This lemon ricotta pizza topped with basil is a spin off my pasta version. There’s something about the combination of ricotta, lemon and basil that I absolutely love. It is one of my favorite, quick and easy sauces to toss spaghetti in, so I figured it would be just as comforting and delicious as sauce over pizza. If you don’t have pizza dough, you can simply make this mixture and use it to spread over fresh ciabatta bread. You can eat it right after you lather the mixture on the ciabatta, or you can still bake in the oven as if you were following the pizza recipe directions. However you decide you enjoy this creamy goodness, you can’t go wrong with this magical combination of flavors!

Ingredients:

• 250g pizza dough, room temperature

• All purpose flour, just for dusting

• 1 cup (or so) of ricotta cheese

• Zest of 1 lemon

• Juice of 1 lemon

• Salt, to taste

• Olive oil

• ½ tsp dried oregano

• A few fresh basil leaves, sliced

• Crushed red chili flakes, optional garnish

Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 450.

2. In a small mixing bowl, whisk together: ricotta cheese, lemon zest, ½ teaspoon salt, little drizzle of olive oil and a splash of lemon juice. Mix well until combined, then taste. At this point you can decide if it needs more salt to bring out flavor or more lemon juice to thin it out and add citrus flavor. Set aside.

3. Lightly dust a clean work surface with flour and begin to roll out your pizza dough into your desired shape. Transfer rolled out dough onto a well oiled baking sheet.

4. Spread your ricotta mixture over the rolled out dough into a thin, even layer. Sprinkle with dried oregano, fresh basil leaves and another little drizzle of olive oil.

5. Bake for 15-20 minutes. Let cool slightly before cutting. Serve as is, or garnish with fresh basil and lemon zest. You may drizzle a little olive oil over top before serving and spice up with chili flakes.

We’d love to see your finished product! Post your picture on Instagram, tag us @danimade.kitchen and hashtag it #danimade