Lamb Pizza Recipe

Lamb Pizza — A Personal Favourite

Adding lamb to a pizza has long been a personal favourite of mine. I feel the stronger flavour of lamb works wonderfully well with Tomato and the added pesto really adds something. It’s not something I ever came across while living in Italy—where it would probably raise more than a few eyebrows—but its roots lie more in Turkey than Naples. In fact, it’s probably the only pizza I truly enjoy that uses minced meat as a topping.

The History of Lamb Pizza

Lamb pizza isn’t part of traditional Italian cuisine, its inspiration comes more from the Middle East and Mediterranean, particularly from lahmacun, a Turkish flatbread topped with spiced minced lamb. As food cultures blended across countries like the UK, Australia, and the US, lamb found its way onto more Western-style pizzas. Often enjoyed with ingredients like yoghurt, mint, or pesto, lamb pizza has become a delicious hybrid, full of rich flavour and warm spice.

What Toppings Work with Lamb Pizza?

At Ruxstons, we take a Mediterranean and Middle Eastern approach to our lamb pizza toppings. We like to keep it fairly simple, allowing the lamb to shine without overcrowding the base. Our go to combination includes:

• Grass Fed Lamb Mince

• Cherry tomatoes

• Fresh parsley

• Pesto

These sit on top of our hand-stretched Neapolitan-style base, making for a delicious twist on tradition. Of course, you can add extras like roasted onions, shallots, or slow-roasted tomatoes—but we prefer to keep it moderately simple when it comes to pizza.

How to Cook Lamb Mince for Pizza

At Ruxstons, we always cook our lamb mince (or beef mince, if we’re doing a variation) before it goes on the pizza. We use 100% grass-fed lamb, sourced from our sister’s farm. Since our lambs are slower-grown than supermarket ones, the mince can be a little fattier—but that’s where the flavour is.

We recommend cooking the mince slowly in a frying pan, without draining off the fat too early. Let it cook through completely, then pour off any excess fat at the end. This way, the mince stays moist and flavourful.

Lamb Pizza Recipe

Ingredients

• 1kg Shipton Mill Pizza Flour

• 700ml Water

• 15g Fine Salt

• 2g Fast Action Yeast

• Diced Mozzarella

• 1 ladle of Mr Organic Passata

• 500g Grass Fed Lamb Mince

• Fresh Parsley

• Zest Pesto

• Semolina (for dusting your surface)

  
  

How to Prepare a Neapolitan-Style Lamb Pizza

1. Make the Dough

Combine the flour, water, and yeast in a large bowl. Mix until fully combined.

2. Initial Rest

Cover the bowl and leave the dough to rest for 30 minutes.

3. Portion the Dough

Divide the dough into 240g balls—each one will make a 12-inch pizza.

4. Prove the Dough

Let the dough balls rest at room temperature for around 3 hours. You can refrigerate them if you need to pause, or delay the process.

5. Stretch the Dough

Once proved, stretch each ball by hand—avoid using a rolling pin so you keep the lovely air pockets.

6. Assemble the Pizza

Dust your surface with semolina and lay down the stretched dough. Spread on half a ladle of passata, followed by mozzarella, cooked lamb mince, and halved cherry tomatoes. Add a little pesto on top—but go easy on the mozzarella, as the lamb already brings richness and it can get a bit oily if overdone.

7. Cook the Pizza

Bake in a pizza oven at 350°C. After 180 seconds, rotate the pizza and cook for another 180 seconds. Then it’s ready to eat!

Lamb Pizza from Ruxstons