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Simple, 4-Ingredient Homemade Pizza Dough
By Alexandra Stafford
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Last Updated: 11/04/2025
This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure policy.
Made with 4 ingredients — flour, water, salt, and yeast — this simple, no-knead pizza dough recipe can be ready start to finish in 3 hours. It produces a pizza with a ballooned edge and crisp but pliable crust. You can use the dough the same day you mix it or store it in the fridge for up to 5 days (or freeze it!). 🍕🍕
Let’s get straight to it. This is a 4-ingredient, high-hydration, no-knead dough. It is the simplest of the simple homemade pizza recipes and, in my opinion, the tastiest, too. If you have time to prep your dough a few days in advance, you’ll be setting yourself up for serious pizza bliss (read on to learn why) but know that you can make excellent pizza, start to finish, in 3 hours.
The first step to making excellent pizza at home is to get comfortable working with high-hydration pizza doughs. Here’s why:
Why High-Hydration Pizza Dough is Best For a Home Oven
High-hydration doughs, such as this overnight focaccia, are doughs made with a high proportion of water relative to the flour. This high proportion of water creates a pizza crust that stays crisp but moist during the cooking process with beautiful air pockets throughout.
How? Understand this relationship, understand everything:
The lower the oven temperature, the higher the dough hydration. And conversely: The higher the oven temperature, the lower the dough hydration.
A great way to understand this concept is to look at the makeup of a classic Neapolitan-style pizza dough. Neapolitan-style pizza is characterized by a blistered and ballooned outer edge with a soft, thin (and sometimes wet) center. Contrary to what you might expect, Neapolitan-style pizza dough is on the lower end of the hydration spectrum: 60 to 65%.
The reason Neapolitan pizzas emerge light and airy with nearly wet centers is because they cook in 60 to 90 seconds in 900ºF ovens. In this short period of time, very little water evaporates from the dough, which allows it to retain its moisture.
When you bake pizza in a home oven, which can only get up to 550ºF, the baking time is longer, during which time a lot of water will evaporate. If you were to bake a 65% hydration Neapolitan pizza dough in your home oven, you will be left with a dry, tough crust due to all of the moisture loss during the long bake.
So, in sum: to prevent your crust from being dry and tough in a home oven, it needs more water from the start.
Working With High Hydration Dough
Working with high-hydration dough can be tricky, and the best way to deal with it is to handle it gently. During the shaping process — the point at which you are stretching your ball of dough into a 10- to 12-inch round — take care to use a light touch. When you handle the dough minimally, you preserve the bubbles created during the rising. See these bubbles? …
Those bubbles become these ballooned textures throughout the dough:
4 Tips for Making Excellent Pizza at Home
1. Use good, unbleached, and unbromated flour. King Arthur bread or all-purpose flour is my favorite.
What is the difference between bread and all-purpose flour? Mostly the protein content. KAF bread flour has a higher protein content (12.7% protein) than the all-purpose flour (11.7% protein). A dough made with bread flour as opposed to all-purpose flour will absorb slightly more liquid and will therefore be slightly stiffer. If you live in a humid environment and often find your dough to be too wet, using bread flour may help.
What about Tipo 00 Flour? Tipo 00 flour is the flour required in the production of D.O.C. Neapolitan pizza. Contrary to popular belief, the “00” is not an indicator of protein content. It refers, rather, to the fineness of the milling, “00” being the finest grade in the Italian classification system. It is known for the extensible gluten structure it creates in pizza dough. When you use Tipo 00 flour, you may find your dough to be much wetter than when you use bread flour, so you may need to adjust the recipe slightly: use less water or more flour.
While I love using tipo 00 flour (Petra 5063 being my favorite) in my outdoor oven, today I find I get better results — better oven spring and browning — in my home oven when I use bread flour or all-purpose flour, namely KAF, whose flour contains a small amount of malt, which helps with browning.
2. Don’t be afraid of salt.
Salt is important in pizza dough not only for flavor but also for strengthening gluten and controlling fermentation. My preference is Diamond Crystal kosher salt or Baleine fine sea salt, both of which dissolve quickly.
