Sky High Pizza Pie

Love Pizza? Love Lasagne? This epic Sky High Pizza Pie is a meaty Bolognese layered with lasagne noodles baked in a deep dish pizza crust. It’s the best of both Italian American favourites.

Sky High Pizza Pie

So, it’s 2016 and as I am typing this, I can hear my pizza bubbling away in the oven. It was a bit labour intensive, but we’ll just call The Sky High Pizza Pie a labour of love! It’s more than just a deep dish pizza, it’s a pizza filled with layers of pasta and meat; it’s a lasagne!

How you say…Guanciale?

First things first, let’s work a little on our Italian shall we? There are some pretty intense words I am going to use and you should know how to pronounce them in your head as you are reading. Let’s start with one of the challenge ingredients; Guanciale.

For heaven’s sake, don’t google how to say it because those robot voices just cannot mimic the way a true Italian speaks. Say it now, “Gwan cha lay” If you still aren’t sure, head down to any Italian deli (like the one at Lina’s Italian Market) and they will correct you!

Guanciale is a very fatty piece of Italian cured meat prepared from pork jowl, or cheeks. I honestly had no idea what to do with it, but I had a good chat with Neil McCue, chef/owner of Whitehall Restaurant here in Calgary.

We threw around some ideas and when I mentioned I might just render it and use the fat to cook onions, he suggested I used it in the actual pizza dough instead of olive oil. So I did.

How you say…Bolognese

The next thing I did was make a Bolognese. Say it, “bo-lo-NYeh-say“! Making the Bolognese begins with a Soffritto (sohf/FREET/toh) using three traditional ingredients; onions,carrots, and celery. This trio is diced, then added to the pan and allowed to sweat until they are soft.

Next, I added some brown crimini mushrooms  (another challenge ingredient) to the soffritto and allowed it all to cook further.Once, finished, I scraped it all into a bowl and began to brown the Italian Sausage (the third challenge ingredient) by taking the meat mixture out of the sausage casings.

I used a ratio of two spicy Italian Sausages to four regular Italian Sausages. When the sausage was cooked through, I added the veggies/mushrooms, a jar of my homemade passata (tomato purée),  and some fresh basil chiffonade (that’s a French word for finely sliced). Then I let it gently simmer for a couple of hours with the lid on.

So, if you are following, I have the Guanciale pizza dough and the Bolognese on the go. Then, I made some fresh pasta. I’ve pretty much used every kitchen appliance by this point; the KitchenAid mixer, the food processor, the pasta roller…

After the pizza dough has doubled in size, I give it a punch down, then line a 9 inch spring form pan with baking paper and grease it with the guanciale fat for good measure. Rolling out the dough was super easy because it was so fluffy.

It went into the pan nicely, then I lined it with foil and blind baked it (using chickpeas) for about 20 minutes at 350 F. I took out the foil and chickpeas and baked it for another ten minutes.

How to Construct a Sky High Pizza Pie

Then it was time for the lasagne construction. Did you notice I didn’t say ‘Lasagna’? That’s because in Italian they say lasagne instead of lasagna. Any how, I built the layers up, with the last layer being entirely of fresh basil topped with pasta, sauce, and finally…cheese!

Concerned that the top would get too browned during the final bake, I covered the top with greased foil, removing it for the last 15 minutes of cooking so the cheese would brown.

Sky High Pizza Pie

If you make this Sky High Pizza Pie recipe, I’d love to hear about it in the comments section or in the ratings. Be sure to follow me on Facebook and Pinterest for my latest recipes. Also, if you do make this recipe please share your photos and tag me on Instagram. I hope you like this recipe!