Hot Honey Pepperoni Pizza with Ricotta

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An upgraded version of hot honey pepperoni pizza topped with dollops of creamy ricotta that comes together in just 25 minutes for a fun, easy date night dinner at home any night of the week.

If you’ve never tried ricotta or hot honey on pizza before, this is your sign. We first experienced this irresistible flavor combo about a year ago at a brewery in Carmel-by-the-Sea, and it was so good we haven’t stopped thinking about it since! Which is why we made our own decadent version of a hot honey pepperoni pizza with ricotta – now we can have it any time we want!

You might be asking yourself, is ricotta or hot honey actually good on pepperoni pizza? Absolutely! These two ingredients are one of the best ways to upgrade a classic pepperoni pizza, in our opinion. The fluffy texture and sweet flavor of the ricotta adds a nice contrast to the salty, greasy pepperoni, while the hot honey gives the whole pizza a little extra zing. Balanced out with fresh basil, these simple ingredients add a new layer of depth to a regular old pepperoni pizza.

When you make it with our fluffy homemade pizza dough, you’ll think you’re eating takeout from your favorite local pizza joint. It’s that good. Try this jazzed up pepperoni pizza next time you’re feeling adventurous in the kitchen (or for an at home date night when you want to impress your SO) and indulge!

Ricotta and Hot Honey Pepperoni Pizza Ingredients

This restaurant style pizza recipe is basically an upgraded version of a classic pepperoni pizza with tomato sauce, featuring delicious ricotta and hot honey. Here’s everything you’ll need to make this pizza at home:

• Pizza dough – We love making homemade dough for pizza, especially a fun one like this. Our go-to recipe is the same day straight pizza dough from Ken Forkish’s Flour Water Salt Yeast cookbook. It makes for the perfect crispy on the outside, fluffy on the inside crust. Of course you can also use store-bought dough instead.
• Pizza sauce – We also love making this easy homemade pizza sauce since the flavor is so much more authentic than any store brand we’ve tried. But again, you can use store bought if you want to make things even easier.
• Cheese – This pizza features 3 types of cheese – mozzarella, parmesan, and ricotta. The salty parmesan helps to balance out the sweetness of the ricotta, so definitely don’t skip this ingredient!
• Pepperoni – Our go to brand of pepperoni is Hormel. We find that it tastes the best and crisps up nicely. 
• Hot honey – You can use your favorite store-bought brand, or make your own hot honey at home. We prefer the taste of homemade hot honey and it’s so easy to make, so we always go that route. Plus, it’s often cheaper!
• Fresh basil – Basil is a bright and fresh addition to the pizza that helps balance some of the heavier and sweeter flavors like ricotta. Don’t skip this ingredient!

How To Make Hot Honey Pepperoni Pizza With Ricotta

1. Prep the dough – Remove the pizza dough from the fridge about an hour before you want to make the pizza so it can warm up to room temperature. In the meantime, preheat the oven to 500 degrees F.
2. Prep the toppings – If you want to make hot honey from scratch, do that now. Then, make a piping bag for the ricotta. Fill a small plastic bag with the ricotta, pushing it down towards one corner of the bag. Then, twist the opposite corner to lightly seal the cheese in the bag. Using a pair of kitchen shears, snip about a quarter inch off of the corner of the bag with the cheese so that you can pipe the ricotta out onto the pizza.
3. Stretch the dough – Generously flour a clean work surface and your hands, and lightly dust the pizza pan and the top surface of the dough with flour. Carefully pick the dough up out of its bowl and transfer it to the work surface. Now, slowly and gently use your fingers to spread the dough out into a circular shape on the work surface – be careful so as not to pop any of the air bubbles trapped in the dough. Since this dough has a higher hydration level, it will want to spread out naturally, so shaping should be fairly easy. Then, transfer the dough onto the prepared pan and gently finish shaping it into a 12 to 14 inch round to fill the pan.
4. Assemble the pizza – Top the dough with an even layer of pizza sauce, leaving about a quarter- to a half-inch of space around the edges for the crust. Sprinkle evenly with mozzarella cheese, add the pepperoni, then sprinkle with grated parmesan and a pinch of salt. Then, pipe the ricotta into small dollops (about a half-inch tall) spaced out evenly across the pizza.
5. Bake – Bake for about 10 to 15 minutes, until the mozzarella is bubbly and browned and the ricotta is lightly browned on top.
6. Chop the basil – While the pizza is in the oven, finely chop a few fresh basil leaves for finishing the pizza. You don’t want to do this step too early, as the basil will oxidize (turn brown) the longer it sits after chopping.
7. Finishing touches – Finally, top the pizza with a drizzle of hot honey and the fresh basil. Slice and serve hot!

Storing and Reheating Leftovers

This pizza is so good, we can almost guarantee you won’t have any leftovers. But in case you do, know that you can store and reheat this pizza just like any other leftover pepperoni pizza!

Wrap leftover pizza slices in aluminum foil (or put them in a food storage container) and keep in the fridge for up to 5 days. Reheat in the oven at 350 degrees F for about 10 minutes.

Why You’ll Love This Recipe

Our sweet, savory, and spicy pepperoni pizza with ricotta and hot honey is a surefire way to shake up Friday night pizza dinner! Not only is this pizza super fun to make, but it’s also so simple that you won’t believe how flavorful it is. It tastes like something you’d find at a gourmet pizza restaurant – even though it’s just a pepperoni pizza dressed up with a few special ingredients.

Try our recipe for hot honey pepperoni pizza with ricotta and don’t forget to leave a rating and a comment to let us know what you think!

Hot Honey Pepperoni Pizza FAQs