How Much Salt to Use: The rule of thumb with pizza dough is that the weight of the salt should be 2 to 3% the weight of the flour. For this recipe that is 10 to 15 grams. I use 15 grams of salt, and I do not find the dough to be too salty.
Flaky sea salt for finishing. I sprinkle every pizza I bake with Maldon Sea Salt just before it sliding it into the oven.
3. Invest in a Baking Steel.
The single best and easiest/most affordable step you can take to make better pizza at home is to invest in a Baking Steel. In short, steel is a more conductive cooking surface than stone. This means heat transfers more quickly from steel to food than it does from stone to food. Why is this important for pizza? Serious Eats’ Kenji J Lopez Alt offers this explanation:
“How does the baking surface affect hole structure? Well those crust holes develop when air and water vapor trapped inside the dough matrix suddenly expand upon heating in a phenomenon known as oven spring. The faster you can transfer energy to the dough, the bigger those glorious bubbles will be, and the airier and more delicate the crust.”
4. If time permits, make your dough several days in advance.
Why? Because: during a long, slow, cold fermentation, enzymes in both the flour and the yeast will break down the starches in the flour into simple sugars, which will contribute both to flavor and to browning. Moreover, during this time in the fridge, the dough will relax, making it easier to stretch into rounds on baking day.
PS: Simple Sourdough Pizza Crust Recipe
How to Make Pizza Dough, Step by Step
Whisk together flour, salt, and instant yeast (SAF is my preference):
Add water, and …
… mix to form a sticky dough ball:
Let rise in a warm spot till nearly doubled, about 1.5 hours.
Turn out onto a floured work surface.
Divide into four portions and …
… ball up, using as much flour as needed.
If you are baking pizza immediately, let the dough rest for another hour before shaping. Otherwise, transfer the balls to storage containers and stick them in the fridge. These Kevjes Dough Storage Vessels have become my favorite:
When it’s time to bake, transfer the dough rounds to a lidded vessel such as a DoughMate or a 9×13-inch baking dish covered with plastic wrap (to prevent the dough from drying out), and let the rounds sit for about an hour at room temperature.
When the dough has proofed, gently stretch it into an 11-inch round, using lightly floured hands:
Transfer the round to a peel lined with parchment paper.
Get your toppings ready. For a classic Margherita pizza, you’ll need tomato sauce, mozzarella, and fresh basil.
Spread about 2 ounces of tomato sauce over your dough.
Top with about 3 ounces of mozzarella. Drizzle lightly with olive oil and sprinkle with sea salt.
Bake on a preheated Baking Steel at 550ºF for 5 to 6 minutes. Shower with fresh basil out of the oven.
The beauty of the Baking Steel + high hydration dough: oven spring.
Troubleshooting
Why is my pizza dough too wet?
It is possible that given your environment and the type of flour you are using, you are using too much water relative to the amount of flour. The fix is simple: reduce the amount of water. Ideally, you are measuring with a scale, so you can ensure you are measuring accurately and making meaningful adjustments. Try holding back 50 grams of water and seeing if that helps.
That said, please read above about the importance of using a high-hydration pizza dough in a home oven. If your dough, upon being mixed, is unable to form a sticky dough ball, you likely need to reduce the water. Reference the video for dough texture.
Why is my pizza dough soggy?
There are several culprits here:
- too much sauce, cheese, and/or toppings
- oven not hot enough
- too short of a baking time
Solutions:
- Invest in a Baking Steel. Read why above.
- Try laying the cheese on top of the dough; then the sauce. The cheese might provide some insulation from the sauce, thereby preventing the dough from getting soggy.
- Consider employing a parbake: bake your pizza “naked” for one minute; then continue baking for 4 to 5 minutes more once topped.
- Try using semolina on your peel.
- Before stretching your dough ball into a round, slick it lightly in a bit of olive oil.
- Use a lighter hand when topping.
