The key to a really good pizza is, of course, the crust. We make pizza at our house at least once a week, so you can be sure this recipe comes to you after years of very meticulous and scientific kitchen testing! We think we've got it just about the way we like it.
Plus, the fact that it comes together in a few minutes and doesn't need time to rise means that we can throw it together any night of the week! Thoughts on pizza-making below, as well recipes for dough, sauce, and topping inspiration!
This crust has a bit of crunch, but it's pliable enough to fold in half if required. The mild wheat flavor is a nice backdrop to whatever toppings you want to layer on top.
Since we're keeping the crust on the thinner side, this dough doesn't actually require time to rise. You roll it out after kneading it briefly and let it rest on the counter while you prepare the toppings. When it goes in the oven, the heat gives the bread a quick burst of rising so it will still have some chew when you bite into it.
For extra depth of flavor or if you're planning ahead for meals, you can refrigerate the dough overnight or up to 48 hours. This gives the dough a slightly sweet flavor and a more crackling crust. Once you've finished kneading, divide the dough in two and store it in separate containers or zipper bags. When you're ready to make your pizza, take the dough out of the fridge and let it warm up a bit while you prepare the toppings--ten minutes or so should do it.
Home-made Thin Crust Pizza
Makes 2 pizzas
For the dough:
3/4 cups (6 ounces) of water
1/2 teaspoon of active-dry yeast (if using instant yeast, you don't need to dissolve it during the first step)
2 cups (10 ounces) unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
For the toppings:
Your choice! Go wild!
For the base, we prefer a classic red sauce, or a white sauce if we're feeling fancy.
For toppings, there's sauteed onions, red peppers, or mushrooms. Sometimes we like to throw a little sausage or crisp bacon on there too!
For cheese, go for one or a combination of the following: mozzarella, provolone, parmesan, fontina, romano, and asiago
Making the Dough:
About 30 minutes to 1 hour before baking, pre-heat your oven to 500 degrees. If you have a baking stone, put it on a rack in the lower-middle part of the oven.
In a small bowl or liquid measuring cup, heat the water until it feels barely lukewarm when you test it with your finger (if the water is so hot that you can't leave your finger in it, wait for it to cool down). Add the yeast to the water and use a fork or whisk to stir it into the water. Set this aside for a few minutes and allow the yeast to dissolve. It's ok if the yeast doesn't bubble, but it should be entirely dissolved and the mixture should look like thin miso soup.
Measure out the flour into a large mixing bowl. Add the salt and use your hand or a whisk to combine.
Make a well in the center of the flour and pour in the water-yeast mixture. Use your fingers or a wooden spoon to combine everything together.
When it comes together into a cohesive ball (see image below), turn it out onto the counter along with any extra flour in the bowl that hasn't yet gotten worked in.
Knead the dough until all the flour is incorporated and the dough is smooth and elastic to the touch--about five minutes.The dough should still feel moist and slightly tacky. If it's sticking to your hands and counter-top like bubble gum, work in more flour one tablespoon at a time until it's smooth and silky (below).
Use a bench scraper to divide the dough in two.
Shaping the Dough:
Tear off two pieces of parchment paper roughly 12-inches wide. Work one piece of the dough in your hands and form it into a large disk. Lay the disk of dough on the parchment paper.
Working from the middle of the dough outwards, use the heel of your hand to gently press the dough outward until it's about 1/4 of an inch thick or less. You can also use a rolling pin for this part. We like to make free form pies, but if you'd like a circular pie, you can trace a large circle on the back of the parchment to use as a guide.
Repeat with the second piece of dough.
Note: The dough will stick to the parchment paper, making it easier for you to roll out. You'll bake the pizza right on the parchment paper. As it cooks, the dough will release from the parchment, and you can slide the paper out before serving.
Topping and Baking the Dough:
Spoon a few tablespoons of sauce into the center of each pizza and use the back of a spoon to spread it out to the edges. Pile on all of your toppings except the cheese.
Using a bread peel or the backside of a baking sheet, slide your pizza (still on the parchment) onto the baking stone in the oven. If you don't have a baking stone, just bake it right on the baking sheet.
Bake for about 5 minutes and then rotate the pizza 180-degrees (most ovens have 'hot spots' your pizza will bake unevenly if it's not rotated). Bake for another 3 minutes and then sprinkle the cheese over the top. Bake for another 2-3 minutes until the edges are golden brown and crispy.
Remove your pizza from oven and let it cool on a wire rack. At this point, you can slide the parchment paper out from under the pizza. Repeat with second pizza.
Let both pizzas cool for about five minutes (we know--it's hard to wait!) and serve.
More Pizza on The Kitchn
• Sweet Potato Pie: Fall Pizza Combos
• Over Easy: Egg on Pizza
• October: National Pizza Month
• Hunting Down a Good Pizza Stone
• Good Question: How Can I Re-Heat Without A Microwave?
(All Photos: Emma Christensen for The Kitchn)
Another tip, if you don't have a stone, bake the pizza on the underside of a baking sheet. It will be easy to slide off.
Also, when the crust has setup, transfer the pizza directly to the oven rack to finish cooking.
view art's profile
No Garlic in your crust?!?! A travesty!
We always mince up several cloves of garlic and throw them into the dough! Not only does it smell amazing when baking but it gives it that extra umph to take a ordinary crust to an amazing crust level!
view Manders22's profile
Does this work with whole wheat flour, too?
view merychipus's profile
I made homemade pizza tonight too. I used a recent Cooks Illustrated test recipe for the dough--can't wait until they print it, it's a winner! But used different toppings then the test recipe, this time I did half pepperoni with mozzarella and provolone, and half pizza margherita.
