Pizza crust is what makes a great pizza. I prefer a thin, somewhat chewy, and crisp bite to my crust. I adapted this recipe from Nancy Silverton’s Pizza Dough Recipe, The Mozza Cookbook. Her recipe is exceptional and perfect for the beginner pizza dough maker. I adapted it to my needs because I rarely use barley malt, wheat germ, or rye flour. I substituted 100% wheat flour and clover honey for these ingredients.
TIP: when making dough, always add liquid first
What Is The Secret To A Crispy Crust?
Heat is your best friend when making pizza. Set your oven as high as it goes. Most home ovens only get up to 550 degrees. Use a pizza stone or baking steel and preheat your oven for at least one hour before using it. Always stretch your dough; never roll it. You want to keep those nice big gas bubbles in your dough. As your dough cooks, these bubbles make your crust crispy, light and airy.
TIP: Well hydrated dough(wet dough) is essential in bread making. Hydration is the amount of water relative to the flour.
What Is A Sponge?
It is a type of pre-fermentation made with water, a small amount of yeast, and a portion of the flour in a recipe. Bakers use it as a shortcut to get a similar flavor and texture to bread made with a sourdough starter.
What Are The Best Kitchen Tools For Making Pizza?
- Pizza Stone: add even heat to your oven
- Baking Steel: my personal preference other than pizza stone
- Aluminum Perforated Pizza Pan: Substitution for using pizza peel.
- Stand Mixer: easier to use instead of kneading doughs by hand, cakes and other baked goods. Here are a few options: kitchen aid, Aucma Stand Mixer, Kitchen in the box Stand Mixer
- Dough Spatula: This is not a necessity but makes dough sizing easier.
- Bench Knife; multi-use kitchen utensil. Use to cut dough
- Digital Scale: Bakers use weights to measure their ingredients. Flours and ingredients have different weights. If you use cup measures it is not the same. Here are some options:Greater Goods Scale
- Wide Mixing Bowl. This is not a necessity. when mixing dough, it is easier to use.
How To Choose The Best Ingredients For Toppings?
Now for the best part: the toppings! You spent all day making the perfect dough, and now it’s time to pick the toppings. Here’s a list of ingredients to use as a base to add wonderful flavors that complement your pizza crust.
- Cheese: buffalo mozzarella mixed with a little parmesan is first choice. It adds a delicate flavor to the pizza and is one of the best cheese to pair with tomatoes.
- Pesto; another favorite as a finishing touch on a marguerite pizza before serving.
- San Marzano Tomatoes: The best! ( not San Marzano”Style” I cook all my Italian dishes with these wonderful tomatoes. They come from the Sarnese-Nocerino district in Campania, Italy, near Naples and are the official tomatoes for the famous DOP Pizza in Naples, Italy.
- Fresh Basil: this wonderful aromatic herb will take your pizza to the next level
- Olive Oil; Immediately drizzle a good quality olive oil over your pizza when it’s right out of the oven. Kirkland Extra Virgin Olive Oil is of good quality for the price.
- Salt: don’t forget to salt the tomato sauce before you add the mozzarella.
What Are The Best Creative Pizza Toppings?
- White sauce and shitake mushrooms with Grana Padano cheese
- Paper thin slices of pineapple and buffalo mozzarella: when cooked, garnish with prosciutto before serving
- Jalapeno and chorizo ( very spicy)
- Fennel sausage and mushroom
What Is A DOP Pizza?
DOP is one of the most important things to consider when learning how to cook traditional and authentic Italian food outside Italy. DOP stands for Denominazione d’ Origine Protetta, in English this translates to Protected Designation of Origin. Neapolitan pizza has a protected status granted by the Italian Standardization Body administered by the Associazione Vera Pizza Napoletana (AVPN).[6] A protected designation is available to pizzerias that meet strict requirements in following Neapolitan traditions in the art of pizza making. Pizza dough (wheat flour, natural yeast, sour dough or brewer’s yeast, sea salt, water), tomatoes (San Marzano or pomodorino del Piennolo del Vesuvio), mozzarella (bufala campana or fior di latte di agerola) are the certified must have ingredients.
FAQs
Should I roll the pizza dough or stretch it?
Never roll pizza dough, always stretch it. Stretching the dough allows the pizza to retain the gas bubbles created during fermentation. The bubbles make the crust crisp, light, and airy as it cooks.
Why does my pizza dough tear when I stretch it?
If you’re having trouble shaping your dough, it’s too tight and needs to rest. All you need to do is reshape, cover it, and let it rest for 10-15 minutes.
Why is my pizza dough not rising?
There are several reasons.
- yeast is old
- dough is cold
- dough has formed a crusty skin from not being covered properly
- too much flour
Why is my pizza dough hard and dense?
Most likely, there is too much flour in the dough. Pizza dough should be a wet and sticky when you first mix it. As it proves, the consistency will change. Resist adding more flour. Another culprit could be old yeast.
What Is The History Of Pizza?
The history of pizza begins in antiquity, as various ancient cultures produced flatbreads with several toppings.
A precursor of pizza was probably the focaccia, a flatbread known to the Romans as panis focacius, to which toppings were then added.[1] Modern pizza evolved from similar flatbread dishes in Naples, Italy, between the 16th and mid-18th century.[2][3]
The word pizza was first documented in AD 997 in Gaeta[4] and successively in different parts of Central and Southern Italy. Pizza was mainly eaten in Italy and by emigrants from there. This changed after World War II when Allied troops stationed in Italy came to enjoy pizza along with other Italian foods.
