This is my all time favorite summer dessert from childhood. The recipe was shared by some close friends, and then my family morphed it into a patriotic theme since we were very into celebrating all things 4th of July…I remember making it all growing up, and posing with my sisters and besties with our flag pizzas–so it was a fun moment to do the same with Emma this year. All 3 of mine added their personal touch to it (cough) and while it neared disaster when Ambrose decided to play toss the blueberries onto the flag, we had a great time and made a memory. It’s super easy to make the dough and the cream cheese frosting in advance (read: before the kids are up) and to do the decorating later. Pro tip: it’s best really cold so see if you can give it an hour of fridge time after frosting and decorating, before serving.

I changed the recipe in a few ways from how it was passed on to me: I made the crust gluten free…because–happy bellies and equally yum! And I increased the quantities of crust and the frosting because you just can’t have too much of those flavors to balance out the fruit, and it’s meant to fill a large rectangular pan. 

Seriously–how can you go wrong with these colors and summer flavors? Seasonal eating? Yes please. Obviously if you can find local strawberries and blueberries, even better! But it will be amazing regardless.

Here’s the combination of flours I’ve landed on for most of my gluten free variations–I find the flour textures balance each other out–and you’ll want to double check the oat flour–some brands are labeled gluten free while others say “may contain traces of wheat”…the coconut flour is heavy, and cooks up denser, so the tapioca flour seems to add the right balance. Have fun experimenting and let me know how you LOVE this recipe!!! I dare you to make it only once this summer:)

Fruit Pizza–patriotic and gluten free

Ingredients:

Crust:

• 1 1/2 sticks butter
• 1 cup powdered sugar (can possibly substitute coconut sugar or raw sugar but I didn’t want to mess with my childhood memories..and the crust is super thin so it’s not too sweet).
• 2 1/4 cups gluten free flour:
  • 1 cup oat flour
  • 3/4 cup coconut flour
  • 1/2 cup tapioca flour

Cream cheese frosting:

• 12 oz cream cheese–you can get (full fat) whipped variety that blends up really well.
• 1 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 3/4 cup powdered sugar

Directions:

Combine butter, flours and sugar. Use a pastry cutter for best effect, and finish with hands. Flatten into cookie sheet crust, and bake for 15 minutes, or until golden brown (recommend you poke some holes with a fork so it doesn’t puff on you).

Then mix the cream cheese, vanilla and powdered sugar for the topping. Spread onto a completely cooled crust.

Layer fruit in the patterns of your choice.

Refrigerate an hour, then serve!!! (Can be stored up to 24 hours before for fantastic taste!)

Crust is totally cooled (we went for a hike and errands in the meanwhile)…fruit washed, strawberries just have the ends trimmed.

Make it happen! And enjoy the process:)

This is when things got a little exciting 🙂 Luckily most of it ended up where it was supposed to and the older girls modeled how best to spread and place the fruit…

Voila!! It tastes even better than it looks!

Loving her toothy grin, and these fun slower summer days together…

She wanted to add marshmallows for the stars…but was flexible when I convinced her that the fruit would taste amazing on it’s own…she’s all about the inspiration, and artistic process, so I’m sure we’ll be doing lots of fancy baking this summer. Share with me pics when you and your loved ones make this–that is my favorite part!

Happy 4th to you all!