Pizza Dough Recipe: How to Make Pizza Dough at Home

I hope to give you a detailed description of how to make the best and easy homemade pizza dough recipe from scratch with simple and basic ingredients. You can make pizza dough recipes without yeast and also with yeast. Making dough for pizza with yeast yields a puffy pizza crust while making the pizza dough without yeast gives a thin crust. It all depends on what you like. The advantage of adding yeast is that it gives the flavor and taste of leavened bread whereas without yeast is just plain, thin, and has no flavor. This recipe uses yeast but you can replace it with some baking powder.

Ingredients for making homemade pizza dough

• 2 cups of all-purpose flour
• 1 and 1/4 tsp of instant yeast.
• 1 tbsp of sugar.
• 1 and 1/2 tbsp of olive oil.
• 1/2 tsp of salt.

With just a few ingredients, you can make your own homemade pizza dough recipe at home and use it for your pizza making.

How to make pizza dough

1. Start making the pizza dough by filling your mixing bowl with some hot water and leaving it to warm up for 1 to 2 minutes; especially when you are staying in a cold environment. Warming your bowl helps to activate the yeast quickly. If you are making your pizza dough recipe without yeast, no need of adding warm water. You can skip this process.
2. Pour out the hot water after 2 minutes and add 1/2 cup of lukewarm water to the mixing bowl. The lukewarm water should be about 110 degrees Fahrenheit.
   To the bowl, add 1 tbsp of sugar with 1 and 1/4 tsp of instant yeast; when using active dry yeast, you need to allow the yeast to be activated (you will know this when you see some bubbles formed in the yeast and sugar mixture after leaving it to rest for about 5 to 10 minutes). But since we are using instant yeast, no need for that, it is activated instantly.
3. Stir the yeast to dissolve in the warm water.
4. Bring in 2 cups of flour, 1/2 tsp of salt, and also 1 and 1/2 tbsp of olive oil.
5. Stir with a spatula until you have a crumbly mixture.
6. Fix the bowl to a stand mixer and mix using the kneading attachment for about 5 minutes, until you have smooth pizza dough. If the dough is too dry, you can 1 tbsp of water at a time and allow it to be incorporated into the dough before adding another. Do not add much water at once. The same process is done when the dough is too watery, add 1 tbsp of flour at a time and allow the mixer to knead until you have smooth pizza dough. You can also knead with your hands on the surface of your table.
7. Next, grease another bowl with about 1 tsp of olive oil and bring the pizza dough into it; this helps to prevent the dough from sticking to the bowl when it rises. Also, rub the same oil over the surface of the dough and cover the bowl with a plastic wrap or cling film.
8. Keep in a warm place for about 40 minutes to 1 hour or until it doubles in size.
9. After an hour, the pizza dough should have doubled in size, deflate it by punching with your hands, and then remove it from the bowl to a lightly floured surface. Knead it into a round ball or into a log for about 1 minute and then cut into smaller sizes that will fit into your pizza pan or based on the size and number of pizzas you would want to make.
10. Use one small ball and press with your palms into a flat round ball and then roll it using a rolling pin to about 9 inches in size (depending on the size of your pizza pan).
11. Grease your pizza pan with a little oil (this makes it easier to cut out the pizza when baked) and then transfer the homemade pizza dough into the pan. Shape the dough to fit into the pan, with the edges being a little bigger than the middle of the dough. You can punch some holes in the middle of the pizza dough to allow for air to escape when baking the pizza. And your homemade pizza dough recipe is ready. You can add the pizza sauce and also top it with some vegetables and mozzarella toppings or simply preserve the pizza dough and use it for any recipe you like.

Preservation and Storage

You can preserve any excess homemade pizza dough by wrapping it in cling film and place it in the fridge for 3 days or the freezer for up to 3 months. All you need to do to reuse any stored pizza dough recipe is to allow it to thaw on the counter and then knead into a round flat shape for your homemade pizza.

The pizza dough when left for some minutes over the table may begin to puff up as the yeast produces gas in it; so if you won’t use it immediately, it is better to refrigerate it pending when you want to make use of the dough.

Would you rate this pizza dough recipe as the best? Is it easy? How simple is it for you? Let me know your thoughts on this pizza dough recipe in the comments.