybe flip it one more time. I also use my juicer to prep the zucchini. I did shred it by hand the first time and drain it with cheesecloth which is totally fine. Just a little bit more work and mess. My juicer just makes it way too easy.
Even my husband who is a meat and potatoes, pizza, burger kind of guy loved this zucchini bread. Insane!! I needed to make another batch because he ate half of mine with our grilled salmon. The
*** I’ve NEVER left a review about anything like this, if that says anything about this zucchini bread 🙂 The best!!
★★★★★
Aww, I’m so glad you are enjoying it and finding so many uses for this recipe!!
Wow! I honestly wasn’t all that confident I would love this like so many reviewers did. I was pleasantly wrong. This is amazing!! It really hit all my cravings! This is the first time making the nomato sauce, the pizza crust, and the cauliflower cheese. Even hubby approved!! Plus I know I’m eating tons of veggies! I added sautéed chicken breast to the pizza. This is an amazing base for so many pizza toppings!!! You need to try this!!!!
★★★★★
Thank you so much!! I’m so glad you both enjoyed!!