Quite tasty and easy to prepare before a big Easter feast. Tomorrow sloppy joes, then very good eats on Sunday! Happy Easter!
view bobcatsteph3's profile
Manders22--Garlic in the crust is such a fantastic idea! I can't believe I've never thought of it before! Thanks for the tip.
Merychipus--You can substitute some of the flour with whole wheat--try between 1/2 and 1 cup. It's tricky to substitute more than half the flour in this particular recipe because the final crust can end up really tough and dense. Having at least a little white flour will ensure some chew.
Has anyone else come across good whole wheat pizza dough recipes?
view EmmaC's profile
I've been using the parchment paper trick for pizza, too! I love it. I feel wasteful for using it, but it really does make it so much easier. I've actually ruined pizzas in the past by unsuccessfully transferring them to my pizza stone. I guess that means I prefer wasting parchment paper to wasting food.
view J-fer Rose's profile
I typically use multi-grain pastry flour rather than whole wheat, it's finely milled and the texture is softer rather than dense. Again, sometimes I mix but you have a bit more leeway.
Rather than garlic (not a fan) I add dried herbs to the dough, usually an Italian blend and a bit of multi-colored pepper. Fresh herbs are fine too, whatever's on hand.
view susna's profile
I've found a few recipes on Allrecipes.com for pizza crust that work well. Particularly one for a Garlic Lovers Crust that you make in the bread machine. I think it calls for 3 cups of bread flour and we always sub WholeWheat for ONE of those cups. It actually works better than all bread flour... makes it less sticky and easier to work with. That being said, always add a tiny bit more yeast if you're subbing wwf, or it could end up being too dense.
view Manders22's profile
Can this recipe be halved? Or can the dough be frozen?
view pidgeon92's profile
and can the kneading be done in a kitchen aid, or is the dough fragile?
view lindsey kathlene's profile
Hi, pidgeon92--this recipe can certainly be halved. I've also doubled and even tripled it with no problem! I've never frozen the dough, though. In theory it would work ok, I think. If you try it, let us know how it works out!
lindsey kathlene--yup, you can definitely knead the dough in a kitchen aid. Put the flour and salt in your mixer bowl and use a spoon to mix in the yeast mixture, just to get everything wet (or you could probably use the paddle attachment as well!). Then use the dough hook and knead the dough on low for a few minutes until it forms a nice, smooth ball.
view EmmaC's profile
I have a yummy spelt pizza recipe if you're looking for a whole-grain version. It comes out pretty hearty, but you could sub for half white spelt or wheat to make it a bit lighter.
http://sugarmagnolia.wordpress.com/2008/02/27/spelt-pizza-with-potato-spinach-goat-cheese/
view Barbara S's profile
I made this dough tonight, husband and I both liked it quit a bit. I subbed in half WW flour, and it was on the dense side so I'll probably up the yeast next time. Good quick recipe though, much faster than my other recipe with involved 2 risings.
Also tried the parchment trick for the first time, much easier and worth the "waste."
view Squirrely's profile
made this last night, and it turned out great! i used 1/2 regular flour, 1/2 whole wheat flour, though. and for toppings... i used a little bit of spaghetti sauce (froze the rest for future pasta night), then topped it off with grilled asparagus, red onion, mushrooms, garlic, black olives, and fancy shaved asiago cheese. yummmmm... glad i made 2 pizzas, because my boyfriend ate an entire pie. i split mine in two and today, at work, the leftovers are just as tasty. thanks for the thin crust recipe!
view ambsATX's profile
I'm about to try this pizza! It looks great!
And... any chance you can make these recipes printable? Like, a Print icon or something so it's easier to print up for my recipe collection? Just an idea.
view Eliza's profile
i just tried the parchment paper trick and the paper started smoldering - when i checked it at the halfway point to rotate it, i couldn't even pull the paper because it had become too delicate. so i just put the pizza on a baking sheet, threw away the paper, and finished the pizza directly on the stone. maybe it was the type of parchment i was using, or maybe i just had too much excess. next time i will probably trim the paper around the dough and see if that works better. but thanks for the recipe, it was easy and tasted great!
view bokeh's profile
I've made this recipe three times so far. It is SO good.
view quitecurious's profile
I tried this recipe and it worked great! Thanks.
view quitecurious's profile
I made it and its ery easy and delicious! I'll post photos on my blog! many thanks!
view ROOM design studio's profile
I just made this tonight and loved it. This was incredibly easy, even for someone as inexperienced as myself. I love that everything can be prepared days ahead of time. The dough under the sauce/toppings was a little undercooked. I'm guessing I just put on too much, because the outer crust was perfect.
I also used the red sauce recipe that was given in the article, omitting the red wine and marjoram with no problem. Much better than any store-bought sauce, and plenty to freeze!
I've got a picture of my first attempt posted here:
http://blog.roydonaldson.com/2009/05/healthy-low-budget-homemade-pizza.html
view Roy Donaldson's profile
My parchment paper STUCK to my pizzas. Like...really stuck. One of the pizzas couldn't even be eaten and the other I had to painfully peel off. I even trimmed the paper because I feared it would smoulder on the stone/in the hot oven. I'm going to blame it on the hot/humid climate I live in and try again without the paper.
That being said, this is a great pizza recipe! I made the homemade red sauce and it is better than anything you could buy.
view moo1018's profile
Thanks for the recipe! Also, I agree with Eliza - a printable option would be a great feature. :)
view mabaihua's profile