Susan: Pizza Dough

Whenever someone tells me they want to try baking bread but have no idea where to begin, I suggest they start with pizza. This is the equivalent of learning to bake biscuits or scones before attempting Danish pastry and éclairs.

The thought of baking your own bread can be a little frightening. It is time consuming, and numerous things can go wrong. But pizza dough is not temperamental or fussy. The actual hands-on work takes less than 10 minutes, and you can let it rise for as little or as long as you like. It is extremely difficult to ruin and will never let you down. Pizza dough disasters are rare.

Life is complicated, but making homemade pizza is not. Basically you mix up some dough, and a couple of hours later you pull a gorgeous, piping hot pizza from the oven.

At least that's what I thought last month — before A Year In Bread. I've never analyzed homemade pizza this much in my life.

There is a fundamental danger in becoming involved in a project with two people who are older and wiser than you. Dealing with them is like playing chess with an expert. The expert is thinking six moves ahead, while you are simply trying to remember which direction the horse is allowed to go. When Kevin and Beth readily agreed to my suggestion that I post my pizza article last, I should have known better.

I wasn't worried about my recipe, since I've been making fantastic homemade pizzas for years. I mainly wanted to go last because I'm always behind with everything, and figured I could use the extra time (case in point — I'm writing this on Wednesday night). But I will admit to having a slight case of stage fright. The enthusiastic response to A Year In Bread has been amazing, and expectations are obviously high. The pressure of going first was just too much. And the second baker's article would have to be at least as good as the. . . Oh no. The third baker was going to have to come up with something really special. No wonder they let me go last. (Stop laughing, you two.)

I panicked, but only a little. Then I saw Kevin's pizza. And this photo of Beth's on our Flickr group. I stared in disbelief. These pizzas looked incredible. They actually made them? My confidence level plummeted, and I tortured myself by looking back and drooling at their photos every few hours for days.

Meanwhile, a cursory glance through a few magazines and cookbooks revealed that not only was my pizza dough recipe remarkably similar to everyone else's, but all of my unique ideas for toppings had already been done. (I didn't dare Google anything.) I was obviously an unoriginal, homemade pizza loser. The slight panic turned into a full-blown attack.

I'll skip the pathetic details. Let's just say that 15 pizzas later, I'm right back where I started. Making homemade pizza is not complicated — and I make fantastic pizza. You can, too. So let's get started.

Susan's Straightforward Pizza Dough Recipe
Makes approximately two 11- to 12-inch pizzas or four 7- to 8-inch pizzas.

This is a simple recipe (don't let all these paragraphs scare you away) that produces a crisp, chewy, and flavorful dough. It takes less than three hours from first step to first bite — which means you can decide at four o'clock on Saturday that you want pizza for dinner and be eating well before seven. That said, it should be noted that my 15 experimental pizzas were not made under exacting scientific conditions in a lab. They were made in real life, which we all know is far from perfect. One time the two-hour rise turned into three. Another time the 10-minute rest period lasted 45 minutes. The good news? Every single pizza still came out tasting (and looking) great.

You can pile on the toppings like I did in the pizza above (it's loaded with a thick layer of my Super Simple Homegrown Tomato Sauce, mushrooms, mozzarella, pecorino romano, and homegrown lamb salami) or simply brush the dough with some flavored olive oil and scatter on a little cheese. The lighter the toppings, the more the crust will rise while baking. If you are really going to load up your pizza with toppings, you might want to make the crust a bit thicker, as the middle of the pizza may get soggy if it's too thin.

Ideally, you want the dough to be between 74 and 78 degrees F (23 to 26 C) while it is rising. If your home is very cold, you should probably let the dough rise longer if you have the time. You can also start with warmer water. During the summer, when our non-air-conditioned house is in the upper 80s (with humidity to match), I still let the dough rise for two hours, but I use cold water. You can also store your flour in the freezer to help cool down the dough (and keep your flour fresher).

I use bread flour when I make pizza, as it creates a crisper crust (but you can make this dough with all-purpose flour). I'm also a big proponent of organically produced (and locally grown) ingredients. I use Heartland Mill organic flours, which I buy in 50-pound bags that I special order at the local natural foods store. Organic flour costs more than conventional, but not much. And compared to the price of a purchased pizza (or any bread for that matter), using top quality ingredients when you're baking is a bargain. Look for organic flours in the bulk section of independently owned natural foods stores, or at places like Whole Foods and Wild Oats.

Do you have a sourdough starter living in your fridge? Tossing some into your dough will make this pizza even more wonderful. You'll find instructions below.

Note: For very small amounts, my beloved digital kitchen scale isn't accurate enough; in fact, few kitchen scales are accurate at such detail. You're better off measuring things like yeast and salt in teaspoons or mililiters.

bread flour 3 c 700 ml 15 oz 424 g (plus a little more added while kneading the dough)
instant yeast 1 tsp 5 ml 1/8 oz 3 g
salt 2 tsp 10 ml 3/8 oz 10 g
lukewarm water (about 90F, 32C) 1 1/3 c 315 ml 11 1/2 oz 325 g

Place the bread flour in a large bowl. Stir in the yeast and salt. Add the water and stir until a soft, but not sticky, dough forms.

