Pizza Lava Toast Is The Perfect Snack (Or Quick Meal)

If you've yet to hear of pizza lava toast, it's likely you have not been on social media in the last 5 minutes or so. It's the latest, hottest (in several senses) trend, at least until something new comes along tomorrow. Still, chances are that pizza lava toast still be the kind of thing people claim to be "obsessed" with for at least as long as it takes you to finish reading this –- and even if it does get supplanted by a viral recipe for Spam and beet sorbet, it still makes for a fun and flavorful snack.

What this toast is, is basically an updated version of that mid-century favorite, English muffin pizzas (here's our recipe for these). No English muffins are needed, though, as a simple slice of bread will do. Well, two slices of bread, actually. That's where the "lava" part comes in. On one piece of bread you make a border out of cheese slices, then plop another piece of bread on top. Smush a well in the center of the top slice and fill this with pizza sauce. Put more cheese all over the bread and layer on any pizza toppings you like. Bake it in the oven (not the toaster! unless it's a toaster oven, in which case it should be okay) until both layers of cheese melt, let it cool off for a few minutes, then eat it. How easy is that? (Spoiler: the answer we're looking for is "Very.")

Pizza lava toast is one of those non-recipe recipes that, once you've grasped the general principle, is extremely easy to personalize to suit your own preferences (or whatever you have on hand in the fridge). There's no need for any special kind of bread since many people make it with the standard white supermarket stuff, but feel free to use sourdough, Italian, French, or any other kind of bread that you like, as long as it can be easily squished to make that sauce well. The slices should also be thin enough so that the double layers of cheese both melt before the outsides burn. There are also two schools of thought regarding toasting in that some people make the sandwich with untoasted bread (which is admittedly more squishable) while others prefer the firmer version that comes with pre-toasting.

You can also switch up the cheeses if you do not have or care for mozzarella, but one caveat is that pre-shredded cheese won't do as you need the kind of short-ish, thick-ish slices that you can only get by cutting up a brick. You could also ring some changes on the sauce, drizzling on some hot honey or even replacing it with alfredo or barbecue sauce if this is the kind of thing you like on your pizza. With toppings, of course, anything goes, from anchovies to zampone (the latter being a type of Italian sausage made from a pig's foot).