PS: If you’re looking for more pizza-making guidance, check out my New York Times bestselling cookbook, Pizza Night, which includes 52 pizza and 52 salad recipes, one pair for every week of the year, as well as five simple desserts 🍕🍕🍕
Simple, 4-Ingredient Homemade Pizza Dough
- Total Time: 2 hours 35 minutes
- Yield: 4 pizzas 1x
Description
Made with 4 ingredients — flour, water, salt, and yeast — this simple, no-knead pizza dough recipe is a snap to throw together, and you can use the dough the same day you mix it or store it in the fridge for up to 5 days (or freeze it!). If you love pizza with a ballooned edge and crisp but pliable crust, this pizza dough recipe is for you.
**Attention Pizza Fans: My new cookbook, Pizza Night, is here.**
NOTES:
- This recipe yields 4 rounds of dough. The recipe can be halved but know that the dough can be refrigerated for up to five days. I refrigerate individual rounds of dough in Kevjes dough storage containers.
- The dough can be frozen, too. After the first rise and after you transfer the portioned rounds to quart containers, this is your opportunity to freeze. Transfer the quart containers to the freezer for as long as 3 months. To thaw, remove a container (or more) and let thaw in the refrigerator for 1 day or thaw at room temperature for 4 to 8 hours. Then, proceed with the recipe.
Ingredients & Tools
- Measure Accurately: As always, for best results use a scale to measure. I love this Ooni scale for its precision, especially when measuring smaller quantities of salt and yeast.
- Peel: This is my favorite.
- Parchment: These rounds are so handy for making the transition from the peel to the Baking steel or pizza stone.
- Yeast: SAF Instant Yeast is my favorite. If you need to use active dry yeast instead of instant, sprinkle it over the lukewarm water and let it stand for about 10 minutes or until it gets foamy before adding to the other ingredients.
- Warm place to rise: Here’s a trick for making the perfect warm spot for the dough to rise. Turn the oven on and let it preheat for 1 minute; then shut it off. The temperature will be between 80° F and 100° F. you should be able to place your hand on the oven grates without burning them.
- Flour: You can use bread flour and all-purpose flour here but if you live in a humid environment, I would consider using bread flour if you can get your hands on it. If you are in Canada or the UK, also consider using bread flour or consider holding back some of the water (see next paragraph). Reference the video for how the texture of the dough should look; then add water back as needed.
- Water: I find the sweet spot for me to be about 418 grams of water, which is roughly an 82% hydration dough. That said: If you live in a humid environment, if you live abroad, if you are using all-purpose flour or Tipo 00 flour, if you dislike handling wet doughs, consider starting with 400 grams of water, which will lower the hydration to 77%. If the dough feels dry, add water as needed to get it to the right consistency (reference the video).
- Salt: The rule of thumb with pizza dough is that the weight of the salt should be 2 to 3% the weight of the flour. For this recipe that is 10 to 15 grams. I tend to use 12 to 15 grams of salt, and I do not find the dough to be too salty, but I have a high salt tolerance. Use an amount appropriate to your tastes and preferences. Finally, I always use Diamond Crystal kosher salt, but you can use fine sea salt or whatever salt you like.
- Toppings: In the notes below the recipe, find the toppings for a classic Margherita pizza and for a kale, parmesan, and crème fraîche pizza. See above for 6 other favorite pizza recipes.
- Timeline: Make it Tonight: Plan on 3 hours start to finish from when you mix your dough to when you turn out a freshly baked pizza. Make it Tomorrow (and beyond): Method 1: Mix your dough today, let it rise for 1.5 hours (roughly). Portion it into 4 balls; then transfer to the fridge for up to 5 days. When using dough you’ve stored in the refrigerator, remove it one hour prior to baking.
