Homemade Pizza

Helga Glaesel de BlandingOctober 9, 2019

This post is also available in / Esta entrada también está disponible en ESPAÑOL (SPANISH)

Everyone should try to make pizza at home, just because… why not? It’s fun! It’s something to make on a Friday afternoon if you are staying in. You can make the dough on a Friday night to get baking on Saturday. You do need to let the dough rise two times, the first time for at least one hour and the second time for 30 minutes, so take the timing into consideration when planning your pizza night. As we said, the dough can be made one day in advance, so you won’t feel like there is too much work all at once.

This dough uses yeast, and you might find a couple of different kinds at the supermarket. There is active dry yeast and instant dry yeast. Make sure you use the active dry yeast for this recipe. The difference is that the instant dry yeast doesn’t need to bloom, and you can just add it to the flour mixture. When baking, we prefer to measure by weight to get the best results, so if you have a kitchen scale, use it.

Sauce

Below is the recipe and procedure for the dough, you can use your favorite pasta or pizza sauce, either store-bought or homemade. We like a basic marinara sauce for our pizza base, and we like to add a few spoonfuls of sauce at the end, after adding all the cheese and toppings

Cheese

According to this recipe, it is best to grate the fresh mozzarella yourself, to get a better melt, so that’s what we did. We also placed a few mozzarella slices for extra cheese. We added enough to cover the entire pizza.

Toppings

We prefer vegetarian pizzas, so we just added onions and sliced olives to ours. Basil is mandatory, but we add that at the end, once the pizzas come out of the oven. If you add it before the basil will burn.

Cooking time

The recipe says 15 minutes. But we put in two at a time and left them in the oven for a little longer, just until the dough looked golden and the cheese looked melted and a little golden on top. For us, it was more like 35 minutes.

We have other Homemade Pizza recipes, like our Easy Pizza Dough or Little Foodie’s Mini Rustic Pizza recipe.

We’d love to know if you try this recipe!

Helga

Homemade Pizza

Yields: 16 servings
Recipe from: Tasty 101

Ingredients, for the dough:
2 ½ cups warm water (600 mL)
1 teaspoon sugar
2 teaspoons active dry yeast
7 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting (875 g)
6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, plus more for greasing
1 ½ teaspoons salt
¼ cup semolina flour (30 g)

Ingredients, for the topping:
1 lb mozzarella cheese
28 oz tomato sauce
fresh basil leaves
your favorite toppings: vegetables, meats, hams

Directions:

Bloom the yeast by sprinkling the sugar and yeast in the warm water. Let sit for 10 minutes, until bubbles form on the surface.
In a large bowl, combine the flour and salt. Make a well in the middle and add the olive oil and bloomed yeast mixture. Using a spoon, mix until a shaggy dough begins to form.
Once the flour is mostly hydrated, turn the dough out onto a clean work surface and knead for 10-15 minutes. The dough should be soft, smooth, and bouncy. Form the dough into a tight round.
Grease a clean, large bowl with olive oil and place the dough inside, turning to coat with the oil. Cover with plastic wrap or a clean kitchen towel. Let rise for at least an hour, or up to 24 hours. At this point, you can make it one day ahead.
Punch down the dough and turn it out onto a lightly floured work surface. Knead for another minute or so, then cut into 4 equal portions and shape into rounds.
Lightly flour the dough, then cover with a kitchen towel and let rest for another 30 minutes to an hour while you prepare the sauce and any other ingredients.
Preheat the oven as high as your oven will allow, between 450-500˚F (230-260˚C).
Place a pizza stone, or heavy baking sheet (turn upside down so the surface is flat). We used two round pizza pans that have holes in them.
Once the dough has rested, take a portion and start by poking the surface with your fingertips, until bubbles form and do not deflate.
Then, stretch and press the dough into a thin round. Make it thinner than you think it should be, as it will slightly shrink and puff up during baking.
Sprinkle semolina onto an upside-down baking sheet and place the stretched crust onto it. (this will allow it to slide off) Add the sauce and ingredients of your choice.
Slide the pizza onto the preheated pizza stone or pan. Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until the crust and cheese are golden brown. (Read our notes above, it took us longer.)
If you will add basil, remember to sprinkle on after the pizza comes out of the oven. Otherwise, it will burn.

Have you made this recipe?

Please let me know how it turned out for you! Leave a comment below and share a picture with the hashtag #thefoodieskitchen!

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