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My New Best Pizza Dough
As you must have noticed by now, we love pizza here! It’s okay to be a pizza fiend. No, really, it is. It’s by far our favorite junk food Friday meal. Since I usually top ours with not all too much cheese, my own pizza sauce and add loads of fresh veggies, I’m not quite sure just how junky it still is. Or maybe I have a different perspective on what really constitutes junk food.
I’ve tried lots of recipes over the years. Most recipes called for 3 cups of flour—sometimes even 3 1/2—on 1 cup of water, making the dough very tough to work with while it’s supposed to be incredibly supple. Maybe I just messed up but either way, it wasn’t working for me and the crust came out tasting like card-board. It was depressing.
What was even more depressing were all those times I couldn’t get the dough to rise no matter what I tried. A lot of crusts tasted kinda bland, so I upped the salt and think it really tastes better like this. Plus, I replaced the sugar with honey and that definitely worked to my advantage. Oh boy, I’ve tried and ate so many pizzas over the past few weeks trying to get the exact right recipe for us. After lots of tweaking I think I have the perfect crust for my family. This one is light, fluffy and exactly right.
Now, if you need me… I’ll be on the Stairmaster.
Ingredients:
1 cup warm water
2 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
2 tsp instant yeast
2 tbsp honey
3 tbsp olive oil
1 1/2 tsp salt (2 tsp also works well)
Directions:
We’ll be needing yeast—I opted for instant yeast but feel free to use active dry yeast—salt and olive oil. Good pizza dough needs oil. Sorry, there’s just no work around or I would’ve found it.
You can either use your stand-mixer, food processor or hands for this. Combine the yeast and salt.
Add 2 tbsp honey. I really like the addition of honey. It adds something to the crust that I can’t really define but that I miss when it’s not there.
And add 1 cup warm water to it. Warm but still very comfortable to touch.
I let the machine spin to combine it all. Of course you can also just let it sit in a bowl for 5 minutes to activate it. Not really necessary with instant yeast but it can’t hurt either.
Add the oil and 1 cup of flour. Wait for the flour to be fully incorporated before adding the next cup. Then add the last 1/4 cup. I let the machine run until it was a supple dough.
The best pizza flour is, by far, Molino Caputo. In Holland that’s very hard to come by so I just use all-purpose flour. Gotta make do with what I have.
I took it out of the machine and kneaded it with my hands for a few minutes as well. What can I say? It works as an anti-stress formula.
Lightly oil a big bowl. Check out the timing on this shot! It’s harder than you might think!
Place the dough in the oiled bowl and spray a little oil on top of the dough as well. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and put it in a draft-free place—I usually store it in my oven or microwave. I did forget about it once and turned on the oven. It was bad. Really bad.
If you’re using active dry yeast let your dough rise twice. If you’re using fresh yeast I assume you know what you’re doing and you don’t need my advice anyway! I’ll just shut up then. At least I’ll try.
Fast forward to 2 hours later.
My dough had risen beautifully. This makes for 2 medium or one really large pizza.
Punch it down and transfer it to a floured board. Make sure there’s flour on both sides of the dough and then only use more flour if the dough starts sticking to your hands.
Use the sides of your hands to create the border, push it down in the center and use your hand or finger tips to gently stretch the dough while turning it around.
Of course I had to get all carried away and stretch it on my knuckles as well. This does work, though, because you get to check the dough for really thin spots this way. I haven’t quite mastered the art of tossing the dough high up in the air. Well, I got the tossing part down but still have some work to do on the catching.
And there’s your pizza dough. Wasn’t too hard, was it?
The best part? It magically transforms itself into this during baking.
I’ve tried this dough several times now with fantastic results and rave comments every single time. I’m sold!
| My New Best Pizza Dough | |
| Ingredients |
2 1/4 cup all-purpose flour 2 tsp instant yeast 2 tbsp honey 3 tbsp olive oil 1 1/2 tsp salt (2 tsp also works well) |
| Directions |
Lightly oil a bowl, place the dough in the oiled bowl and spray a little oil on top of the dough as well. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and put it in a draft-free place. I usually store it in my oven or microwave. If you’re using active dry yeast let your dough rise twice. Let the dough rise for a few hours, until it has doubled in size. Punch it down and transfer it to a floured board. Make sure there’s flour on both sides of the dough and then only use more flour if the dough starts sticking to your hands. Use the sides of your hands to create the border, push it down in the center and use your hand or finger tips to stretch the dough while. If you can, stretch it on your knuckles as well so you can check the dough for thin spots. |
| Meal type: | pizza |
| Servings: | 2 medium or 1 large pizza |
| copyright © kayotickitchen.com | |
127 Comments »
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I have whole wheat pastry flour do you think this would work in place of the all purpose flour?
