Nut-Free Fathead Dough aka Mozzarella Dough

Fathead Dough, aka Mozzarella Dough, used to be all the rage a few years ago. In my keto kitchen, it still is: this neutral-tasting, versatile, and pliable dough is magnificent for creating superb keto baked goods, sweet and savory alike.

However, regular Fathead Dough uses almond flour and thus is not suitable for people with nut allergies. Moreover, almond flour is high in oxalates, an antinutrient that can be detrimental to health. Some Fathead Dough versions use coconut flour instead of almond flour but let’s face the fact: coconut flour simply doesn’t make a satisfactory Fathead Dough.

But worry no more: I developed a wonderful Nut-Free Fathead Dough that uses an awesome zero-carb ingredient to further reduce your carb intake. Read on to find the secrets — and the secret ingredient — to the ultimate Fathead Dough without nuts of any kind!

How to make the Nut-Free Fathead Dough aka Mozzarella Dough

Making this dough is easy — just like a regular Fathead Dough. I prefer to do my dough in a saucepan as the microwave method 1) results in intolerably hot dough and 2) easily creates an uneven dough. So, in this post, I’ll show you how to make this dough in a saucepan for the smoothest result and easy kneading.

The base of the dough is naturally the combination of shredded mozzarella, plain cream cheese, and egg. I also love to add some baking powder to make the dough rise more. In addition to these well-known Fathead Dough ingredients, you’ll need a secret ingredient that I will reveal soon!

So, let’s get our hands dirty and take a look at how to make this delightful dough.

First, take your secret ingredient *insert drum roll here*: oat fiber! Yes, oat fiber is the secret ingredient for a perfect Nut-Free Fathead Dough. So, take 1/4 cup (60 ml) oat fiber and place it in a small bowl.

Add also 1 teaspoon aluminum-free baking powder.

Mix until well combined. Set aside.

Next, make the cheese base: Take a small saucepan and combine 5.3 oz (150 g) starch-free shredded mozzarella cheese…

…and 1 oz (30 g) plain full-fat cream cheese.

Heat over low heat, all the time mixing…

…until a Play-Doh-like mixture forms, like this.

Remove from the heat. Add the oat fiber mixture…

…and one egg.

Knead…

…knead…

…until smooth dough forms and you can shape a ball from it.

Place the dough on parchment paper.

Roll out and use as you wish.

This time, I made Pigs in a Blanket. By the way, I prefer to bake the dough at a little lower temperature, at 300 °F (150 °C), to guarantee even baking result. The Pigs in a Blanket took 20 minutes in the oven.

 

How I came up with this Nut-Free Fathead Dough recipe

I have to confess that I was never really a fan of Fathead Dough until I made it with the Ketokamu keto baking mix I have developed. Well, I have posted two recipes featuring Fathead Dough here on my blog, this flatbread recipe, and this Finnish Christmas Pastry recipe.

The biggest issue that prevented me from making Fathead Dough was that I always burned my fingers when I prepared the dough and melted the cheeses in a microwave oven. However, things changed when I found out that melting the cheeses in a saucepan over a stovetop works so much better in every way: first of all, the temperature doesn’t rise intolerably high, and the resulting dough is much smoother than with the microwave method.

I did my first Fathead Dough experiments with our Ketokamu baking mix when I was in Greece, where there was no microwave oven. There I got the idea to melt the cheeses in a saucepan. After finding out this unbeatable method, there is no return to the inferior microwave oven method!

After that, I’ve made numerous recipes using Fathead Dough, as now it’s a real pleasure to make! But, I wasn’t planning to post anything with Fathead Dough here on my blog this week until things suddenly changed.

I had ordered oat fiber from iHerb. Here in the Nordic countries, keto people have used potato fiber for years. We haven’t had oat fiber, which seems to be suddenly very popular among ketoers, especially in the US. Therefore, I wanted to try out how oat fiber compares with potato fiber.

