Portable, handheld little pizza muffins make the best lunchbox item for little hands, a fun snack after school, or a soft yummy side to a bowl of soup!
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Ahhh…school lunch pizza day.
Brings back memories, doesn’t it?! That school pizza could look a hundred years old, but I would always still go for it because, well, it’s pizza! I wrote this post back in 2014 when my oldest was off to kindergarten. It’s been a number of years (that little one below is in high school now!), and I’m updating some older recipes and pictures. These pizza muffins are *still* a staple in our home for my younger 2, so I just had to update this one! During that first year of kindergarten, I found out that they had a pizza day fundraiser *every week*…I probably would have been fine with a one time deal, but I couldn’t get behind this being an every week event with the pizza restaurant they were buying from. I decided I’d send her with leftover pizza if we had the chance to make homemade, but I knew I’d have to have a plan for most weeks that involved something less fussy. At the time, I was not only working through my first year of having a kindergartener, I also had a 3 year old and 1 year old at home!
Easy prep and freezable!
That was literally the name of my game back then (still is most of the time now too!). With 3 kids under the age of 6, I needed to be able to pack her lunches quickly, and not be cooking everyday. These pizza muffins were the answer to our pizza day dilemma, and to this day, my youngest who is in 4th grade now definitely still asks for pizza muffins on those pizza days. My middle schooler and high schooler still love them too, but tend to need to pack more alongside – we’ll get to those ideas in a minute!
Lunchbox perfect!
Less mess, less fuss, and still so delicious! Pizza muffins have become one of those lunchbox staples that I rely on in a pinch. Always prepped in my freezer ready to go! I take them out frozen right into the lunchbox and they thaw by lunchtime. You could also take them out the night before to thaw. When the girls were little, I usually packed pizza muffins with an easy to sip veggie soup puree like broccoli soup, tomato soup, butternut squash soup, or zucchini soup. I’d put a little protein on the side like a hard boiled egg or meat stick along with a little piece of fruit too. As the girls have gotten bigger, I tend to pack Caesar salads, but they still really love the soup days – especially in the winter. We still do a lot of the same protein and fruit sides as well.
The Method :: The Veggies
In my original recipe, I chopped the peppers and onions, but over the years I ended up tossing the entire batter into a food processor. It was more to make the batter faster and easier, rather than hiding the veggies, although I know so many of you will have kids that appreciate not “seeing” the veggies inside! Simply toss your veggies in to pulse, and you’ll see in the next step that the batter follows right in after. I recommend not skipping the veggie step – the sweet and savory flavor that comes from these veggies really help with that pizza flavor!
The Method :: The batter
Once you have your veggies pulsed down, you’ll add in the rest of the batter ingredients, blend until smooth, and then fold in the pepperoni and cheese! If you’re dairy free, you can use the Viola Life dairy free coconut based “cheese” or just leave the cheese out. I have also found adding a good few tablespoons of nutritional yeast makes a cheese free pizza muffin have a cheese like flavor.
The Method :: Baking the muffins
You can make your pizza muffins regular sized or mini! The both freeze fantastic. You’ll find that as your kids get older, they will want the bigger ones, so if you have little ones at home, enjoy the minis if you have one of those pans at home. My 4th grader still enjoys a mini muffin for sure!
What’s the texture like?
These pizza muffins are super soft and easy to eat! The texture stays the same even frozen. In the past I have sent along pizza sauce or pesto to dip, and the pesto is a big hit here. In my original recipe, I used 4 separate gluten free flours. This was before gluten free flour blends were more readily available and more affordable! For a number of years I have been making pizza muffins with gluten free flour blends like Namaste, and it makes the texture even softer, as well as making the muffins faster to prep!
Pizza Muffins :: Perfect For “Pizza Day” At School!
Ingredients
- 1/2 medium onion quartered
- 1/2 bell pepper quartered
- 1 small/medium carrot quartered
- 1 1/2 cups Namaste Gluten Free Flour Blend
- 1 tsp aluminum free baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1-2 TB organic pure cane sugar or coconut sugar
- 3/4 cup organic pizza sauce
- 1/4 cup coconut milk or raw milk
- 1/4 cup olive oil or avocado oil melted butter or coconut oil works too
- 3 eggs
- 1 TB Italian seasoning
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1/2 tsp sea salt
- 3/4 cup chopped pepperoni Could do cooked sausage or ham too!