Ingredients
Please Read All Notes Above Before Proceeding
- 4 cups (512 g) bread flour or all-purpose flour, plus more for assembly
- 3 to 4 teaspoons (10 to 15 g) kosher salt
- 1 teaspoon (4 g) instant yeast
- 1.75 to 2 cups (400 to 454 g) lukewarm water
Instructions
- Make the dough: In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and instant yeast. Add the water. Using a rubber spatula, mix until the water is absorbed and the ingredients form a sticky dough ball. Pour a drop or two of oil over the top and rub with your hands to coat. Cover the bowl with a damp tea towel or plastic wrap and set aside in a warm spot to rise for 1 to 1 1/2 hours, or until the dough has doubled in bulk. (Note: Optional Step: If time permits, 30 minutes after you cover the bowl, perform one set of stretches and folds: grab an edge of the dough using a wet hand and stretch it up and in. Repeat this 8 to 10 times, grabbing a different edge each time. By the end, the dough should transform from shaggy in texture to smooth and cohesive. I find performing a set of stretches and folds gives my dough more strength and ultimately more lightness.)
- Prepare the oven: If you are baking the pizzas right away (as opposed to refrigerating the dough for another day), place a Baking Steel or pizza stone in top third of oven and preheat oven to its hottest setting, 550°F. Be sure the Baking Steel heats for at least 45 minutes once the oven temperature reaches 550ºF.
- Ball up the dough: Cover a work surface or cutting board liberally with flour — the dough is very wet, so don’t hesitate to use flour as needed. Turn the dough out onto your floured surface and use a bench scraper to divide the dough into 4 equal portions. With floured hands, roll each portion into a ball, using the pinkie edges of your hands to pinch the dough underneath each ball. If you are not baking the pizza the same day, transfer each round of dough to a storage container (see notes above), cover, and store in the fridge. (At this point, if you plan on freezing the dough, transfer the vessels to the freezer for up to 3 months. See notes above for thawing.) If you are baking right away, let the balls sit on their tucked-in edges for 30 to 60 minutes without touching in a lidded, lightly floured vessel such as a DoughMate or a 9×13-inch pan covered with plastic wrap.
- Proof the dough: If using refrigerated dough, pull out a pizza round (or as many as you wish) from the fridge 60 to 90 minutes before you plan on baking. Transfer the rounds to a lidded, lightly floured vessel such as a DoughMate or a 9×13-inch pan covered with plastic wrap.
- Make the pizzas: Handling the dough as minimally as possible, shape the dough into a 10″–12″ round. If the dough has proofed sufficiently, you should be able to pick it up and stretch it very easily using the back of your hands. Lay a sheet of parchment paper on a pizza peel, and pour a few drops of oil into the center of it. (Note: the oil is optional. It’s especially helpful if you find shaping dough using the backs of your hands tricky.) Transfer the dough round to the parchment-lined baking peel.
- Top pizza as desired or to make the Margherita pizza: spread 2 ounces of tomato sauce over your pizza dough. Top with 3 ounces of mozzarella. Drizzle with olive oil. Season with a pinch of flaky sea salt. Shimmy the pizza, parchment paper and all into the oven. To make the kale and crème fraîche pizza: Place the kale in a small bowl, drizzle lightly with olive oil, season with sea salt, and toss with your hands till the kale is coated in oil and salt. Spoon crème fraîche over the dough leaving a 1/2-inch border or so—I use 1 to 2 tablespoons per pizza. Sprinkle with the garlic and a handful of the grated Parmigiano Reggiano. Top with the kale.
- Bake the pizza: Shimmy the pizza, parchment paper and all into the oven. Bake the pizza until the top is blistered, about 5 minutes. Transfer to a cutting board. Shower basil over the pizza Margherita. Cut and serve. Discard parchment paper.
Notes
Margherita Pizza:
- 2 ounces tomato sauce, such as this one
- 3 ounces fresh mozzarella (if using buffalo mozzarella, drain before using)
- olive oil
- flaky sea salt
- fresh basil
Kale & Creme Fraiche Pizza:
- extra-virgin olive oil
- a couple handfuls of baby kale
- 1 to 2 cloves garlic
- Sea salt, such as Maldon
- 2 tablespoons crème fraîche
- grated Parmigiano Reggiano, about 1/4 to 1/3 cup
- Prep Time: 2 hours 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 5 minutes
- Category: Pizza
- Method: Baked
- Cuisine: American, Italian
This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure policy.