I am making this right now! On the search for the perfect pizza crust! Thanks for writing it with real measurements! Not everyone has a food scale.
I tried and love it !! New to your blog !!
I tried the recipe did not have any olive oil but it came out great thanks
I’m going to try this but instead of using commercial yeast I’m going to use my sourdough starter. I’m on a sourdough kick so anything bread just has to have sourdough in it!
I use honey in my bread all the time. nice taste and much better for you… I’ve been making pizzas for a while now, even tried using the chicken in satay marinade as a topping (!!worked well!!) I’ll be giving all your pizza recipes a try tomorrow, Kay!! I’m sure they will be delicious!
This is the best dough, I have ever made.
Thank you so much!
I made this on Valentines Day for my kids and hubby. We made heart Pizzas and the dough was amazing! Thank you so much for the recipe :) I am making it again tonight!!!
I had a day off today and thought that I’d make myself some pizza using this recipe, since it was the first one I found that didn’t specifically say that I needed bread flour. I ended up with a breakfast pizza (eggs, bacon, mozzarella cheese, basil and tomatoes) and one with goat cheese, provolone, mushrooms and asparagus. Both were delicious! The crush had a nice crunch and a sweet undertone that I can only think to thank the honey for. Wonderful!
hi! just wondering if this crust should be pre-baked before all the toppings go on. if so, how many minutes do you think? thanks so much for posting! looks great!
I have not bought store-bought dough or ordered pizza in since discovering this recipe. So delicious, thank you for figuring it out and sharing!
i just made this dough and i a so glad i did! i have been looking for a less dense dough than the ones i have been making. this is my new fav pizza dough recipe! thank you for sharing. ^__^
Making the dough right now!!! Looks awesome!!
YUM! Thank you for this recipe! I had been using another one and decided to try this one. It was a big hit!
The only problem I had was the amount of flour. For me, it was too little and made a big mess. So I just added more until the dough was workable for me and it was absolutely delicious! So glad I found this recipe! The verdict was that it was better than any pizza place around. :)
I’m GLAD it’s in measurements I can understand. Ha! So thanks for that!
Will be making again and again and again and again and……… :)
Just wanted to drop by and thank you for this recipe. I made it today, and it was delicious! Fluffy, crispy and chewy. Yummy!
I am having difficulty figuring out how it is possible that this recipe works. I’ve tried this 3 or 4 times now and I always have to add a lot more flour. As-is, this recipe results in a very sticky, wet dough. Almost a batter rather than a workable dough. The typical pizza dough recipe calls for 3 cups of flour to 1 cup of dough. This recipe is way-off that ratio, plus it adds the honey and oil for even more moisture. What am I missing?
What you’re missing it that, during kneading, the gluten are build up. Which is why working with a machine gives far better results since you won’t have to knead sticky dough. You add only so much flour that the dough doesn’t stick to your hands and all of a sudden … the dough gets less sticky.
The recipe works for me and for a lot of other people… so I guess something is right about it :)
Hmmm. Last 2 times I tried it, I used a food processor with a dough blade. Alas, I do not have a stand mixer, though it would surprise me if it was that much different from the food processor. I’m just guessing here, but I suspect many of your readers are adding extra flour too. The 3:1 ratio of flour to water is pretty common in all the recipes I’ve looked at.
Just look at the comments to see that for most of the people this dough seems to work. Too bad it doesn’t for you… but you can always add more flour.
Caleb- pizza dough recipes go from 60% to 100% hydration of the ones I’ve seen). Just experiment with the dough- it’s your pizza. I do see what you mean about it seeming too wet but leave it in the bread maker to knead for 15 minutes using the 2 1/4 c flour and then reevaluate……
Delicious! I am using this dough recipe every time I make pizza. Great step-by-step instructions as well. Well done.
I used this recipe and it turned out great! I used a recipe that I found at a yeast site and it turned out like a baguette. Tasty, but not what you want in your pizza. When I made it, I added dried herbs at the yeast stage. It ended up super tasty!