I looked at the oat fiber bag and was pondering how to use it. Maybe I take one of my recipes with potato fiber and just swap the potato fiber for oat fiber? But which recipe?

Then it suddenly hit me: I could try out how Fathead Dough works with oat fiber! The problem with the usual Fathead Dough recipe is that it contains almond flour which has 1) carbs 2) oxalates (a powerful antinutrient). Oat fiber is practically carb-free and pure fiber, so it sounded like a perfect replacement for almond flour.

I was eager to try how my idea works in practice. But how much fiber to use? I have absolutely no experience with oat fiber, so I could only make an educated guess based on my experience on potato fiber (even I have never used potato fiber in Fathead Dough). In addition to oat fiber, I wanted to use baking powder as a leavening agent.

So, I started preparing the usual Fathead Dough and took 5.3 oz (150 g) shredded starch-free mozzarella, 1 oz (30 g) plain full-fat cream cheese, and one egg. I took a small bowl and mixed together 1/3 cup (80 ml) oat fiber and 1 teaspoon aluminum-free baking powder.

After melting the cheeses in a saucepan, I added the egg and the oat fiber mixture and kneaded the dough until I could form a ball from it. At least it looked perfect!

But what should I do with the dough now?

I had food additive-free sausages and decided to do Pigs in a Blanket. I rolled out the dough, cut it into rectangles, spread sugar-free ketchup on the triangles, and placed a piece of sausage on each rectangle. I rolled the dough to cover the sausage.

After rolling out the scraps, I noticed that the dough started cracking. Hmm, maybe there is too much oat fiber? If I used only 1/4 cup (60 ml) instead of 1/3 cup (80 ml), that might make a more pliable and flexible dough, I pondered.

The Pigs in the Blanket turned out great, but I certainly wanted to try out if less oat fiber would produce an even better result.

Without further ado, I prepared another batch of dough with 1/4 cup (60 ml) oat fiber. Lo and behold, the resulting dough was just perfect! Now, I just needed to bake something with it.

I had fried ground beef which I had seasoned with Cajun seasoning. That would make a fabulous filling to pastries when mixed with an egg to bind the filling, I thought. So, I rolled out the dough, took round shapes, placed some ground beef in the center of each round, folded the rounds, and pinched the edges well together.

Indeed, the pastries turned out awesome.

Well, but even the dough was perfect in my opinion, I still wanted to try if there was any way I could improve it. I did another experiment using 1/3 cup (80 ml) oat fiber and two eggs instead of one. However, the dough turned out too soft. I didn’t waste the dough but made a pie crust from it.

I filled the crust with a mixture of ground beef, cheese, and egg. It was fabulous! But the dough wasn’t sturdy enough to make pastries.

In conclusion, the version with 1/4 cup (60 ml) oat fiber produced the ultimately best result, so I decided to publish it.

Oh yes, in case you read my last week’s post, I wanted to make Keto Pizza Pinwheels, but the dough cracked when I rolled it. I realized that this Nut-Free Fathead Dough would be perfect for making Keto Pizza Pinwheels!

I added just marinara sauce, oregano, and mozzarella as filling, and the result both looked adorable and tasted awesome! Magnificent!

Here’s the recipe for you to enjoy:

Nutrition information	In total	Per serving if 16 servings in total
Protein	51.1 g	3.2 g
Fat	57.9 g	3.6 g
Net carbs	2.9 g	0.2 g
kcal	731 kcal	46 kcal

 

General prattling

This week was again quite busy. I finalized the Ketokamu Rehydration Guide (in Finnish) and posted it to our followers. I also was working on my book manuscript, which I have to return quite soon. I’ll update my latest Finnish keto book as a new publisher house will publish it this fall.

Well, but the busiest time was at the end of the week. Right now, when this post goes live, I’m attending a keto festival in the neighboring town, serving keto treats and selling our Ketokamu products.

I baked two versions of focaccia, Keto Mocha Bars, and truffles with our Ketolla nut and chocolate spread, among others.