Homemade Pizza Dough: Step by Step
Ingredients
22 ounces warm tap water (2 cups, 6 ounces)
1 teaspoon active dry yeast
26 ounces unbleached bread flour, plus more as needed
1 oz(2 tablespoon) 100% whole wheat flour
1/2 (1 tablespoon )mild-flavored honey, such as clover or wildflower
1/2 ounce (1 tablespoon) Diamond Crystal kosher salt(See Notes)
Olive oil, grapeseed oil, or another neutral flavored oil, such as canola oil, for greasing the bowl
Instructions
Making The Sponge:
- Whisk flours together
- Put 15 ounces of the water and the yeast in the bowl of a standing mixer and let it sit for a few minutes to dissolve the yeast. Add 13 ounces of the flour mixture. Stir with a wooden spoon to combine the ingredients.
- Wrap the bowl tightly in plastic wrap and tightly wrap the perimeter of the bowl with kitchen twine or another piece of plastic wrap to further seal the bowl.
Options
- Set the dough aside at room temperature (ideally 68 to 70°F) for a minimum of 1 1/2 hours or until it has doubled in size.
- I highly recommend this option, and it is a time saver. Make the sponge the night before and let it sit in the refrigerator overnight. A long rise time creates better flavor and texture.
Making The Dough
- Uncover the bowl and add the remaining 7 ounces of water, the remaining 13 ounces of flour mixture, and the honey. Fit the mixer with a dough hook, place the bowl on the mixer stand, and mix the dough on low speed for 2 minutes.
- Add the salt and mix on medium speed for 10 minutes. Stop the mixer from time to time to knock down the sides and scrape the flour bits from the bottom of the bowl. Your dough is ready when a ball forms around the dough hook/paddle. If this does not happen, the dough is too wet. Add a small handful of flour until the dough has the right texture. The dough will be smooth and sticky.
Proofing
- While the dough is mixing, lightly grease a bowl with olive oil. The bowl should be large enough to hold the dough when it doubles in size.
- Turn the dough out of the mixer and put it into the oiled bowl. Wrap the bowl as before. Set the dough aside at room temperature for 45 minutes or until double in size. Proofing time may vary depending on room temperature and time of year.
Folding The Dough
- Dust your work surface lightly with flour and turn the dough onto the floured surface. Dust your hands with flour to stop the dough from sticking. Acting as if the round has four sides, fold the edges of each side of the dough toward the center. Turn the dough over and return it, folded side down, to the bowl. Cover the bowl again with plastic wrap and set it aside for 45 minutes or until double in size.
- Dust your work surface again lightly with flour and turn the dough onto the floured surface. Divide the dough into six equal segments, each weighing approximately 7 ounces. Gently tuck the edges of each dough round under itself to form a ball. Dust your tray with flour and place your rounds on the tray. Cover the dough rounds with a clean dish towel and let them rest for 5 minutes.
- Lightly flour your hands and use both hands to gather each dough round into a taut ball. Dust a baking sheet generously with flour, place the dough rounds on the baking sheet, and cover with a dish towel. Let them rise at room temperature for 1 hour.
Making Pizza
- Choose the pizza(s) you want to make and prepare the necessary ingredients.
- Place a pizza stone on the lowest rack of the oven. A pizza stone absorbs and distributes heat evenly, which helps you achieve a crisp crust. Buy a quality stone that will not crack from extreme heat. In a pinch, use the underside of a thick baking sheet.
- Preheat the oven and stone to 500°F, or as hot as your oven will go, for at least 1 hour.
- Create a pizza station that includes bowls full of olive oil, kosher salt, and the ingredients necessary to make the pizzas you have chosen.
- Have a bowl of flour ready to dust your countertop.
- Have a bowl of semolina ready for dusting your pizza peel, a tool with a long handle and a large, flat metal or wood surface for sliding your pizzas in and out of the oven.
- When your dough is ready, generously flour your work surface and place one round of dough in the center of the floured surface. Dust the dough lightly with flour. (If you haven’t already, right about now, you’ll want to pour yourself a glass of wine.)
- Using your fingertips as though you were tapping on piano keys, gently tap the center of the dough to flatten it slightly, leaving a 1-inch rim untouched.
- Pick up the dough, ball both your fists, and with your fists facing your body, place the top edge of the dough on your fists so the round stretches downward against the backs of your hands, away from them.
- Move the circle of dough around your fists like the hands of a clock so the dough continues to stretch downward into a circle.
- When the dough has stretched to about 10 inches in diameter, lay it down on the flour-dusted surface.
- Brush the rim of the dough with olive oil and sprinkle kosher salt over the surface of the dough.
- Dress the pizza according to the recipe you have chosen, making sure to leave a 1-inch rim with no sauce or topping around the edge.
- I use a perforated pizza pan. See recommended tools on Table of Contents. Dust a pizza peel with semolina and slide the pizza peel under the pizza with one decisive push. You are less likely to tear or misshape the dough with one good push of the peel rather than several tentative pushes. Reshape the pizza on the peel if it has lost its shape. Shake the peel gently to determine whether the dough will release easily in the oven. If it sticks to the peel, carefully lift one side of the dough and throw more semolina under it. Do this from a few different angles until there is semolina under the entire crust.
- Open the oven door and slide the dough onto the preheated pizza stone. Again, moving decisively, pull the peel toward you to leave the pizza on the stone. Instead of a peel I use a perforated pizza pan.(see Recommended Kitchen Tools)
- Bake the pizza until it is golden brown, and the rim is crisp and blistered, 8 to 12 minutes. Cooking times may vary according to the power of your oven.
- While the pizza is in the oven, clear a space on a clean, dry cutting board or place an aluminum pizza round on the counter to put the baked pizza on. (see Notes)
- When the pizza is done, slide the peel under the crust, remove it from the oven, and place it on the cutting board or round.
- Use a rolling pizza cutter to cut the pizza.
- Make another pizza.
