Preheat the oven to 475 degrees, or if using store bought pizza dough or pre-made flat breads, preheat the oven according to the package.
Lightly season a skillet with olive oil over medium high heat. Add the sausage and break the meat apart with a wooden spoon or spatula. You don't want to add too much oil because the sausage will render a lot of fat during the cooking process.
Cook the sausage until it is golden brown on all sides. Remove the sausage from the pan and set it on a plate. Also remove any excess fat from the pan, leaving about 2 tsp behind in the pan. You can save the sausage fat in a jar and use it for roasted potatoes or veggies, or you can toss once it cools down.
Adjust the heat to medium and add the sliced fennel to the pan.
Sauté for 5 minutes, until the fennel begins to with and become slightly caramelized (AKA golden brown.) Add the garlic and sauté another 2 minutes, until fragrant. If you have a lot of golden brown bits on the bottom of the pan, pour 2 tbsp of water into the pan and scrape them off until they combine with the water.
Let the water cook off and then add the sausage back to the pan, tossing all of the ingredients together for one minute. Remove the mixture from the heat.
Put the pizza dough onto a sheet pan or pizza pan and prepare according to the recipe or box instructions.
Sprinkle mozzarella cheese onto the pizza according to taste.
Add dollops of ricotta according to taste.
Top with the sausage mixture and some fennel stalk slices according to taste.
Add shallot slices according to taste.
Bake according to package or recipe instructions. I baked around 12-15 minutes! Top with a drizzle of olive oil, freshly cracked black pepper and fennel fronds to taste. Enjoy!
