“Use your imagination and creativity to make a healthy pizza,” says Elisabeth Lee, a registered and licensed dietitian at Children’s Medical Center Dallas. “Pizza can be a balanced entrée because it includes starch, protein, vegetables or fruit, and dairy.”

Pizza is child-friendly as a meal or snack. You can set up a pizza toppings bar – heavy on the veggies – and let the kids make their own, says Lee.

A few slices of advice:

• You don’t have to make your own dough. Refrigerated crust is easy to find, and already-baked pizza crusts come in a variety of types (individual size, thin crust, whole wheat).
• Low-moisture, part-skim mozzarella is the first choice for cheese. But you can be creative with cheddar, feta or other types.
• Instead of ready-to-use pizza sauce (often very high in sodium), try fresh tomato slices or sun-dried tomatoes to add flavor without salt. No-salt-added sauces also are available.
• Limit the use of higher fat meats, such as pepperoni and sausage. Instead substitute traditional meat toppings with other protein sources including grilled chicken, Canadian bacon or black beans.
• Vegetable toppings can add vitamins and needed fiber to your pizza. Let the kids pick out a few vegetables they want to try and have them add it to their pizza – get them involved in the process.

One pitfall of pizza: It tastes so good you might eat too much. Lee suggests serving a large green leafy salad with your pizza and limiting your serving to one to two slices of pizza. Remember, everything in moderation.

Cooking spray
1 13.8-ounce package refrigerated pizza dough
1 tablespoon cornmeal
1/2 cup fat-free ricotta cheese
1 pound cooked and peeled shrimp, sliced lengthwise
6 cloves roasted* garlic, sliced
8 ounces part-skim mozzarella cheese (about 2 cups)
1 tablespoon crushed basil

*If you don’t have time to slow roast garlic in a 325-degree oven for an hour, microwave on high for about 30 seconds to soften cloves.

Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees. Lightly spray 101/2-by- 151/2-inch baking pan with cooking spray. Sprinkle cornmeal evenly over pan. Stretch refrigerated pizza dough across pan. Bake dough for 8 minutes.

Spread ricotta over pizza base. Put a layer of shrimp and sliced garlic. Cover pizza with mozzarella and sprinkle with basil. Bake on the bottom rack of an oven heated to 400 degrees for about 12 minutes, until cheese is bubbling. Cut into 12 pieces and serve immediately.