Gluten-Free Pepperoni Pizza Bites

These absolutely awesome gluten-free pepperoni pizza bites are made with Schär gluten-free puff pastry dough, pizza sauce, turkey pepperoni and buffalo mozzarella cheese. So easy to make, too!

the gluten-free pizza quest

One of the things I miss most about having to eat sans gluten, is just ordering a pizza for delivery. And even though they have gluten-free options at pizzerias, I’m just too scared of cross-contamination.

So I have been on a perpetual quest to find good gluten-free pizza that reminds me of the real thing without having to make the crust from scratch using yeast, etc. And lately we’ve been getting closer.

Recently, I used the Schär puff pastry dough as a pizza crust. It was actually really great for this BBQ chicken pizza. Bendable, light and crispy.

Well my search is finally over… these little gluten-free pepperoni pizza bites were the bomb! They remind me of mini versions of Red Baron Personal Deep Dish Pepperoni Pizzas. No lie. I would not lie about this.

We tried this simple recipe several times with different combos of ingredients and cooking times to get it just right, and the last attempt actually worked out perfectly! I am so beyond excited about these mini gluten-free pepperoni pizzas.

pre-cook the puff pastry dough

We have been using this Schär gluten-free puff pastry dough to make a lot of goodies around here. I absolutely loved using it to make the crust for mini quiche Lorraine bites and spinach goat feta puff pastries.

I have found that with the mini quiche and spinach puffs, I do not need to pre-cook the puff pastry dough. But that with pizza, it really needs to be pre-cooked about 5-6 minutes before adding the pizza sauce and ingredients.

So here is how the pastry prep goes. After thawing the dough, use a small glass bowl to cut out 16 circles in the puff pastry.

Then roll out the circles with a rolling pin to make them more pliable and less puffy when cooked. Press into a mini muffin tin so that the edges are covered. You want to keep the toppings from seeping between the muffin pan and the crust.

Then take some of the extra pieces and press into the bottom of the crust to make it a little thicker at the bottom.

There will be a little extra pastry dough so roll out 3-4 balls and turn those into crusts as well. I usually get 19-20 crusts from one sheet of Schär gluten-free puff pastry dough in total.

After baking the puff pastry, let cool for a few minutes before adding the pizza sauce, pepperoni and cheese.

choosing buffalo mozzarella cheese

Usually I use my go-to hard goat mozzarella cheese for pizzas and other recipes. It makes the best fried cheese sticks. But it didn’t really work in this recipe. It wasn’t melty enough. I wanted a more pillowy, stretchy melt from the cheese.

So we thought why not try buffalo mozzarella cheese instead?

It might melt better. And it did.

I just chopped it up and mixed it with chopped pepperoni. The sauce goes down first and then the cheese/pepperoni mixture goes on top. Then you bake it for about 12 minutes or until the cheese has melted and the crusts have browned.

Did you know that buffalo milk predominantly contains the A2 casein as does sheep and goat milk. Which is easier on the digestive system. So yay to that!

And Campania Felix Buffalo Mozzarella (found at Central Market in Austin in the epic cheese section – not sponsored) from Italy is made from some of the best buffalo milk. Here is a quote from their website about how the buffalo are fed and treated:

All soils are invested in fodder with a classic rotation system that allows breeding to have great availability of high-quality fodder. The result is a high quality product, obtained from animals reared well because fed in a natural way and not driven to produce at all costs. The milk produced in these conditions is definitely the best you can get.

It is wonderful freshly sliced but also melts into bubbly soft stretchy cheese. I’m sure any type of fresh buffalo mozzarella would work in this recipe. But this was pretty epic.

choosing the other ingredients

Well there are only two other ingredients needed. The pizza sauce and the turkey pepperoni.

I really like the gluten-free Field Day organic pizza sauce. It comes in a 15.5 ounce jar and I only need some of it for one pizza. So I freeze the rest in small containers and we have pizza sauce on hand in the freezer.

As for the pepperoni, I have switched to turkey because we are eating way less pork at home. Plus turkey pepperoni is actually less greasy when you cook it in the pizza bites. We really like Boar’s Head sliced turkey pepperoni (it’s gluten-free, too).

These gluten-free mini pepperoni bites stored in the fridge and reheated really well in the microwave. I did not get a chance to test the freeze-ablity. Maybe next time we’ll pop some in the freezer before eating them all. ?

So if you’ve been missing cheesy gooey pepperoni pizza bites in your gluten-free life, hopefully you’ll love this recipe as much as I do!

want more fun gluten-free snack bite ideas?

• fried artichoke hearts
• ranch cucumber bites
• southwestern egg rolls
• vegetarian jalapeno poppers
• fried chicken tenders
• shishito peppers and spiked chipotle mayo
• pecan pie mini tarts
• puff pastry beignets

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Gluten-Free Pepperoni Pizza Bites

These absolutely awesome gluten-free pepperoni pizza bites are made with Schär gluten-free puff pastry dough, pizza sauce, turkey pepperoni and buffalo mozzarella cheese.

Course Appetizer, Main Course, Snack

Cuisine American

Keyword buffalo mozzarella, pepperoni, pizza bites, Schär puff pastry

Prep Time 20 minutes

Cook Time 17 minutes

Total Time 37 minutes

Servings 20 bites

Ingredients

• 1 sheet Schär gluten-free puff pastry dough
• 1/3 cup pizza sauce
• 7 oz buffalo mozzarella
• 20 slices turkey pepperoni

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

2. Roughly chop the buffalo mozzarella and place into a strainer and let the water drain from it. This is important because the cheese retains a lot of water and if you don't let it dry out a bit, the water will affect the baking process.

3. Thaw the sheet of puff pastry dough. Roll out and use a small glass bowl to cut out 16 circles in from the pastry dough. Roll four small balls with some of the excess dough.

4. Use a rolling pin to thin out the puff pastry circles. Press into a mini-muffin tin. Make sure the edges are covered so the toppings won't overflow between the crust and muffin tin. Take some of the extra dough and push into the bottoms of the puff pastry to make the bottom thicker.

5. Bake in the oven for 5 minutes. Remove and let cool a bit.

6. Chop the turkey pepperoni slices and mix with the buffalo mozzarella ina small bowl.

7. Fill the pre-cooked puff pastries with a small spoonful of pizza sauce. Then a large spoonful of the mozarella and pepperoni. Bake for about 12 minutes so that the cheese has melted and crusts have browned.

8. Let cool on a cooling rack for a few minutes. Remove the puffs to cool completely on a cooling rack or plate.

9. Can be stored in the fridge for a few days and reheated in the microwave.