Pesto Pizza Twists

Pizza:  crust, sauce, and cheese. Does it get much better than that? Probably not. So that's where we're beginning our journey.

These pizza twists are a remake of typical cinnamon-sugar twists. Starting with pre-made dough and sauce makes these a quick recipe to toss together for dinner on a week night or a lazy weekend as well!

All I can say was yum. These were delicious, and the garlic powder on top added just the right amount of flavoring to complement the pesto.

Start with pre-made pizza crust, mozzarella, Parmesan, sun dried tomatoes, and pesto spread. The pre-made dough makes this recipe so quick!

Roll out the dough and slice into two long equal sized pieces. It doesn't matter if it's perfect, as you can stretch the dough around to match edges later.

Spread the glorious pesto spread all over one piece of the dough. Make sure to spread it all over, as that gives the cheese something to stick to!

Spread your sliced sun dried tomatoes around. I prefer to arrange them so I won't slice through the tomatoes when slicing the dough into pieces later.

Sprinkle the mozzarella then Parmesan all over. It's starting to look like a pizza coming together!

Fold the empty dough piece over the loaded, and seal your edges. Slice into about 1" slices. The thicker the slice, the easier the twisting part. The slices puff up somewhat when you bake them, so make sure not to slice too thickly. 

Pick up a slice, twist it, then place onto a pizza stone. Sprinkle with garlic powder, or spices of your choice.

Don't worry if cheese oozes out and starts melting- you can break it off later if it bothers you! I think it adds some nice crispy pieces though :)

Bake for 8-10 minutes at 450F, then remove from oven. Don't these look delicious? And it's so easy to toss together!

Yum. Up close and personal with a pesto pizza twist. Look at that cheese and pesto deliciousness.

An alternative to the twist is to roll the 1" slices into pinwheels then baking. This gives you a nice melty center if you like that! These won't last long when put on the table! They can easily be modified with red pizza sauce and the toppings of your choice. 

Recipe

Feeds: 4 (About 12 twists) ~ Prep time: 5 mins ~ Cook time: 10 mins ~ Total time: 15 mins

Ingredients

• 1 pre-packaged pizza crust (I used the Pillsbury Thin Crust pizza dough so they wouldn't be as bready)
• 1/4 cup pesto spread
• 1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
• 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese
• 1/4 cup sliced sun dried tomatoes
• Garlic powder (to taste)

Instructions

1. Place pizza stone in cold oven (If you don't have a pizza stone, a regular baking sheet will be just fine but bump the temperature down to 425F so the twists don't brown on the bottom)
2. Preheat oven to 450F
3. Unroll pizza crust onto pastry sheet or other working surface
4. Slice pizza crust into two long equal sized pieces (cut down middle on the short side so you get two long pieces, or "hot dog style")
5. Spread pesto all over one piece of the dough
6. Disperse sun dried tomatoes equally on top of pesto
7. Sprinkle mozzarella then Parmesan cheese over pesto
8. Flip empty dough piece on top of loaded dough piece to form an envelop around the filling
9. Press to seal edges
10. Slice approximately 1" slices, then twist and transfer to pizza stone (they can also be rolled into pinwheels if so desired!)
11. Sprinkle with garlic powder to taste
12. Bake 8-10 minutes, or until golden brown
13. Remove from oven and place on cooling rack

Happy Snacking :)