Pizza Dough

Healthy pizza doughI’ve tested so many different pizza dough recipes and this one is a combination of them.

A great pizza has a crispy outer crust with a soft textured dough on the inside, baked perfectly in the hottest of ovens. If your oven doesn’t go up to 500° F or higher, I suggest purchasing an inexpensive pizza stone. Use your creativity to top this tasty crust. If you are using meats, seafood, or dense vegetables, precook them before topping your pizza.

Serves 8

[amd-zlrecipe-recipe:131]

Comments

  1. Abdallah Clark says

    Dear Jennifer,

    I love pizza. I mean I REALLY love pizza and make it from scratch with a Pro 600 mixer every week, thin crust on a pizza stone and deep-dish in a cast-iron skillet. A multitude of variations in toppings and sauce. However, I still read your article about making it healthier for I am indeed concerned about keeping up progress in my eating habits to avoid high cholesterol, diabetes, high blood pressure and weight gain.

    I have two questions, though, which may have been answered if the links to “white” whole wheat flour or whole wheat pastry flour had been working. 😉

    First, I currently use high-gluten bread flour for the pizzas. Is the whole wheat flour naturally as high as possible in gluten content? (Is there no such thing as high-gluten whole wheat flour?)

    Second, every preferred recipe I’ve consulted differs from yours in two ways– not only is the yeast sitting in water alone for five to ten minutes before adding the flour and other ingredients, but the dough is allowed to rise for an hour, punched down and allowed to rise again before being shaped into a pizza crust, then allowed to rise for 10-15 minutes before adding the toppings. Otherwise, I find the crust is tough, rather hard and more like a cracker than toasted bread. In my other baking, whole wheat flour based breads are heavier and don’t rise much, so I was shocked to see no treatment of the yeast or the dough (as regards rising) with your recipe.

    I thank you in advance for your comments.

    Abdallah

    • Hey Abdallah!

      Thanks so much for you comment and advice I agree with you, pizza is the best!! Yes you can let the dough rest another 15 minutes before you add toppings but, I find that it takes people a while to top it which is enough time for the gluten to relax so the dough is soft. You don’t have to let the yeast rest in water before adding to the flour (that’s called proofing), unless you suspect that the yeast isn’t alive. Professional baker “proof” the yeast in warm water to make sure that it’s still active but it’s an extra step that busy home cooks might not want to spend time on. I advise people to check the dates and keep even the packet yeast in the fridge if they aren’t planning on using it right away. Thanks again and happy pizza baking!

      • Hi,

        To add to Abdullah’s question. I’ve tried several times to make bread (Parker House Rolls) that you haven’t “proofed” the yeast on and find it very hard to get the dough to rise. It will rise though. I’m guessing that means the yeast IS alive?

Speak Your Mind

*