Chorizo and Goat Cheese Pita Pizzas

Make these simple chorizo and goat cheese pita pizzas for a light dinner or as an appetizer for four. They only take about 20 minutes start to finish!

 Updated from the archives. First published in August 2009

Chorizo and Goat Cheese Pita Pizzas

Sometimes the best things come from seemingly mismatched odds and ends that, together, turn into something delicious. Take, for example, some pitas topped with warm Mexican chorizo, creamy goat cheese, and fresh grape tomatoes. It’s not a combo I would have come up with during an official sit-down recipe planning session and only came to be as I stood in front of my fridge in a desperate attempt to avoid ordering pizza for dinner. Spontaneity is often the catalyst for creativity and, in this case, I ended up with something much better than pizza delivery.

As is, the recipe serves two for dinner or maybe four as an appetizer but with extra ingredients, there’s no reason you can’t pop an extra baking sheet in the oven and double the servings to stretch it out a bit. For me, it was a simple dinner on a Saturday but I imagine these would go over well as a game-day snack or as tasty bites for a small holiday get-together along with glasses of crisp white wine or a margarita wine spritzer.

Some Ingredients You’ll Need

• Pitas: I’ve been known to use flour tortillas to make “pizzas”, but I prefer pitas because they’re a little sturdier and don’t get weighed down by the toppings.
• Mexican chorizo: Not to be confused with Spanish chorizo which is cooked when you buy it. Mexican chorizo, most often made with pork and a variety of spices needs to be cooked first. I consider it a bit of an indulgence because it’s rich and flavorful – it’s definitely not an everyday sort of ingredient, but for these pizzas, I’m not sure I would substitute anything else because the flavor is so unique.
• Monterey jack cheese serves two purposes: first, it’s a great melting cheese and, two, as it melts over the chorizo it sort of holds it in place so when you take a bite you don’t have to worry about losing any of the chorizo. Nothing worse than a pizza with toppings that fall off when you take a bite.
• Goat cheese: Unlike the Monterey jack cheese, the goat cheese holds its shape in the oven and just sort of warms through so when you take a bite you get a tangy creaminess that is a nice contrast to the chorizo.
• Grape tomatoes and diced red onion add a little freshness. They don’t really cook in the oven and maintain their shape and flavor.

More Recipes for Two

• Creamy Gruyere Spaghetti for Two
• Easy Ground Turkey Taco Bowls
• 30-Minute Sesame Beef Bowls