I like to start any recipe by getting ALL the ingredients out and ready before starting. This is called “mise en place” in the culinary world, a fancy French phrase for putting everything in place. Ready? Let’s start! First, the really hard pizza sauce. Mix all of the sauce ingredients together in a bowl and set aside. Done! 😅 The “set aside” part is actually very important. It allows the dried herbs to hydrate and the sugar to kind of counteract the acid in the tomatoes.

Sprinkle a little flour on the counter and gently roll out your thawed puff pastry just a bit. What you want is to kind of get rid of the fold lines a little and widen each “slice” just a touch. Slice the pastry sheet into 3 even pieces.

Using the dull edge of a paring knife, make some score marks all around the edge of your dough, about ¼ inch in, without actually cutting the dough. It’s just decorative, but also gives you an actual border to work with as you move forward. Lightly brush your egg wash along the score marks. This will give you a nicely browned crust. Place about 3 tablespoons of pizza sauce (don’t use any more sauce than this or your crust will get soggy.) down the center of your dough, using the back of the spoon to evenly spread the sauce within the borders you made. Pretty!

Sprinkle ¼ cup of mozzarella cheese, or the cheese of your choice (fly free, my pizza friend!) right on top of the sauce. See where we’re going with this?

Evenly distribute your toppings, on top! I used a classic sausage and bell pepper motif here. I use red bell pepper because I’m not a fan of the traditional green bell. Plus, it’s prettier 😊

Bake at 425° for 20-25 minutes, or until the crust is beautifully puffy and your cheese is bubbly and browned a bit. Here I did pepperoni, sausage and bell pepper, and the classic “Deluxe” combination! 😋 Go on now. Make some pizza and let me know how it goes! Tell me all about it in the comments! (Fun note: I experimented, and you can freeze these pizzas, fully dressed, and bake them at 425° for 30 minutes with fantastic fresh pizza results! YAY!! More Pizza, later on!!)