824 Comments on “Simple, 4-Ingredient Homemade Pizza Dough”
Can I use one ball of this dough for a 10″ or 12″ cast iron skillet pizza?
Yes!
Wow, thanks kindly, excellent recipe which actually works, plus your layout/presentation on this URL are easy on the eye and a joy to follow.
Love this recipe , so simple and delicious. I didn’t have a pizza steel but I cooked it on top a cast iron pan which I placed on top of flipped sheet pan. It came out crispy, light and the kids loved it. Thank you so much.
Great to hear! Thanks so much for writing and sharing your notes/method. So clever!
I make your recipe over and over. It is so simple and turns out perfectly every time. It’s just the two of us, so I keep two balls out and freeze the other two. Then I make one large pizza, and we have enough for dinner the next night. We like pepper jack and mozzarella cheese. I buy a large chunk of mozzarella and freeze it. It freezes beautifully! Then we like sliced red or yellow onions and minced jalapeño pepper on it. I make my own sauce, which is simply crushed canned tomatoes, lots of fresh minced garlic, salt and pepper. Of course, there is no need to cook the sauce. Ali, thank you for this recipe. I look forward to each and every one.
Kathleen! It’s so nice to read this. Thanks so much for writing and sharing your notes. So helpful for others looking to freeze… I get questions all the time about what can be frozen. Great to hear that a large block of mozzarella freezes well. Thanks again for writing and for your kind words 🙂
Excited to try this but i was wondering if i can just half all the ingredients to make two doughs instead of 4? We dont have a lot of freezer space.
Yes, absolutely, go for it!
Hey. Trying to work out if I can prove this I overnight?
Hi Lina, are you hoping to bulk ferment overnight? It’s a little bit of a risk if you have a very active starter. If you plan on doing this, be sure to do it in a cool spot. Use a straight-sided vessel so you can see how much the dough truly grows in volume. The risk of doing this is that your dough over-ferments overnight, which will cause it to lose its strength and become unusable.
So reporting back. I mixed the dough just before bed time and by the time I’d tidied up, it was time for the 30 mins folds. I then put it all in the fridge till the following morning. Shaped, cut into four, rolled into balls and put in separate bits of greaseproof paper (I don’t have dough proofing pots or whatever). Snuggled them all together and back in the fridge till evening. Then I when it was time I got them out and started prepping ingredients and the greaseproof rounds. Stretched them one by one, I found that they were very tense initially but by the time I’d done the fourth I could go to the first and re do, by which time they’d relaxed into lovely rounds. Toppings on, each baked one by one, turned out beautiful. Can share a picture.
So nice to read all of this, Lina! Thanks so much for circling back and sharing your notes/process. So helpful for others. I wish I could see a photo!! I don’t have that technology unfortunately.
Alexandra, after trying numerous recipes over many years, I must say yours is by far the best! I am just amazed home made pizza baked in my own oven can taste that good! This pizza dough recipe is my family favourite and a definite keeper. I can’t wait to see what’s in the book! Thank you!
I’m so happy to read this, Katerina! Thanks so much for writing and sharing this. Hope you love the book, too 🙂
Hi Ali,
I loved your recipes, I’m also a vegan food blogger. But I stopped for 10 years, and I have a plan to return back soon .
