Homemade Pizza Dough Easy

I have to confess I only recently began making pizza dough from scratch. I've been making homemade pizza for years but I always used store bought, ready made dough from the supermarket.

My daughter gave me her recipe many years ago (which I never tried) when she and her girlfriend would make pizza dough all the time for friends on weekends. WOW, now that I think about it, that was a reaaaallllllly long time ago.

Anyway lovely daughter insisted she give me a lesson on how easy it is to make the dough. I'm glad she did because I was surprised at how fast it was to make and it was so much easier than I imagined. Oh, and I convinced my sister the 'cook' to try it, and even she said she couldn't believe how easy it was to make.

Here's the easy dough recipe. I don't know the source since it does not show on the photocopy my daughter gave me (it was back in the '80's).

Pizza Dough
Ingredients

• 1 1/3 cups warm water (approx. 165 degrees)
• 1/2 tsp. sugar
• 1 pkg. dry yeast
• 2 TBLS. olive oil
• 2 tsp. salt
• 3 1/2 to 4 cups sifted all-purpose flour

Instructions

1. Measure water into large bowl. Add sugar to warm water and stir until dissolved.
   Sprinkle the yeast over the sugared water and let sit for 10 minutes.
   After 10 minutes stir well with whisk, then add the oil, salt and flour mixing well with a wooden spoon to blend. Then use your hands to be sure all the flour is mixed well with the liquid.
2. Turn out the dough onto floured surface and knead, adding more flour if sticky. Turn the dough over, into itself, and continue kneeding for about 5 minutes or until smooth.

3. Gather the dough into a ball and put into a greased bowl, covering with a damp towel (this will prevent the dough from forming a skin).
4. Let rise, about 2 hours, until it doubles in size.
5. Divide dough into 2 equal pieces. It will make 2 14 inch pizzas.
6. Roll out the dough on a floured surface to desired size. Place on a lightly oiled sheet of parchment paper lined pizza pan.

Add your favorite toppings and bake on the bottom rack of oven at 425 degrees approximately 12 minutes, or until the bottom of the pie crust is lightly browned.

Now how easy was that! The actual prep for dough making is about 10 minutes. I make the dough early in the day and let it sit on the counter until I'm ready to make the pizza. You can also make calzone with the dough (I'll post a recipe).

I have also made the dough for future meals. I cut the dough in 2 equal pieces and then freeze each piece of dough individually wrapping it in parchment paper first and then seal in a freezer bag to use another day.

The only issue with freezing is that you need to know in the morning you want to make pizza so that the dough has time to defrost (needs several hours). I leave the frozen dough out on the counter for the day until I'm ready to use it. WARNING! if it's the warmer months, leave the dough to defrost in the fridge.


Mangia!
Winelady Cooks