If you are looking for a fun play on pizza with sweet and salty notes, you will love this prosciutto and pear pizza. The pears ever so lightly caramelize just enough for their sugars to release, which pairs deliciously alongside sautéed shallots, salty prosciutto and a drizzle of balsamic glaze.
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One of my favorite flavor combinations is layering sweet fruit with salty and savory ingredients. Usually, I like adding fresh fruit to salads, such as arugula pear salad, which offers a delicious refreshing bite or roasting pears and carrots for a sweet and savory side dish.
This prosciutto and pear pizza features that perfect balance of sweet and savory flavors! The pizza is layered with salty prosciutto, sweet caramelized pears and caramelized shallots, all drizzled with a tangy balsamic glaze.
And for a a truly impressive meal, pair the pizza with a fresh burrata caprese salad.
🍐 Why You'll Love This Recipe
- Sweet and Savory Flavors! The combination of sweet caramelized pears with salty prosciutto is fantastic!
- Savory spin on sweet fruit! I love adding fruit to traditionally savory recipes such as honey Dijon roast chicken with pears.
📋 Ingredients
- Pizza Dough: When working with raw pizza dough, keep it at room temperature for at least 30 minutes before rolling the dough out.
- Shallot: Shallots cook faster and are more mild than standard onions. If shallots aren't available, use thinly sliced red onion.
- Pears: Bosc pears are crisp and sweet and hold up well to the cooking.
- Mozzarella Cheese: A few slices of fresh mozzarella are used for this pear pizza to keep it light and not too heavy. Another favorite is buffalo milk mozzarella which has great flavor and is easily digestible for most people.
- Parmesan Cheese: This is a hard aged Italian cheese that gives the pizza (or anything else you want to top it with) great savory and nutty flavor. I like using a microplane to freshly grate the parmesan right on top.
- Prosciutto: This Italian dry cured ham is rich and salty and sliced very thin. You can often find prosciutto in several Italian recipes such as beef braciole or crisped up on top of roasted tomato soup.
- Aged Balsamic: Use a balsamic glaze or a good quality aged balsamic, which will be thicker, sweeter and have more depth of flavor.
See recipe card for full information on ingredients and quantities.
🍋 Substitutions and Variations
- Instead of cow milk cheese, substitute buffalo milk mozzarella and substitute pecorino cheese, instead of parmesan cheese.
- If bosc pear isn't available, look for green anjour pear, which has a nice sweetness and will caramelize easily.
- Add other cheeses! Make a pear and blue cheese pizza and add crumbles of gorgonzola cheese.
- Instead of sliced pears, substitute with fresh figs!
⏲️ Instructions
Step 1: Cook the sliced pears until lightly caramelized on both sides.
Step 2: Roll out the pizza dough on a lightly floured surface to a 9 to 10 inch circle.
Step 3: Brush the pizza dough with olive oil and top with fresh mozzarella and prosciutto.
Step 4: Layer the caramelized pears and caramelized shallots around the pizza. Top with grated parmesan cheese.
Step 4: Transfer the pizza into a preheated oven onto a hot pizza stone and cook for 7-9 minutes until the crust is golden brown.
Step 5: Garnish the pizza with a drizzle of aged balsamic and fresh basil.
📍 Recipe Tips
- For the prefect golden pizza crust, pre-heat the oven to 550 degrees Fahrenheit for 30 minutes.
- If you don't have a pizza stone, use a baking sheet! Turn the baking sheet upside down onto its flat side and pre-heat in the oven.
- If the pizza dough springs back as you roll it, don't force it! Let the dough rest at room temperature for another 10-15 minutes and it will stretch easier.
Recipe FAQs
The ideal temperature for a perfect pizza is anywhere from 550 to 700 degrees Fahrenheit. If the temperature is too hot, it can burn and if it's too low, the pizza won't achieve that crisp golden crust.
Prosciutto is a cured sliced ham and doe snot need to be fully cooked. You can eat it right out of the package or crisp up the prosciutto for a salty and crisp bite.
Bake the pizza in a preheated oven for 6-9 minutes. The hotter the oven, the quicker the pizza will cook.
More Pizza Recipes to Try
Love this recipe? Please leave a 5-star 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟rating in the recipe card below & a review in the comments section further down the page.
Caramelized Pear and Prosciutto Pizza
LittleFerraroKitchen.com
Equipment
Ingredients
Pear Pizza
- 1 pound pizza dough cut in half and at room temperature
- Flour for dusting
- 4 tablespoons olive oil for pears and pizza
- 2 bosc pears sliced into ¼ inch slices
- 8 ounces mozzarella cheese roughly torn
- ½ cup grated Parmesan cheese + more for garnish
- 4-6 slices of prosciutto
- Aged balsamic for garnish
- Basil leaves for garnish
Instructions
- Pre-heat the oven to 550 degrees Fahrenheit.
- While the oven is preheating, caramelize the shallots. Bring a medium sized skillet to medium heat and drizzle with 2 tablespoons of olive oil.
- Add the sliced shallots and sauté until the shallots soften and edges slightly caramelize, about 5-8 minutes. Once the shallots change color and darken, remove them and set aside.
- Wipe the same skillet clean and drizzle a bit more olive oil. Add the sliced pears and cook until the pears just deepen in color and smell sweet, for about 4-6 minutes. Then turn over and caramelize the other side for another 3-4 minutes. Once done, remove and set aside.
- Lightly dust a clean surface with flour and divide the pizza dough in half.
- Roll each dough ball into a 9–10-inch circle and drizzle the center of the dough with 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil.
- Top both pizzas with roughly torn mozzarella and grated parmesan cheese. Gently tear large slices of prosciutto and place the slices around the pizza, along with the slices of caramelized pears.
- Finish with a few dollops of the caramelized shallots around the pizza and drizzle with olive oil.
- Transfer the pizza to the hot oven on either a pizza stone or baking sheet and bake until the crust is golden brown and cheese melts, about 7-10 minutes.
- Once done, garnish drizzled the pizzas with aged balsamic and fresh basil leaves.
Video
Notes
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- For the prefect golden pizza crust, pre-heat the oven to 500 degrees Fahrenheit for 30 minutes.
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- If you don't have a pizza stone, use a baking sheet! Turn the baking sheet upside down onto its flat side and pre-heat in the oven.
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- If the pizza dough springs back as you roll it, don't force it! Let the dough rest at room temperature for another 10-15 minutes and it will stretch easier.
- Yields 2 medium sized pizzas
Tom says
WOW, it's a pear pizza, definitely not a traditional Pizza. Pear and a great Balsamic on anything is wonderful but Chef Samantha puts it on a perfectly done pizza dough, Wonderful! The Bolognese pizza on this site is traditional if that's what you want but really, you must try this great twist on a pizza.