Recipe: Pizza-Inspired Low-Carb Frittatina

I told you, we're pizza fanatics. So here's another way to enjoy my favorite meal while sticking to a low-carb diet (for me, South Beach). I made this after being a little disappointed in my choice of toppings for the summer squash crust I made. I wanted to just do it with tomato sauce and mozzarella, but I didn't want to shred another squash and go through all that, so I just decided to make the "crust" out of eggs. Kind of like a frittata, but super thin and covered with toppings. Pizza toppings. Hence my wonderful name "Pizza-inspired Frittatina."

INGREDIENTS
3 eggs
1/2 t dried thyme
sea salt
fresh cracked pepper
1/4 C tomato sauce
1/4 C lowfat mozzarella
toppings (I used deli pepperoni and sliced olives)

DIRECTIONS
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Coat pie dish evenly with olive oil cooking spray.
2. In a bowl, beat eggs, thyme, and salt and pepper (base amounts on your preferences, I just used a little bit of each). Pour eggs into pie dish and bake for 5 minutes.
3. Prepare your toppings (I used 5 black olives, sliced, and 3 paper-thin slices of deli pepperoni). After 5 minutes, remove dish from oven. Spread tomato sauce on top and sprinkle with mozzarella. Add toppings and return to oven for 2 minutes.

Word of advice: orange is not the best color as a background for photographing pizza.

It's that easy! Nutrition facts will vary depending on what you use, but mine came out to 400 calories, 9 grams of carbs, 29 grams of protein, and 24 grams of fat. If I had planned ahead of time and gotten low-carb tomato sauce, it would have only had about 6 carbs total. But I just used what was open in the fridge. Also, I know turkey pepperoni would have been better for me and had fewer calories, but I decided to let myself indulge a little. It's a lot harder to stick to a diet when you feel deprived, so little indulgences are important for the overall picture!