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This dessert pizza is made with Naples style dough, mascarpone, strawberry and banana slices, and Nutella for a simple and tasty treat!
It’s the end of October, which means we’ve got nothing but sweets on our minds. So in true Pizza of the Month fashion, we created a totally unique pizza recipe to fit this time of year: dessert pizza with mascarpone and Nutella.
Like us when we first had this idea, you might be wondering what dessert pizza is made of. The answer can be a lot of different things – we’ve seen variations that use cookie dough, pizza dough, chocolate chips, cinnamon, and all sorts of other sweet flavors. Our simple dessert pizza is made with super soft and chewy Neapolitan style dough, creamy mascarpone cheese, slices of strawberry and banana, and a drizzle of Nutella. It’s almost like an open-faced dessert crepe, except made with a deliciously fluffy pizza dough base instead of a thin pancake.
Serve this unique dessert pizza hot or cold for a fun sweet treat this holiday season! It’s tasty both ways and will be a hit with your friends and family.
Mascarpone Nutella Dessert Pizza Ingredients
To make our dessert pizza, you’ll need a few ingredients:
- Neapolitan style pizza dough
- Mascarpone
- Strawberries
- A banana
- Nutella hazelnut spread
Using pizza dough and mascarpone as the base for this dessert helps balance the Nutella used in this recipe, so that each bite is just sweet enough without being overly sweet. The mascarpone is also super creamy, providing the perfect texture for the strawberry and banana slices to sink into so they don’t slide off the pizza too easily.
Neapolitan style pizza dough isn’t too difficult to make from scratch if you have the right tools: a few basic ingredients (bread flour, water, yeast, salt), a stand mixer, and this Mastering Pizza cookbook that will teach you how to do it. If you have this cookbook, we followed the recipe for a single Naples style dough ball at 60% hydration for cooking on cast iron. If you don’t have this cookbook but love to make pizza, we highly recommend purchasing yourself a copy here! Marc Vetri’s thorough instructions simplify making incredible pizzas at home.
However, you can simply use store-bought pizza dough for an easier alternative in this recipe – but you’ll need to adjust the cooking method. Keep reading for notes on how to make this dessert pizza with store-bought dough!
How To Make A Dessert Pizza
Making this strawberry banana dessert pizza can be broken down into 4 simple steps:
- Stretch and bake the dough.
- Top the warm dough with mascarpone.
- Top with slices of strawberry and banana.
- Finish with a drizzle of Nutella and serve.
That’s right – you bake the dough without anything on it first, then you add the toppings. This method yields warm and fluffy pizza dough that makes it easy to spread the mascarpone cheese on, plus fresh toppings for contrasting temperatures and textures. Note that you’ll have to be patient when spreading the mascarpone, since it becomes almost slippery when it hits the warm pizza dough. The best technique is to sort of glob it on, then gently spread it around as it warms up.
Baking The Pizza Dough: Cast Iron Method
If you’re going to make Naples style pizza dough from scratch like we did, you can bake the pizza dough on a cast iron pan. Here’s how Vetri explains to do this in the Mastering Pizza cookbook:
- Preheat your oven to its maximum temperature.
- Once the oven is hot, start preheating a 10-inch cast iron pan over medium-high heat on the stove. At the same time, open the oven door to let some of the heat escape and then switch it to the broiler setting. Close the oven.
- After about 5 minutes, the cast iron pan should be super hot. Stretch the pizza dough to the size of the pan and then lay it flat on the cast iron.
- Turn the stove off and immediately transfer the cast iron pan to the oven. Cook the pizza dough under the broiler for about 2 to 5 minutes, rotating it halfway through.
This method simulates the type of heat pizza gets when cooking in a brick oven – a super hot surface on the bottom, and radiant heat from the top. It works well for Naples style dough so that the outside crust gets crispy while the inside stays soft and fluffy.