Thank you, Annie 🙂
Hi Ally-I just made the dough. No need to add sugar or honey? Thank you
No need! Personally, I don’t like a sweet dough, but more importantly, sweeteners can cause the dough to brown too much at the high temperatures. Also, and I write more about this in Pizza Night, but ideally you’d employ a long, slow rise using only 1/2 teaspoon yeast. During a long slow rise, enzymes in both the flour and the yeast will break down the starches in the flour into simple sugars, which will contribute both to flavor and to browning, rendering sugar unnecessary. I’m thinking about replacing this recipe entirely with the Neapolitan-ish pizza dough recipe from Pizza Night… it’s very similar, but better 🙂
Thank you.I hear you and understand. I will look at pizza night on your site. I used the dough after letting it rest for 2 hrs. It was very wet to handle so I had to either wet my fingers or use some flour on my hands and on the counter. It was absolutely delicious. Should I have refrigerated the dough before shaping and baking it? Thanks again for your help
Dear Ali,
Just under six years ago (the last week of February 2020), with a 2-year-old and a newborn, I borrowed your first cookbook, Bread Toast Crumbs, from the library. Before the loan had come due, our local library closed due to the SAH order issued because of COVID-19, and all loans were extended until the library could open again. Well, for the next six months, our family went through nearly each recipe in that cookbook; I came to have the peasant bread recipe memorized (I think I still probably could do it in my sleep and one-handed, as one must learn to do with a newborn).
When our library finally (finally!) reopened, I told my husband I couldn’t return the book until I had bought my own copy. So many years later, I don’t think we’ve gone more than a couple of days without baking SOMETHING from it – it is dog-eared, smattered and sauced, floury fingerprints coating many pages. My kids know which cookbook I say when I ask “will you bring me the bread book?”
This past week, in anticipation of the snowstorm about to blanket our state, and the sub-freezing temperatures expected for the next couple of weeks, I finally brought home Pizza Night. (Also from the library. I hope this doesn’t spurn another long stint of closure.) My son, the newborn who helped me eat much of the bounty from BTC, saw the cover photo and his eyes positively lit up. (He wanted to read through that cookbook first, before any other library book we bought home, to give you an idea of his excitement.) We have some dough rising right now, and can’t wait to pick a recipe to make first.
Thank you for the many fine meals you have helped inspire our family to bake and enjoy over the years. I know it is a lot of work to feed a family – not to mention develop a recipe to feed a growing one. I’m glad to know your recipes are written with family in mind AND that they will nourish us, body and family alike. May the Lord bless the work of your hands!
-Laura
Laura, hello! And apologies for the delay here… thank you for all of this. I don’t even know where to begin?! I am currently watching The Morning Show, and it is so bizarre to watch and sort of relive the early days of the pandemic and to revisit all the measures we felt were so foreign but that quickly became second nature and that quickly helped us all get through such a weird time… that is a very distant tangent to say, I am happy to hear that BTC brought some comfort during the pandemic and that the peasant bread recipe was something you committed to memory. This sentence in your comment spoke to me: “I think I still probably could do it in my sleep and one-handed, as one must learn to do with a newborn”… I don’t know how many loaves of this bread I have made one-handed with a newborn on my hip. I’m so happy to hear your son was excited by the prospect of Pizza Night, and I hope your homemade pizzas were delicious. Thank you for taking the time to write such a thoughtful comment, and thank you for our kind words. Wishing you and your family many happy pizza nights to come!
I have tried so many pizza dough recipes and this one is by far the best and easiest recipe I’ve ever used! I used all-purpose flour and baked in a cast iron skillet. It turned out beautifully. I definitely have this recipe saved and will be using on repeat!
Great to hear, Holly! Thanks so much for writing and sharing your notes 🙂
Hi Ali. I’m very good with making sourdough but that’s it. I made this and did not change anything but the dough was very sticky and I got annoyed making the pizza. Any ideas what may have gone wrong? I used another recipe from Brian Lagerstrom and used these measurements but the dough was very doughy but not sticky. Yours was a thin crust, which I like. These are the ingredients I used:
400g (1 2/3c) Warm Water, 86F/30C
▪20g (1 1/2T) Extra virgin olive oil
▪7g (2t) Instant Yeast
▪15g (1T) Salt
I want to make hyour pizza again so hopefully next time will be better. Thank you!
Hi Michelle,
What kind of flour, brand included, are you using? Do you live in a humid environment? Did the first rise go OK? As in did it double in volume? Did balling up the dough go OK? How long did you refrigerate the dough balls before using them?
