Portobello Pizzas (Oil-Free)

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Saucy, cheesy, and flavorful, these Portobello Pizzas might just be your new favorite way to eat pizza! Firm Portobello mushroom caps are loaded with pizza sauce, homemade healthy vegan mozzarella, the veggies of your choice, and baked to perfection. These Portobello pizzas make the perfect appetizer or entree.

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I LOVED pizza before going whole food plant based. Not as much as I loved pasta, mind you, but I really did love it. So since I don’t believe in cutting things completely out of my diet (except meat, dairy, eggs, and fish obviously), I knew I had to find some new ways to enjoy pizza.

I’ve made quite a few whole wheat pita pizzas, but the brand of pita I buy is kinda high in sodium. I could make my own (and I’ll definitely try it soon), but I really needed a lazy girl way to make pizza.

Enter Portobello pizzas! Not only is this a very easy way to make pizzas (30 minutes from start to finish!), it’s also a very vegetable-forward way to enjoy pizza flavors.

And of course, that ooey gooey homemade vegan mozzarella cheese? All it takes is the whiz of a blender! This cheese recipe is based heavily on my homemade stretchy vegan mozzarella on my other blog, but the version I’ll give you today uses miso instead of salt.

Use any toppings you like. If it’s a special occasion, try the vegan pepperoni or tofu sausage crumbles recipes I have on my other blog too.

Otherwise, load it up with veggies for a super healthy but flavorful dish.

Ingredients

See the recipe card below for the full ingredients list (with amounts) and instructions.

Portobello Pizzas

• Portobello Mushrooms: Choose firm portobellos with a real “ridge” around the edge. This helps keep all the pizza sauce, vegan mozzarella, and toppings from leaking out into the baking dish. The portobellos should almost look like a bowl once you remove the stem.
• Coconut Aminos: This allows us to give our mushrooms a little flavor without adding too much liquid. If you can’t have any added salt, try using balsamic vinegar or unsalted vegetable broth instead.
• Dried Italian Seasoning: I like to sprinkle this on the mushrooms right after I dress them with the coconut aminos.
• Pizza Sauce: Use the pizza sauce of your choice! I really like the fat-free pizza sauce from Trader Joe’s (it’s oil-free!), but it does have sodium. If you need a sodium-free pizza sauce, you can easily make your own by blending whole canned peeled tomatoes with basil, oregano, granulated onion, and granulated garlic.
• Vegan Mozzarella: Check out my recipe below for a healthy homemade vegan mozzarella!
• Toppings: You can use any toppings you like! I like to use red onion, bell pepper, and these sun-dried tomatoes from Trader Joe’s that come dry, not packed in oil. Other good options include artichoke hearts, finely chopped broccoli, spinach, black olives, roasted red peppers, banana peppers, etc.

Vegan Mozzarella Cheese Sauce

This is heavily based on my existing vegan mozzarella cheese sauce on my other blog, but this version uses miso instead of salt and silken tofu as a shortcut.

• Silken Tofu: This is the base of the sauce and it makes the sauce very silky and smooth but low in fat and high in protein. You can substitute a cup of white beans, soaked raw cashews, or soaked raw sunflower seeds, but you will need water to make it blend (the silken tofu has enough water in it to blend without adding liquid).
• Unsweetened Soy Milk: You can use any unsweetened, unflavored non-dairy milk. I just always have organic soy milk in my house because I buy it in shelf stable cartons. I buy from a brand that makes soy milk from just organic non-GMO soy beans and water.
• Lemon Juice: While fresh squeezed is best, use what you have on hand.
• Non-Fortified Nutritional Yeast: To keep the cheese pale like real mozzarella, I used non-fortified nutritional yeast. You can use whatever you have on hand.
• Granulated Onion and Granulated Garlic: These add a lot of nice “cheesy” flavor to the recipe.
• Yellow or White Miso Paste: This is to replace the salt in the recipe, but I also love the little hint of umami flavors. Per Dr. Michael Greger of NutritionFacts.org, the soy in miso has a protective effect so the sodium in miso paste will not affect us negatively. Please feel free to omit or use a pinch of salt if that is what you prefer.
• Tapioca Flour (Tapioca Starch): This allow us to get a stretchy and “solid” feel to the cooked mozzarella sauce. If you don’t have it, you can add some arrowroot powder or cornstarch and it will thicken the cheese sauce but it will not stretch the way it does with tapioca starch. Since these Portobello pizzas are pretty small and not like a big slice or a grilled cheese, that might not matter that much anyway.