- 3/4 cup shredded raw/organic cheese of choice See Tips section if you are dairy free
Instructions
- Pre-heat the oven to 375 degrees. You'll need either a silicone muffin pan, or a muffin pan lined with paper cups or silicone cups. Both regular sized muffin pans and mini muffin pans work.
- Put the onion, pepper, & carrot into your food processor, and pulse until the veggies are in little pieces, about the size of rice.
- Add the rest of the ingredients EXCEPT the pepperoni and cheese. Blend into a smooth batter.
- Fold the pepperoni and cheese into the batter, and scoop the batter into your prepared muffin pan.
- Bake regular sized pizza muffins at 375 degrees for 25-30 minutes, or mini muffins for about 20 minutes.
Notes
- If you’re dairy free, you can use the Viola Life dairy free coconut based “cheese” or just leave the cheese out. I have also found adding a good few tablespoons of nutritional yeast makes a cheese free pizza muffin have a cheese like flavor.
These sound amazing…and your pictures are fantabulous. I’m literally *drooling* while reading the recipe and looking at the pics. Can’t wait to make these for the fam. Thank you! 🙂
Hi Jessica! Thank you! I’m sure the kiddos will love it 🙂
Cant wait to make these. Look so good. Wish I had pinterest when my kids were growing up. Would have made these healthy options instead of sweet yucky cupcakes, but the again, I didnt know any better back then. Glad things have changed for the better for today’s moms! Thanks for sharing
Hi Jean 🙂 You are absolutely right – when you just don’t know any better how would you even know to change it. No guilt on you at all – just pass the info along to friends and family with the little ones now and make it better for our next generation of kiddos 🙂
This looks like such a great, creative, delicious snack. Your kids are very lucky!
Amazing! Pinned twice!
Great post!! Trish
Oh goodness! What a great and delicious idea. Will be trying this!
I saw this post on Pinterest and it really peaked my interest! I love how creative it is. Will be giving this a try when I can have rice again!
You know this is going into the rotation soon. I’ll be trying the egg free version.
My kids are going to love these. 🙂 I probably will too…. 😉
Every time I try to make savoury muffins I am met with resistance, but these might do the trick!
Great Naomi!
If I don’t have sorghum flour can I use coconut flour or something else? Thanks!
Hi Jamie! Brown rice flour would be a good swap – a whole grain gluten free flour would be better than more of a white one like the white rice flour. So oat flour or quinoa flour or even almond flour would work too. Does that help?
Do you think I could get away with using a gluten free flour mix? The blend I have had all the same flours 🙂 These sound delish
Yep that should work!
Made these tonight and they were a huge hit with my girls. I used einkorn flour because we are not completely gluten free and they were great. My 3 year old asked me to save her one for breakfast tomorrow.
My kids have loved all of your recipes that I have made for them. Thank you!
That’s awesome Nadia!
How would you sub regular flour for this? I use wheat and einkorn.
Hi Lexy! I’m not real experienced with wheat flour so I’m not quite sure in this recipe! If you give it a shot let us know!
What an insanely delicious idea!
These were great! They’re also very easy to make. This will be my new go to recipe when I need something “safe” for my oldest kid to eat on an outing. He is allergic to wheat, dairy, eggs, soy, peanuts, tree nuts, and sesame. This recipe is so easy, I’m sure he could learn to make it himself. (Then I won’t have to spend an afternoon making calzones.) Thank you for sharing! My kids love your chicken nuggets & soaked oatmeal recipes, too.
That is so awesome Carrie! So glad he has something fun and safe to eat!
Do we need to precook/fry the veges off first? Thanks
How are these cold? Is the texture still good? Trying to figure out if I can send these in lunchboxes.
Hi Carrie! The texture is soft and fantastic cold – I send them in the lunchbox at room temp!