Dessert Pizzas Are Great Profit Opportunity

KEY INSIGHTS

• Dessert pizzas can help maximise customer spend per meal and also be a dining occasion in themselves
• They’re cost-effective to make and you’ll have many suitable ingredients on hand
• Consider adapting ingredients from your dessert and breakfast menus
• Make sure there’s not too moisture in your dessert pizza toppings

DESSERT PIZZAS are not only the perfect complement to an Italian style main menu, they’re also a great profit opportunity to increase the total bill value.

If your customer orders an entrée, main and a beautiful dessert pizza this will help you maximise your revenue. Dessert pizzas don’t only have to be served at the end of a big meal – you can also encourage customers to come in and enjoy a dessert pizza with alcoholic beverage or coffee, as an afternoon snack or late evening treat.

And because customers usually remember the first and last things they eat when dining out, a fantastic dessert pizza will also encourage repeat business.

To find out more about dessert pizzas, we spoke to Anchor Food Professionals Chef Mark Normoyle, who has created some exciting new dessert pizza recipes for the Fresca website.

“Dessert pizzas are a great addition to the menu, because they’re cost-effective to make and require only minimal preparation and ingredients,” Mark says. “You don’t need a special base – just standard pizza dough. And when it comes to dessert pizza toppings, as long as you’re using quality ingredients you’ll find a little goes a long way.

Mark begins by cooking the pizza base then brushing lightly with olive oil. “When it comes out of the oven, that’s when the fun begins. It can be as simple as smearing the base with some chocolate and hazelnut spread, then adding beautiful fresh strawberries, mint and a light dusting with icing sugar – and you have a really well-presented, simple yet beautiful tasting dessert pizza.”

As always, look to maximise the use of ingredients you already have in the kitchen. Fresh fruit is always a terrific choice, along with sweet sauces, maple syrup, coconut, chopped nuts and even ice cream. Mark and his team use ingredients like white chocolate ganache and salted caramel, and adds that berries and chocolate always go well together.

“Have a look at the ingredients on your dessert or breakfast menu and see which you can adapt for dessert pizza,” he recommends. “If you have a bar area, you’ll likely have ingredients like marshallows on hand – give them a quick toast and they make a perfect dessert pizza garnish.”

Mark adds it’s important to make sure there’s not too much moisture in the ingredients you choose: “The pizza base will be hot, so whatever you put on will start to melt down. That means it needs to be quite thick to start with, so you can still pick the pizza up and eat it without toppings sliding off. It’s all about ensuring the right balance between enough sauce, enough fruit and toppings so the customer isn’t left with empty pastry dough on their plate.”

Another of Mark’s recent dessert pizzas inventions is strawberry with Persian fairy floss and white chocolate – flavours which complement each other beautifully.  “The beauty of dessert pizzas is adults don’t feel guilty about ordering them,” he says. “If you can evoke a childhood favourite dessert, but give it a fresh twist by presenting it on pizza, they’ll see it as a fun, innovative indulgence they’ll be happy to pay for.”

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