Turn the dough onto a floured surface and knead it for 3 minutes, sprinkling with a little flour each time it sticks to your hands or the counter. The dough should be quite soft. (Just knead it by hand. It's easier and faster than getting out your big electric mixer. Yes, Kevin, this means even you.)

Liberally sprinkle the mixing bowl with flour, place the dough back in it, and sprinkle the top of the dough with flour. Cover with a damp tea towel or cloth napkin and set in a warm place for two hours.

After about an hour, place a baking stone on the lowest rack in the oven, and set the temperature at 500 degrees. (You never want to put a cold baking stone into a hot oven as it may crack.)

Turn the risen dough out onto a lightly floured surface, and divide it into two or four pieces. (I use a pastry scraper, sometimes called a dough scraper or bench scraper, which is a handly little gizmo that is also great for cleaning off my butcher block countertop). Flatten each piece of dough into a disk and let them rest for 10 to 15 minutes.

There are many ways to shape pizza dough; experiment to find what works for you. Smaller pizzas are easier to shape than larger ones. I simply hold the disk of dough in front of me by one edge and use gravity and my fingers to gently stretch it into a larger circle. I then lower it onto a wooden pizza peel that has been dusted with plenty of cornmeal, and finish stretching it into the shape and thickness I want, pinching together any tears. You can also set it on a rimless baking sheet (or directly onto your pizza pan if you aren't using a baking stone).

Beth and Kevin recommend creating (and baking) your pizzas on a sheet of parchment. I'd never thought to do this, but it makes sense, especially with heavily topped pizzas — and in warmer weather when the dough wants to stick to the peel.

Don't worry if your pizzas are not perfect circles. The more oddly shaped and rustic looking the better, in my opinion. If you like a thick edge on your pizza, go around the outside of the circle and fold the dough over, pressing it down and sealing it with your fingers.

Top your pizza however you like, gently shake the peel to make sure the pizza is not stuck to it, and then carefully side the pizza onto the hot baking stone. This is done in one quick move, and it can take some practice, but all mistakes are edible. My baking stone is about 14 inches by 15 inches and will hold one 12-inch pizza or two 8-inch pizzas.

Bake until the crust is golden and the cheese has started to brown, about 8 to 15 minutes. (If I know I'll be freezing and reheating a pizza later, I undercook it by a couple of minutes.) Assemble the next pizza when the first one is nearly done. Unlike Kevin's and Beth's recipes, the finished, uncooked pizzas do not rise at all but go straight into the oven.

Use your pizza peel to remove the pizza from the oven, or just slide it straight onto a pizza pan. I use an aluminum blade peel for removing pizzas and breads from the oven. The thin edge easily picks them up, and the long handle is really nice.

If a pizza is really loaded with cheese and toppings, I let it rest two or three minutes before cutting into it. If I'm making several pizzas so there will be leftovers for the freezer, I let them cool on stacked wire racks. (These inexpensive, ingenious things are indispensible — especially during the holiday baking season). Nothing slices pizza like a good pizza wheel, but I've found that small, lightly topped pizzas can be easily cut into appetizer-size pieces with a pair of scissors (I always keep at least two pairs of decent but cheap scissors from the dollar store in my kitchen).

I'll tackle toppings in the next few days, including what just might be a thoroughly unique idea (yep, I even had the guts to Google it). I'll also write about my experience with the whole wheat version of this dough that I made the other day using 100% white whole wheat flour.

Susan's Sourdough Starter Pizza Dough Recipe
Makes approximately two 12-inch pizzas or four 8-inch pizzas

I've found that adding some sourdough starter to my pizza dough improves the flavor and texture. This is also a great way to use up starter if you need to refresh your container of it but don't want to bake bread. Sourdough starters are easy to make. The initial process takes a few days, but the actual hands-on-work is minimal. Recipes for sourdough starters abound in cookbooks and online. I made my 5-year-old starter using the recipe in Bread Alone by Daniel Leader (my favorite bread book). The easiest thing to do, though, is to get some from somebody else. Ask around; you might be surprised by who has one living in their fridge. And for those of you interested in sourdough breads, we'll definitely be baking some here in the coming months.

You can make my Straightforward Pizza Dough recipe (but reducing the amount of water to 1 cup 240 ml 8 oz 224 g) and simply toss 1 cup 240 ml 8 oz 224 g of sourdough starter straight from the fridge into the mix. But it's best if you add a little flour and water to your cup of starter and let it sit awhile:

sourdough starter 1 cup 240 ml 8 oz 224 g
water 1/4 cup 60 ml 2 oz 56 g
bread flour 1/4 cup 60 ml 1 1/4 oz / 32 g

Combine starter, water, and bread flour in a small bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and let sit at room temperature for 8 to 10 hours (or less if that's all the time you have). Proceed with my Straightforward Pizza Dough recipe, but reduce the amount of water to 1 cup 240 ml 8 oz 224 g.

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