Homemade Pizza

4 from 4 votes

Friday night is Homemade Pizza Night, and this is more than just a recipe, it's my complete pizza making system! These are the tips and tricks I use to easily make delicious homemade pizza every week!

Prep Time30

Cook Time1

Total Time1 30

Course: Dinner

Cuisine: American, Italian

Servings:

Calories: 705kcal

Author: Meryl Downing

Ingredients

For the Crust (Makes 8 Pizzas, Freeze Extras)

5⅓ cups flour
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 cups lukewarm water (microwave for 1 minute)
1 teaspoon active dry yeast
1 teaspoon honey or sugar
1 Tablespoon olive oil

For the Sauce (Makes 5 pint jars, Freeze Extras)

1 Tablespoon olive oil
1 small onion, diced (optional - add extra hidden veggies like bell pepper, zucchini, carrot, mushroom, celery, and a few leaves of spinach or kale, ground in a food processor)
3 cloves garlic minced
½ teaspoon kosher salt
8 grinds fresh black pepper
2 teaspoons Italian seasoning
1 small can tomato paste 6 ounce can
2 large cans crushed tomato 28 ounce cans

For the Toppings

1 Tablespoon cornmeal IMPORTANT! DO NOT SKIP (start with 1 teaspoon and add more between each pizza)
white cheese Any combination of shredded provolone, mozzarella, white cheddar, or Parmesan
fresh mozzarella 1 ball for 4 pizzas, in addition to shredded cheese
Optional Toppings - bell pepper, onion, tomato, mushroom, zucchini, minced garlic, olives, artichokes, fresh or frozen herbs or greens like spinach, kale, parsley, basil, oregano or rosemary
Pepperoni, cooked sausage or prosciutto
Variations - Pesto or Bbq sauce with leftover or rotisserie chicken

Instructions

For the Crust

This recipe makes 8 pizzas, which is 2 pizza nights, 4 pizzas each night for my family of 4. Freeze the extra balls of dough immediately after making. Make the dough the morning of, or 1 to 2 days before pizza night. Add flour and salt to the bowl of a stand mixer. In a glass measuring cup, warm 2 cups of water in the microwave for 1 minute. Add the yeast, honey and olive oil to the water and mix with a fork, let sit 5 minutes. Add the liquid into the flour and mix on low speed with the dough hook to form a rugged ball.
Knead the dough for 5 minutes using the dough hook on medium-low speed, or by hand on a floured cutting board if you don't have a mixer. If making by hand, lift and turn with your left hand and push down with the heel of your right hand, over and over for 5 minutes. Add flour if the dough is too sticky. A few times, pull and stretch the dough, wrap it around itself, and then tuck it back into a ball.
Once you have kneaded the dough, remove it from the mixer, and tuck it into a ball by tucking the ends under itself to look like a mushroom top. Cut the dough in half with a knife, then in quarters, then in 8 equal pieces.
Take each piece and form again into the little mushroom ball. Oil a large bowl, and a container with a lid for the freezer and set 4 dough balls in each. Choose containers that are larger than the dough is now, it will expand to be bigger in size. Adjust these amounts for your family size. These are thin and not very large pizzas, a hungry adult would eat 1 pizza or more and a hungry kid maybe a half. Freeze whatever amount you don't plan to use. For a family of 4, this is 2 nights worth of pizza dough.
Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, or reuse an old bread bag to be eco-friendly. Leave it on the counter if pizza night is tonight, or set it in your fridge overnight and pull out the morning of pizza night. Frozen dough can be thawed in the fridge overnight. On the morning of pizza night, take the dough out of the fridge and let it sit on the counter all day.

For the Sauce

I don't recommend making homemade sauce on pizza night, see the above sauce section for easy pasta sauce/pizza sauce recipes and variations.
To make this homemade sauce recipe, in a large saucepan over medium heat, add oil, onion and any extra hidden veggies from the food processor. Saute until starting to brown and soften.
Add garlic, salt, pepper, and seasoning.
Add canned tomato. Reduce heat to low and simmer at least 1 hour. Freeze extra sauce in pint size jars (1 jar, about 2 cups, is the right amount of sauce for 4 pizzas). Only fill jars ¾'s full so they don't crack when freezing, cool in the refrigerator before freezing.

Making the Pizza

Place a large baking sheet or pizza stone on the bottom rack of your oven and preheat to 450° convection bake.
On a cutting board, prepare and slice all toppings, including veggies, cheese and pepperoni.
Prepare a pizza peel or another cutting board with a generous sprinkling of cornmeal (start with 1 teaspoon and add more between pizzas).
On another floured cutting board, roll out the first ball of dough with a rolling pin (don't worry that they have expanded and grown together, just pull or cut back apart). Add flour as needed. Get it as thin as you can, about the size of the pizza peel. You can pick it up and lightly stretch it over the backs of your hands, but try not to get a hole in the dough.
Transfer dough to the cornmeal covered peel. Top with sauce, cheese and toppings.
Making sure the pizza slides around on the cornmeal, transfer the pizza to the hot pan in the oven. You can take the pan out and set it on the stovetop if that is easier. If any part sticks, carefully release it with a spatula and add more cormeal.
When pizza #1 is in the oven, make pizza #2. When pizza #2 is ready to go into the oven, pizza #1 probably won't be quite done, but the crust will be firm enough to transfer to the top oven rack. With two sturdy metal spatulas, carefully pick the whole pizza up and put it directly on the oven rack above. You can also do this with an additional cutting board or pizza peel. This pizza will finish cooking, giving you a nice crispy crust. Now your pan is free to slide in pizza #2.
While those two are cooking, make pizza #3. By the time you are ready to add #3, pizza #1 is probably done. Remember your oven is really hot, so check on it and don't let it burn. Take it out, slice and serve on a cutting board. Now transfer pizza #2 to the top oven rack and pizza #3 to the sheet pan. Make pizza #4 and transfer them all through the oven using this same method.
You did it! And it all gets easier with practice! Enjoy!

Notes

Amounts - This recipe makes enough dough for 8 pizzas which is 2 pizza nights for our family of 4. The sauce makes enough for 5 pint jars, which is 5 pizza nights for us. Extra dough and sauce can be frozen. I slice 1 ball of fresh mozzarella for 1 pizza night (4 pizzas), plus extra shredded cheese.
You can make bulk amounts of pizza dough and freeze for several pizza nights. Only do 1 recipe in the mixer at a time or it won't fit. So just make the recipe, then make it again, and again, as many times as you want! I usually make the recipe 4 times, for 8 pizza nights! Make sure you have enough containers and freezer space.
Pepperoni and Sausage - buy a 1 or 2 pound bag of pepperoni from the deli counter and store in the freezer, add to pizza, no need to thaw. Cook a pound of bulk Italian sausage and freeze to use for several pizza nights.
If your oven does not have a convection bake setting, just use regular bake.
Any parts of pizza night can be completely made from scratch, or take a little help from the store by buying refrigerated pizza dough or a jar of sauce.
Nutrition info is for 1 pizza including the crust, sauce and cheese. Does not include toppings.

Nutrition