Perfect homemade pizza dough recipe

This is a simple pizza dough recipe you can make at home. Get the perfect no-bloat tasty pizza ever!

If you are struggling to find a simple pizza dough recipe, look no further. I’m quite sure everyone loves pizza everywhere in the world! However a lot of people cannot digest pizza easily, this is mainly due to the type of flour and the leavening agent used. Using active dry yeast, or one of those super fast yeast won’t really help with easing the digestibility of your pizza. Neither will do the white flour (maybe enriched with some strange additive to make you think it will be healthier). A good and easy to digest pizza is made with simple ingredients and time. Time is the key, actually.

Simple pizza dough recipe: Stop the bloat! Easy to digest pizza dough

If you want to tase a very good pizza and don’t feel the bloat afterward there is a simple trick: time. When you prepare your pizza dough at 5pm to eat it at 8pm I can assure that pizza will stay in your digestive tract much longer than needed. However, if you prepare your dough at least 24h in advance, you will notice the difference as soon as you bite into your slice.

My recommendation is to use sourdough to make pizza (and bread and many other things), it is actually easy to prepare, easy to maintain and gives you a very complex and nutritious end product, be it pizza, bread or other preparations.

Pizza margherita

How long does pizza need to rise?

I know that many do not have the time to care for sourdough and they prefer the dry yeast, and that is perfectly fine and I’ll teach you the trick to prepare a prefect pizza with yeast.
The trick is to make the pizza the day before, or even a couple of days in advance. This will allow for less yeast to be used and a super digestible dough (also a very tasty one).  Once the dough is ready you can put it in the fridge to “mature”, this means that your flour, water and yeast will do their magic slowly at a controlled temperature. The phytates in the wheat will be broken down, and so will be the gluten, moreover a lot of other nutrients will grow in the dough, making it tastier and in some ways “pre-digested”, and since you’re using less yeast you won’t feel the bloat.

Another way to reduce the use of the chemical yeast is to prepare a “pre-dough” the night before. You can use 2gr of dried yeast, 50ml of water and 100gr of flour, mix and let it sit covered overnight (or at least 6h). Then use it instead of the yeast in the recipe.

Solid sourdough starter

Simple pizza dough recipe: no yeast, no pizza… or maybe.. yes?

Do you crave pizza but you don’t have yeast at home? There are other ways to make your pizza dough, actually you can easily use yogurt or kefir, both contains the good bacteria that will help your dough rise, it will take a bit longer but the result will be as good.
PREPARE THE “FAKE” STARTER:
Add 100ml of yogurt to 100gr of flour and 1gr sugar or maple syrup. Mix, cover and let it sit at room temperature for at least 12h (if the room temperature is high, it may take less time). When doubled in size, use it instead of the dried yeast in the recipe.

Simple pizza dough recipe

Ingredients for 6/8 pizzas

  • 1/2 lt water
  • 15gr salt
  • 5gr of dried yeast (or the “pre-dough”)
  • 3 tsp of extra virgin olive oil
  • 500gr whole wheat flour or a stone milled flour semi refined (I don’t usually use all purpose or any bleached flour)
  • 150gr soy (organic) flour
  • 150gr rice flour

How to make the dough

Step 1
The night before put 100gr of flour into a bowl and add 50gr of water and the dried yeast. Mix it  and let it rise all night long in the oven, or in a place with constant temperature. (or use the yogurt as indicated above)
In the morning you will have a mini dough that will be the base for your perfect pizza.

Step 2
Mix the flour into a bowl. In another bowl add the water the “starter”, mix lightly and then add almost all the flour and the salt. Start kneading the dough with a spoon. Keep mixing the ingredients until it forms into a ball. If it is too sticky add the remaining flour and mix a bit more. When using whole wheat it’s ok if the dough is a little sticky, the fibers in the flour will absorb the excess moisture.

Step 3
Cover the dough with a plastic wrap or a lid and let it sit at least 30min and up to 3h. Take the dough and knead it a minute or two, it will become elastic right away. Add the oil and knead well again for a minute, cover and let it rise until double in size. At this stage you can choose to keep the dough in the fridge (up to 48h) then use it to bake your pizza, or use it immediately. The dough will keep in the fridge for 3/4 days, and in the freezer for months.

How to cook your tasty pizza

Step 1
Turn on the oven in advance at maximum temperature (270°C or 520°F) for 30 to 40 minutes, every oven is different so check the temperature inside. If you have a pizza stone put it in the oven when still cold. If your dough was in the fridge, take it out at least 1h before cooking the pizza.

Step 2
Now you just need to spread the dough in the baking tray, season it with tomatoes, salt, pepper, anchovies, mozzarella or whatever you like and put it in the oven to cook for about 4 to 8 minutes (it depends on how thick you spread the dough and the temperature of your oven).

If you are using a pizza stone, spread the pizza onto a very well floured surface and when seasoned, slide it directly on to the stone.

Step 3
The most important thing is to keep aside some 150gr of dough, in a jar or in an airtight container, you will use it the next time to skip the first step. It will keep in the fridge for a week or in the freezer for six months. If you’re going to use the dough as starter for another dough, remember that the proportion are 100gr of dough for 450gr of flour.

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