Veganism and Pizza

When you think of pizza, the image that inevitably comes to mind is a pie loaded with a pound of meat, and two pounds of cheese. If there are any veggies, they are rationed out with such miserly care that you'd think the cook was adding gold as a topping! Even on 'vegetarian' pizza, the average mainstream pizzeria is accustomed to burying the vegetables under a mountain of mozzarella - they don't have to pay much attention to how many veggies are under that pile of animal excretion.

Ask your average Pizza Hut waitress for a pizza 'minus cheese' and you will most likely be treated to a glassy-eyed look of raw disbelief. To look at her, you'd think you just asked for a little extra plutonium on your pizza.

But I'm here to tell you, it can be done. First off, if you're really hell-bent on the bleached-white flour 'wonder bread' crust of the mainstream chain pizza; or if you're on the road in say... Cheyenne, Wyoming, and there's just no choice, here are a couple tips. First, the cook will not know how to upwardly adjust the portions of the veggies on a no-cheese pizza. If you just ask for a 'Vegetarian, minus cheese', you're in for a surprise. Bread, pizza sauce that's been baked dry, and about 19 chunks of vegetables. The pizza looks about as attractive as a hairless cat. (the funny side-note here is that the restaurant is saving so much cost by leaving off that cheese that they could afford to go 'wall-to-wall' veggies and still come out ahead). So. What to do... First, order your pie with extra sauce. It's free, and will help to insure that there is some moisture content left to it after the oven. Second, choose a few veggie ingredients at random (maybe three) and ask for 'extra'. There will most likely be an up-charge, but the idea is to get the cook into the mindset of going heavy-handed on the rest of the veggies. It usually works. (yep - pizza psychology 101, folks). One last note: if you know from your former meat-eating life, that a particular chain uses canned veggies (like mushrooms), KISS THAT RESTARUANT GOODBYE. The canned veg might fly if they're window dressing to all that sausage, but not as your main course.

So what else is there besides the chains? Ma-and-Pa pizza joints, and the more 'gourmet' pizza places. Ma-and-Pa are likely to use the canned goods (longer shelf life). The best example of the gourmet in Anchorage, and probably the best place in town to get a good vegan pie is Mooses Tooth. They offer whole wheat crusts on all but the largest size pizza (whole wheat, it seems, doesn't hold together beyond a certain diameter). And you'll find choices right of the menu that don't need to be custom ordered! Tip: Do you like eggplant? How about artichoke? Calamata olives?? Try ordering the 'Purple Haze'. It's no longer on the menu, but the more senior staff will still know it, and you'll look like a veteran Mooses Tooth patron for having ordered it.

Okay. How about at home? First, I've found that Papa Murphy's does an excellent job of making a cheese-less veggie pizza, if you can deal with the fluffy white flour crust. And - bonus! - you can watch them make it (e.g. - make sure they don't screw up). Sometimes asking for no cheese is akin to asking for no ice in your soda. The server has the best intentions, but just can't stop their hand from doing it's thing.

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And finally, there's even an alternative for frozen pizza - CHEESELESS frozen pizza from the grocery store. And you'll find it at most Carrs or Fred Meyer's health-food freezers. It's Amy's brand No Cheese pizza. It doesn't use tomato based sauce, but instead uses a bed of caramelized onion and garlic. And they're on a whole wheat crust. Goooood stuff.