Crab rangoon pizza

 

There are cheese pizzas and then there are pizza ideas that are potentially cheesy. I first heard of crab rangoon pizza when some of the Fong's Pizza locations in Iowa closed and commenters were lamenting the demise of a source of this pizza variation. A little research indicates this oddity has spread and has been available on the menu locally at Day Block Brewing, where the beer list is likely to make cheesy ideas seem less of a stretch.

Crab rangoon pizza
The recipe started with an amalgam of several recipes I found online and my standard crab rangoon wonton recipe, and then I experimented a few times until I came up with something workable. Dinnerthendesert.com and the Brownie Bites Blog were among the more useful sources. You can either use purchased sweet chili sauce or make the recipe that follows.

Ingredients
4 ounces cream cheese, softened
2 large garlic cloves, chopped
½ tablespoon toasted sesame oil
½ tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
¼ teaspoon onion powder
1 (4.25-ounce) can crab meat, divided
2 green onions, chopped, divided
½ cup grated mozzarella
2 tablespoons grated Parmesan
5 to 6 tablespoons sweet chili sauce, divided
Premade wonton crisps for garnish
1 prebaked or parbaked pizza crust

Method
Preheat oven to 425. Combine cream cheese, garlic, sesame oil, Worcestershire sauce and onion powder in a small bowl. 

Set aside 2 tablespoons of the crab meat. Stir the rest into the cream cheese mixture. Set aside a generous tablespoon of green onions for garnish. Put the rest in the bowl with the cream cheese mixture and mix well.

Place prebaked crust on a pizza pan, or else parbake a crust on a pizza stone. Spread cream cheese mixture over crust. Top with remaining crab meat. Sprinkle cheeses over the top and drizzle with some sweet chili sauce. Bake for 15 to 18 minutes (for a parbaked crust) or 10 to 12 (for a prebaked crust like a Boboli) or under golden brown. (Remove from oven and top with wonton crisps, remaining green onions and some more sweet chili sauce.

Sweet chili sauce
From dinnerthendessert.com

Ingredients
¾ cup sugar
⅓ cup white vinegar
⅔ cup water
¼ cup soy sauce
1 tablespoon ketchup
2 tablespoons cornstarch

Method
Combine all ingredients in a small sauce pan and cook until the mixture comes to a boil and thickens. You will have tons leftover, so if you don’t use sweet chili sauce often, you might want to cut it in at least half. 

Rating: Can there be an authentic crab rangoon pizza? (Or even authentic crab rangoon, when you think about it.) I have no idea whether this is anything like the original restaurant version, because I've never had it. But since it seems we're unlikely to eat inside a restaurant any time soon, I figured I might as well try it. The first version I made had way too much cream cheese, and the crust clearly couldn't stand up to all that moisture. So we dialed back the cream cheese the next time and used a prebaked crust. I'd say this version works well enough, at least as an oddity. If we survive long enough, perhaps some day we'll run across it on a menu.