Since this pizza doesn’t have any toppings when it bakes, you might get air bubbles that puff up in the center of the dough. If this happens, simply puncture it with the corner of a metal spatula and then gently press down on it with the spatula to deflate it.
Baking The Pizza Dough: Traditional Home Oven Method
If you’d like to use store-bought pizza dough for this recipe, you can easily bake it in the oven without any toppings. However, you’ll want to treat it like a typical home oven pizza recipe and skip the cast iron pan.
First, preheat your oven to 500 degrees F. Stretch your dough into a 10-inch circle and lay it flat on a floured or lightly greased pizza pan. Then once the oven is hot, bake it until the crust starts to turn golden-brown, rotating halfway through. This should take about 8 to 10 minutes. Then remove the pizza from the oven and continue following the recipe as normal.
Is Dessert Pizza Really Pizza?
So, is dessert pizza really considered pizza? Well, when you make a dessert pizza with pizza dough, we think so! Our dessert pizza recipe may not have a sauce or traditional ingredients, but it does have dough, cheese, and toppings. And just because those toppings are fruit and chocolate doesn’t mean this unique dessert shouldn’t get to call itself a true pizza!
This truly is the best Nutella pizza you could serve for dessert, complete with fresh fruit and creamy mascarpone cheese on fluffy dough. It’s easy to make ahead of time and serve cold for a refreshingly sweet and creamy treat. But making this pizza on-demand for dessert is also a fun nighttime activity the whole family can enjoy! Whatever your reason for making dessert pizza, we know you’ll love our recipe.
Try our strawberry banana dessert pizza with mascarpone and Nutella below and let us know what you think in the comments! If you’re curious about our Pizza of the Month series and are interested in staying up-to-date, sign up for our email newsletter here.
Love this recipe? You may enjoy these recipes, too:
- S’mores Dip
- Nutella Stuffed Brioche French Toast
- Candied Bacon Chocolate Pretzel Bark
- Sweet Charcuterie Board
To browse more of our latest recipes and seasonal dishes, visit our homepage here.
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Dessert Pizza With Mascarpone and Nutella
Equipment
- Cast iron griddle 10-inch round
Ingredients
- 270 grams Naples style dough ball at 60% hydration room temperature
- 3 ounces mascarpone
- 3 large strawberries sliced thin
- ½ medium banana sliced thin
- ¼ cup Nutella
Instructions
- Preheat oven to its hottest temperature (typically around 500 to 550 degrees F).
- Flour a clean work surface and stretch the dough into a roughly 10-inch circle. Start by flattening it into a disc and gently pressing around the edges to form a small edge, then use two hands underneath the dough to stretch it from the center outwards. You can use two fists to gently coax it into shape, with your hands at a slight angle to let gravity help you.
- Once the oven is preheated and your dough is ready, open the oven slightly to let some heat escape and switch on the broiler to HIGH. Close the oven door. Then, preheat a cast iron pan on the stove over medium-high heat for about 5 to 10 minutes.*
- Carefully lay the stretched dough flat on the cast iron pan. Then transfer the cast iron to the oven and cook under the broiler for about 2 to 5 minutes, or until the crust is golden brown.otate the pan halfway through cooking to ensure it cooks evenly.
- Transfer the cooked pizza dough to a cooling rack or cutting board. Dollop mascarpone onto the crust and let it melt slightly before gently spreading it into an even layer, leaving about a half-inch border around the edge of the pizza. Next, top with slices of strawberry and banana.
- Finish the pizza with a criss-cross drizzle of Nutella. To easily drizzle Nutella over something, make a piping bag with a sandwich-sized plastic bag by cutting off one corner. Place the Nutella in the bag, then gently squeeze it over the pizza.
- Slice into 6 triangles and serve immediately, or let cool and store in an air-tight container in the refrigerator. This pizza can be served cold later on and will keep for up to 2 days in the fridge.
Notes
Nutrition
If you have any questions regarding the information presented in this post, please refer to our Nutrition Disclaimer here.
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