Name: Vegan White Sauce and Sourdough Thin Crust Pizza
Prep time: 8 h
Cook time: 20 min
Total time: 8 h 20 min
Yield: 10
Ingredients: 2 cups Plain Oat Milk; .5 cups Whole Wheat Flour; .25 cups Olive Oil; .5 cups Chopped Onion; 3 Cloved Garlic Minced; Dash Fresh Ground Nutmeg; .5 teaspoons Salt; Pepper to taste; 8 cups Whole Wheat Flour; 1 cup Sour Dough Starter; 3 cups Water; 2 tablespoons Sugar; 2 teaspoons Sea Salt; 2 tablespoons Olive oil

Instructions

Vegan White Sauce

We wanted to create something creamy and wonderful to use in place of cheese for one of our personal pizzas tonight. If we had vegan cheese we could have used that, but we needed to be creative and work with what we had on hand. The result was a vegan white sauce that would have made even non-vegans say YUM!! Saute the chopped onion in olive oil until soft. Add the garlic and stir until fragrant. Next add the flour and stir until it is well coated and just lightly toasted. Pour the milk slowly into the hot pan as you continue to stir and simmer over medium heat until thickened. Add salt and pepper to taste, and just a few shavings of fresh nutmeg. We choose to use a stick blender to make a smooth sauce, but you could certainly leave it chunky if that is your preference.

Whole Wheat Thin Pizza Crust

To make the crust we started in the morning, grinding red winter wheat berries on the fine setting. We then used a single strainer and then double strainer to extract about 25-30% of the bran. Leaving a decided still whole wheat flour, but less dense. We'll use the bran for muffins or as a fiber add in to hot cereal. In a large bowl combine the flour, sour dough starter, water, sugar and salt and combine using a heavy spoon. The dough will be wet and hard to work with by hand. But if you can grab the edges with a silicone spatula you can turn and twist the bowl and work the dough to activate the gluten. Continue "kneeding" best you can for at least five minutes. Then place in an oiled bowl, cover, and let rest until doubled in size. This can vary greatly from 5-12 hours or more depending on your starter. Divide the dough into six pieces and roll each flat and place inside a parchment lined baking pan. Let rest another 1-2 hours. Top your pizzas as you like best and bake in a 400° oven for 20 minutes or until the crust is done on the bottom and the top is bubbly and lightly starting to brown. Place the dough in a large oiled bowl with a lid and let rest until doubled in size. Depending on the starter (yeast) you are using, this may take anywhere from 5-12 hours.

Note

We milled hard red winter wheat this morning. And used a fine sieve to remove about a quarter of the bran (which we use for muffins or added fiber in hot cereal.) The made the dough consistency somewhat wet, but not as wet as for the ciabatta. We placed the dough in an oiled bowl with a cover and let rise for five hours until it doubled in size before rolling it out onto baking sheets lined with parchment where they to rest for 90 minutes before topping and baking. Our toppings tonight were mostly from the pantry which helped make it easy. For those having cheese, we had mozzarella. For the meat eaters we have pepperoni in the fridge. The vegetarian pizza topping options tonight included fresh sweet pepper, canned mushrooms, canned pinapple, canned black olives, canned artichoke hearts and red pepper flakes. We also put a couple of jalapenos on the stove top grill for folks who like that BITE! In addition to the white sauce we found a lovely New Jersey brand of canned tomatoes that make a perfect sauce for these not so traditional tomato pies!

Vegan White Sauce and Sourdough Thin Crust Pizza