These Mini Buffalo Chicken Pizzas are smothered with spicy buffalo sauce, homemade ranch and of course, pulled buffalo chicken! The perfect easy weeknight meal or game-day appetizer!
True life: I’m obsessed with pizza. I think I have discussed this before on Our Balanced Bowl…I wouldn’t be surprised if I had. Every single week, I look forward to Friday – or what my husband and I lovingly refer to as “Pizza Movie Night.”
Pizza movie night is pretty simple – you basically either order or make your own pizza, pick out a movie or TV show and buy a bottle of spicy red wine. With the combo of pizza, wine, TV, and your favorite person in the world; you truly can’t go wrong. I highly recommend having a night like this during the week with your significant other! It’s so fun and not stressful at all like a “dress up and go out” date night can be.
Since the weather is getting cooler, football games are starting and all I want to do is eat cozy foods, I knew that for Pizza Movie Night, I needed to develop a buffalo chicken pizza.
I mean, I figured that I already eat SO much homemade ranch with my pizza – so the combo of the spicy buffalo chicken with the creamy and tangy ranch on a delicious crunchy crust made my heart sing. So I did it! AND Y’ALL. It turned out amazing. Way better than any other buffalo chicken pizza I had ever had out at a restaurant.
By making the buffalo chicken pizza on your own, you’re able to choose the spice level you want, as well as how much ranch you want. By making it at home, you also don’t have to refuse the blue cheese dressing the waiter inevitably offers you. RANCH ALL THE WAY, BABY! Who’s with me?!
Another thing I specifically love about this recipe is that: THEY ARE MINI PIZZAS. Can we all agree on the fact that miniature things are just automatically cuter? Not to mention, when you’re making your own mini pizza, you don’t have to worry about your significant other who wants waaaay more toppings than you or always puts too much red pepper flakes. You can customize it exactly the way you want it. And not to toot my own horn, but my combination is pretty much fire.
In addition, mini pizzas make for a GREAT APPETIZER! Seriously, slice the mini pizzas into small slices and set them out with a bowl of ranch for people to dip it in and you’re set! So easy!
Ingredients for Mini Buffalo Chicken Pizzas:
- 3-4 smaller store-bought pizza crusts
- your favorite pizza sauce
- your favorite hot sauce
- mozzarella cheese
- a little bit of butter
- chicken breast
- homemade ranch
- green onions (optional for garnish)
Choose a Pizza Crust/Sauce:
Everyone usually has their own favorite store-bought sauce/dough. I’ve been loving the Pastorelli brand lately for both their pre-made crusts (SO EASY!) and their pizza sauce (which is literally so delicious I’ve been eating it by the spoonful). I love their pizza sauce especially because it has NO added sugars! That’s usually so difficult to find! If you can’t find mini ones in the store, you can always buy the dough in balls (Trader Joe’s has an awesome deal on theirs!) and then section the dough into two or three smaller pizzas.
Choosing a Hot Sauce:
Like above, everyone usually has a favorite hot sauce as well. For most buffalo chicken type recipes, a fan favorite has to be Frank’s Red Hot Sauce. This is good, but I encourage you to step out of the box and try Texas Pete! I’ve been using this stuff since I was a kid, it’s an NC based company, and it never lets me down. It has the perfect amount of heat!
How to Make Buffalo Chicken Pizzas:
Begin by baking your chicken breast until it gets extra tender and juicy. Once it’s done, add in 4 tablespoons or so of your hot sauce, a little bit of melted butter and mix together. Add more if you want it extra spicy.
For the base layer sauce for the pizza, we are going to combine the pizza sauce with some more hot sauce. Once combined, you’re going to begin to make your pizzas! Add as much or as little sauce as you want on each crust. Next, you’re going to make your homemade ranch dressing. You can use store-bought if you want BUT ACTUALLY PLEASE NO DON’T. My recipe is fool-proof and you will never go back to bottled ranch again. Find the recipe for my homemade ranch here.
So, do a layer of the pizza/hot sauce mixture, add on a drizzle of ranch. Then add your preferred cheese (I used mozzarella). Add on your chicken and then of course MORE CHEESE!
Cook according to whatever pizza dough you may use – for me, I cooked it for about 10 minutes and then broiled it for 1-2 minutes to make sure the cheese was extra golden and melty!
Garnish with chopped green onions + more ranch + more hot sauce! EAT UP.
Be sure to follow ourbalancedbowl on Instagram and tag me with your photo! You can also post a photo of your recipe to the Our Balanced Bowl Facebook page! I always love to see your re-creations! If you do make it, be sure to rate and comment so I can get your feedback! Xo!
Mini Buffalo Chicken Pizzas
These Mini Buffalo Chicken Pizzas are smothered with spicy buffalo sauce, homemade ranch and of course, pulled buffalo chicken! The perfect easy weeknight meal or game-day appetizer!
Ingredients
- 4 mini pizza crusts (store-bought or divide a store bought pizza dough ball into fourths)
- 1/4 cup pizza sauce
- 1/2 cup hot sauce (divided)
- 1.5 cups shredded mozzarella cheese
- 1 chicken breast, shredded
- 1/3 cup ranch dressing
- 1 tbsp melted butter
- green onions (for topping)
- 1 tsp oregano
- 1 tsp garlic powder
Homemade Ranch
- 2 tbsp mayo
- 1-2 splashes of whole milk
- any spices you have on hand (i use thyme, oregano, cayenne, salt and pepper)
Instructions
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Preheat oven to 350. In a baking dish, add your chicken breast, a splash of olive oil and salt and pepper. Cook for 30 minutes or until done. Once done, shred your chicken. Add 4 tbsp of hot sauce and 1 tbsp of melted butter. Mix until combined.
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In a small bowl, mix 1/4 cup of pizza sauce with 3 tbsp of hot sauce, oregano and garlic powder. In another small bowl, mix your mayo, milk and spices together to make your homemade ranch.
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Spread the sauce evenly on your pizza crusts. Drizzle a bit of ranch on top of the sauce. Add a layer of mozzarella cheese. Distribute your buffalo chicken evenly on top of the pizzas. Finish with an extra layer of cheese.
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Bake your pizzas according to the crust package instructions. I baked mine for 10 minutes or until the cheese gets golden and bubbly.
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Top with additional ranch, hot sauce and chopped green onions. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: This post is not sponsored – Pastorelli gifted me both the pizza sauce and the crust and all thoughts and opinions are my own. Thank you for continuing to support me and the brands that I work with!
the only thing that could make these better is beer. awesome pizza
I like your thinking, Michael! Thank you!