Pizza: Basic Pizza Crust

Pizza is the best of everything. It's yeast bread, which is my favorite thing in the world, and it's cheese, which is my second thing in the world. It's saucy, which is awesome, and it can be spicy, which is double awesome. Pizza can be anything you like. And making it at home is satisfying and delicious.


The secret to a great pizza is in the crust. It should be light and airy and have a gentle crisp to it. You can make it thin or thick, crimp the edges so it has a defined crust around the edge or keep it flat so you can take toppings all the way to the edge. It's really up to you.


While you can use a regular bread dough to make pizza, it's not recommended. There is a difference in the dough, so use a pizza recipe like the one below. Also, a note on yeast. I don't use traditional yeast. I hate dissolving it. You can use a bread machine yeast (even if you don't use a bread machine), a quick-rise yeast, or even a pizza yeast. They make pizza yeast now. I like it.


I also like precooking my crusts. I call it flashing, and it sets the crust just enough to make it really easy to make pizzas quickly if you're serving a large crowd. It's also handy for freezing crusts to use at a later date. Because I love flashing my crusts so much, it will be included in the recipe below.


Ingredients


1¼ tsp pizza yeast
3 cups all purpose flour
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp garlic powder
1 tsp oregano
3 tbsp olive oil
1 cup warm water

Preparation


If you're using a bread maker, just toss everything in, select the dough cycle, and walk away until the bread maker is done. If you're doing it by hand, you'll have to mix and knead with your own two hands. The results will be the same, so use a bread machine if you have it, or do it by hand if you don't. Mix until you have a smooth ball of soft dough. Allow to rise until doubled in size, about 60 minutes. It may take as long as 90 minutes depending on temperature and humidity.


Pizza dough typically only rises once, so when it's ready, you'll be making pizza. Punch down the dough until most of the air bubbles have been eliminated. Preheat the oven to 350°F so you'll be able to flash your crust. Use a pizza stone for this step; you'll want the pizza stone to heat in the oven so it's piping hot when the crust hits the stone. Alternatively, you may use a pizza cooker. These are small appliances with cast iron that preheat, so they're very like pizza stones. Either way, you'll want a hot surface to flash your crusts.


Now you'll shape your crusts. Do this with your hands and not a roller. Using a roller will drive out all the air bubbles, and you don't want that. Pizza crust doesn't rise a second time, so you want some of those air bubbles to remain, so use your hands and be gentle. Stretch and press your dough until it is the size and thickness you want. You can divide the dough to make 2 or even 4 smaller pizzas if you like. You can make a thicker, pan crust. You can roll it out until it is paper thin. With a basic crust, this is up to you. When you first start making your own pizza crust, roll them out semi-thin. You can adjust this to your own preferences in later batches.


Once shaped, you have to flash your crusts for 5 minutes. You can do this by using a pizza peel to slid them into the pizza stone. Coat the pizza peel in flour or cornmeal to prevent sticking if needed. If you want a crisp and professional crust, try brushing the pizza stone with a little garlic butter, maybe even garlic butter with parmesan, right before you add the crust. You won't be disappointed, I promise.


Allow the crust to bake for 5 minutes. It's not cooked, obviously, but it is flashed. Remove and repeat with any remaining crusts.


Once you have flashed all your crusts, you can start to make your pizzas. Increase the oven temperature to 425°F. Add your sauce and toppings. Topping are up to you. We usually have cheese and pepperoni, because I have kids. But we also do margarita and red pepper-pepperoni when my mother or sister are around. Don't be afraid to throw a few dried herb on top of your cheeses. It will be delicious.


Bake your pizzas for 10 to 15 minutes, depending on how dark you like them. They are cooked after about 8 minutes because you previously flashed the crusts, so anything beyond that is personal preference.


Allow to cool for 3 minutes before cutting so the cheese has time to set, then enjoy.