Gray Welch looked inside the refrigerator of his Hinds County home in 2021, scouring over what ingredients he had available to him to make some sample pizzas for his friends to try later that day. As the cool air hit his glasses, he took inventory, seeing pepperoni, shredded cheese, cream cheese, bacon, green onions and Ritz crackers. He’d already recently made a dip using these same ingredients for his friend’s wedding.
“What would it hurt to put it on a pizza?” he thought to himself.
First rolling out his dough, Welch spread a homemade red pizza sauce for his base before sprinkling a house blend of cheese. Next, he added bacon, dispersed dollops of cream cheese around the surface and topped the pie with green onions. To finish off his creation, he crushed up the buttery Ritz crackers and draped them across the pizza before drizzling on some sweet-pepper glaze.
Placing the pizza in a wood oven, Welch watched as the Neopolitan style crust bubbled to a crisp brown-to-black char at the edges to give it a firm, crispy texture and a smoky, slightly sweet calcified taste…