Hi Ali. I used Wheat Montana bread flour but I just realized after it rose I didn’t refrigerate it. That explains the stickiness :O ). OK thanks a bunch. Will make a new batch this week. The other dough I made that was not your recipe used 680g flour and the ingredients I listed above. It was very doughy and yours was a perfect thin crust. How did that happen with your recipe? Love a thinner crust
That dough is much lower hydration: 59%. This one is 77% hydration — you really need a high hydration dough when baking in a home oven. I explain in the post above.
Thank you. Will look again at what you used or suggested.
Ali-what brand flour do you use for the pizza? I will buy it. Thank you
For years I used KAF all purpose or bread flour, and I tested every recipe in my pizza cookbook, Pizza Night, with both of those flours, so I highly recommend starting with either of those. Bread flour will make for a less sticky dough, and since you had issues with stickiness, I might suggest starting there. Now, I use Petra 0102, which I order online.
Thank you for the recc’s. Can I use Petra for sourdough or do you suggest this for just pizza? And wheat Montana bread flour has less protein than KAF? I’m using the wheat Montana with a mix of rye or whole wheat for my sourdough
Yes, you can use Petra for sourdough though I might suggest mixing it with something like a KA bread flour. I am not familiar with wheat Montana bread flour, so I’m not sure about the protein level.
OMG! This crust is fantastic! Best same day crust I’ve ever made! I did do the stretch & folds and I do think it helps. Thanks for the the recipe
Great to hear, Julie! Thanks so much for writing and sharing this 🙂
Hi! I first want to say I love your recipes! I love cold fermenting my doughs like I do with your focaccia recipe and I was wondering if I could cold ferment the dough for 2 days prior to freezing it or should I freeze immediately? Thank you!
Hi Caitlin! Thank you 🙂 Means a lot. I would freeze it immediately; then let it thaw in the fridge for 2 days before using. I think you’ll find you have a stronger dough if you freeze it immediately.
Tried this tonight and it turned out amazing! Followed the recipe exactly as written. Thank you for walking us through it step by step. This was my first time making the dough from scratch and this success is such a shot in the arm. I topped mine with some leftover tandoori chicken and some onions and bell peppers. Just a little detail that I would have appreciated was what temp to pre-heat the oven for that 1 minute prior to proofing. In the larger scheme of things it’s a minor detail but when you’re a newbie white knuckling your way through it’s helpful to not have to guess. All in all, a perfect recipe. Definitely getting your book.
So nice to read this RS 🙂 Thanks so much for taking the time to write and share your experience/notes. Regarding the oven temp, you can really set it to any temp, bc the oven won’t get up to that temperature in 1 minute — you’re just trying to create a cozy spot, and that brief blast of heat as your oven preheats (again to any temperature) will do that. Hope that makes sense.
Hello Alexndra,
I have made your 4 ingredient pizza dough 2x and it was perfect. So good. I made it again today on my pizza steel and the bottom burned on the pizza without the top being fully cooked. This has not happened before. I was wondering if you had any ideas as to why that might have happened? Thank you!
Interesting… did you use a scale every time you made the dough? In this latest attempt, do you think there was too much excess flour coating the dough? Did you use parchment paper? Finally, did you preheat the oven sufficiently with the Steel in it (roughly 1 hour)?
Yes I used a scale and a preheated steel. There COULD have been excess flour – I will be aware of that next time and see if I get better results.
Great to hear re scale and steel. One thought is to use rice flour or a mix of rice flour and ap flour when you are proofing your dough balls at room temperature in the lidded vessel before topping and baking them — rice flour doesn’t burn the way wheat flour does.
Dough came out great but it was slightly difficult to stretch with a few holes. I am wondering if “punching down” would be beneficial, after the 30 minute stretch and fold or after the 1.5 hr rise? I will try and raise the gluten levels next time and wait the full 90 minute outside the fridge instead of 60.
I do think a longer room temperature proof (ideally in a lidded vessel) before baking will help with the stretching and prevent holes from happening.
What kind of flour are you using?
Did you use a scale to measure?
How long did the dough cold proof for?