Tie Dye Pie

Marinara, vodka sauce, and pesto swirled over fresh mozzarella. Three sauces, one psychedelic pie.

Time: 8 min | Yield: 1 pizzas | Difficulty: Intermediate | Serves: 3 | Published: 2026-07-24

Three sauces on one pizza sounds like chaos. Spooned right, it's the best-looking pie on this site: red marinara, blush vodka sauce, and green pesto marbled like a tie-dye shirt.

The fresh mozzarella goes down first in torn chunks. Then alternating spoonfuls of marinara and vodka sauce, restrained, because sauces expand as they bake and over-spooning turns tie-dye into mud. The pesto never sees the oven; it swirls on after the bake, keeping its green while the reds set around it.

All three sauces are in the recipe (the vodka and pesto match my standalone versions), or pull from your fridge stash. This is the pie you make when someone says pizza can't be pretty.

Ingredients

Pizza

• 1 ball fresh mozzarella
• Marinara
• Vodka Sauce
• Pesto
• Pecorino Romano

Marinara

• ½ can Crushed Tomatoes
• ½ teaspoon salt

Vodka Sauce

• ¼ chopped Yellow onion
• 2 chopped garlic cloves
• ½ can crushed tomatoes
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1 tbsp tomato paste
• ¼ cup heavy cream
• ¼ cup grated Parmigiano reggiano
• pinch of salt and pepper

Pesto

• ¼ cup pine nuts
• ½ cup grated Parmigiano Reggiano
• 3 tbsp heavy cream
• ½ cup olive oil
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• 1 tbsp water
• 2 cups fresh basil
• 1 garlic clove
• pinch of salt and pepper

Directions

1. Pre heat your oven to 550 degrees or as high as it can go on the convection setting.
2. Make or buy your sauces ahead of time. See attached sub-recipes.
3. Add all ingredients into a blender and pulse. You can add more water or whole milk if you want a thinner consistency. Also run the blender longer for a smoother consistency. Better for the "swirl" design. juice, 1 tbsp water, 2 cups fresh basil, 1 garlic clove, pinch of salt and pepper
   You'll know it's right: Pulse the pesto to spoonable, it needs to swirl, not chunk. Thin with water or milk if it fights the spoon.
4. Stretch your dough to 14-16 inches.
5. Rip chunks of fresh mozzarella and evenly place over the pizza
   You'll know it's right: Torn chunks spaced across the dough, the white gaps between them are where the sauce colors live.
6. Evenly spread spoonfuls of marinara and vodka sauce. Be sure not to overdo it, because the sauce will expand and you don't want a floppy pizza.
   You'll know it's right: Alternate small spoonfuls of red and blush with gaps between. The sauces spread and marble in the oven, restraint is the art.
7. Sprinkle pecorino evenly on top
8. Bake in a preheated oven at 500-550 degrees
9. Top with your pesto/ either with spoonfuls or using a squeeze bottle
   You'll know it's right: Pesto after the bake, in spoonfuls or squeeze-bottle lines across the set sauces. It should sit ON the colors, not sink in.
10. Finish with Parmigiano Reggiano
11. ENJOY!

Troubleshooting

The colors blurred into one

Over-sauced. Small alternating spoonfuls with visible gaps. The oven does the marbling, your job is restraint.

Pesto turned army green

Baked it. Post-bake only. The reds bake, the green finishes.

Soupy center

All three sauces plus wet mozz. Drain the fresh mozzarella chunks and keep both red sauces to spoonfuls. Three sauces means a third of each.

Flavors were muddled

Sauces weren't seasoned individually. Each sauce should taste finished on its own spoon before any of them meet the dough.

Looked nothing like tie-dye

Spread instead of spooned. Spoon and leave. Spreading homogenizes; spooning marbles.

Nutrition (2 slices (1/4 of a 14-inch pie)): 400 calories, 16g protein, 39g carbs, 21g fat.