How to Make Portobello Pizzas

Watch me make this recipe or follow the step-by-step instructions below.

1. Prep the Oven and Baking Dish: Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit (200 degrees Celsius) and line a baking dish with parchment paper (whatever size baking dish will fit all your mushrooms! You can use two if you need to.). I used a deeper baking dish but I think a rimmed baking tray should also work fine. With the baking dish, I cut diagonal slits at each corner so I could line the walls of the baking dish too. This helped contain any mess and made cleanup a breeze.
2. Make the Cheese: If you haven’t already, blend the cheese ingredients in the blender until smooth. Taste. It will taste a little chalky from the tapioca starch, but that flavor will go away after baking. Now is a good time to adjust the saltiness, spices, lemon, etc.
3. Clean the Mushrooms and Remove the Stems: Clean the Portobello mushrooms with a damp cloth, making sure to gently clean the gills and inside rim as well. Use a small knife to very carefully remove the stem. I save the stems to eat at another time (I chop them up and throw them in a cooked vegetable side or something).
4. Season the Mushrooms: Place the mushroom caps upside down in the lined baking dish. Add about a teaspoon of coconut aminos (or balsamic vinegar or unsalted vegetable broth if totally salt-free) to each mushroom cap and use a silicone basting brush or your fingers to gently brush the whole mushroom with the coconut aminos. Sprinkle dried Italian seasoning on each mushroom cap.
5. Assemble the Portobello Pizzas: Add a spoonful of pizza sauce to each mushroom cap. Then place a large spoonful of the cheese over the top of where you just put the sauce. Finally, sprinkle your toppings onto each pizza.
6. Bake: Place the baking dish on the center rack in your oven and bake for 20-25 minutes until the cheese looks solidified, the veggie toppings have softened, and the mushrooms look cooked. Remove from the oven and allow to sit for 5 minutes.
7. Serve: Carefully scoop out each pizza and place on a plate. For a full meal, my partner and I each eat 3 pizzas along with a starch like a serving of air fried French fries (recipe coming soon).

Expert Tips

• Don’t Choose Flat Mushroom Caps: To contain all our pizza sauce, cheese, and topping goodness, you really want to pick Portobellos that have a ridge along the underside. If you flip the mushroom upside down, it should look like a bowl. If not, a lot of the sauce and cheese can run off and get a lot messier.
• Don’t Skip Seasoning the Mushrooms: I love the extra layer of flavor I get from having seasoned the mushrooms with the coconut aminos and dried Italian seasoning. I think it will still taste good though if you have to use balsamic vinegar or unsalted vegetable stock (if you’re totally sodium free, that is).
• Serve Immediately: I think these might get a little too soft when reheated the next day, so I highly recommend only making as many Portobello pizzas as you’re going to eat the first night! Luckily they’re pretty light, so polishing all 6 off between 2 people was no hardship. If cooking for one, just make two or three!
• The Cheese Keeps Well: I have you make a whole batch of cheese sauce for this Portobello pizzas recipe because it’s hard to only use part of a package of silken tofu. You can put this cheese on everything, but since there is tapioca starch in it (or cornstarch or arrowroot powder), you will need to cook whatever you put it on! Try it on grilled cheese, in a baked pasta dish (coming soon!), or in a cheesy rice casserole (coming soon!).

Serving Suggestions

These Portobello pizzas go great with anything! They’d be excellent as an entree along with a starch like pasta or potatoes.

To keep things lighter, try a side of my kale sweet potato salad or potato and cauliflower soup!

You could also serve them as an appetizer along with veggies and a fun hummus like my spinach artichoke hummus or butter bean hummus!

Portobello Pizzas Recipe

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