Pizza how to make pizza

How To Make Pizza From Scratch

Learning how to make pizza from scratch and making your own pizza dough may seem intimidating for some but it really needn’t be. It’s simpler than you think. And If the urge to fire up that pizza oven for the first time is just too much to contain and you just want to make pizza RIGHT NOW. Then you can check out this super simple pizza dough recipe and I’ll bid you farewell.

In fact, here it is;
500g 00 Pizza Flour,
305g Water,
1.5g Yeast,
12g Salt

For those of you still reading I’m going to let you into a little secret, those readers that left to fire up the pizza oven and make pizza from scratch without reading the rest? They’ll be back. Because once you’ve tried making pizza from scratch that’s not the end. Oh no, you my friend are now a pizza maker! The future consists of non-pizza nights becoming a scarce rarity as you fling dough around your kitchen in search of the perfect pizza.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

We need to start at the start. You’re here to learn how to make pizza from scratch after all.

Essentials

I’m going to assume you have a Gozney pizza oven already but what else do you need to get started making pizza dough? Thankfully, not a lot. But like a good boy scout a good pizza maker should always be prepared and these would be our top 5 essentials to have on hand before making your first pizza.

Digital Scales

Placement Peel

If you’re here as you’ve bought a Roccbox you’ve got the most amazing commercial grade pizza peel included already, if not, you can check out the Gozney pizza peels here. This is a positively essential tool as transferring your delicious carbohydrate cargo from the work surface to the oven is literally impossible without this bit of kit.

Turning Peel

Although not strictly ‘essential’ (you can bake an incredible pizza without one!) There’s a reason all the pros use one. The turning peel makes it easier to keep the pizza in the pizza oven during cooking ensuring a beautiful even bake. You can check out how to use a turning peel here.

Bowls

You’ll need something to weigh the ingredients out in and mix the dough in. Hopefully these will be something you have on hand already but you’ll want plenty. As well as holding dough during various stages of the pizza dough making process these guys will let you set up your toppings in close proximity to where you stretch your pizza base ensuring speedy topping and less mess.

Dough Trays

Normally, these are flat plastic trays with sides that can be sealed air tight. However, you can (and I regularly do!) just use any sort of tray you have in your kitchen that fits that description (baking trays, tupperware etc) and cover tightly with clingfilm. You’ll achieve the same end result but as you make more and more pizzas (remember, this is only the start!) you’ll probably want to look into a tray that you use solely for dough and pizza making.

How To Make Pizza Dough

The first Neapolitan margherita pizza was baked in a wood fired outdoor pizza oven in 1889 but as humans we’ve been making flatbreads of some description since 8000bc. You’ve probably got a distant relation somewhere that was an accomplished baker; so don’t be intimidated, it’s in your blood!

There’s no right or wrong way to make pizza. If what you make tastes good to you, you’re doing a great job! And not all pizzas are created equal. Once you’ve made your very first Neapolitan pizza from scratch you can then explore other styles of pizza; Thin & Crispy, Deep Dish Detroit, Classic New York, now you’re the proud owner of a pizza oven, all these incredible dough based delights are at your fingertips!

00 Pizza flour is finer milled, absorbent and has a high protein content (this is important as protein will become gluten, which will become stretchy, which will mean you can throw the dough above your head and impress your friends). Maybe you’re not quite ready to commit to a cupboard full of fancy italian flours, that’s cool, our simple dough recipe works well with all purpose or strong white bread flour that you’d find in the supermarket.

You’ll see fresh yeast used in a lot of pizza recipes but if that is a bit trickier to get hold of for you you can use dry yeast with brilliant results. If your recipe calls for fresh yeast simply use half the amount of dry yeast, or a third of the amount of instant dry yeast. If you’re feeling particularly adventurous you could even build a sourdough starter made up of naturally occurring wild yeast and make a sourdough pizza, but that’s probably a little way down the line right now.

How To Make Pizza Sauce

The passionate sourcing of ingredients doesn’t stop at flour. Most pizza sauces are simply the finest tinned peeled plum tomatoes you can find, delicately hand blended with a little salt. That’s it. San Marzanos are particularly favoured for Neapolitan pizza but do some taste tests and if it tastes good from the can, chances are it’ll taste great on pizza.

If this sounds a touch uninspiring (I promise, with good tomatoes it’s not) you can always add a little pizazz with a couple of basil leaves, or pinch of oregano before pulsing or even make a cooked tomato sauce (after all, this is your pizza and your journey) and not many are better than the one made with this Detroit style pizza here.

The Best Cheese For Pizza

The easy answer here is mozzarella cheese, but it gets a bit more nuanced as you delve into different pizza styles. Fior di latte is the ‘go to’ for Neapolitan pizza but low moisture mozzarella is favoured for a New York pie whereas a very specific Wisconsin Brick cheese is required to recreate the perfect deep dish Detroit.

As you begin, I’d advise trying whatever mozzarella you can get your hands on and if it’s wet, dry it on paper towel a little before topping your pizza as otherwise you may find your pizza base becomes too soggy which can lead to some unfortunate mishaps when launching the pizza into the pizza oven!

How to stretch pizza dough

There are as many ways to stretch pizza dough as there are pizza styles but one vital factor is allowing time for the pizza dough balls to sit at room temperature before attempting to open them into a pizza. When you ball the dough the gluten will get incredibly tight and you need to allow time for it to relax- otherwise your dough will just spring back on you as you try and open it. How long this period of time will be depends on a few factors (amount of water in your dough recipe, how warm is it where you are, etc) but is generally around 2-4 hours.

Once the gluten is relaxed and you’ve got a clean, flat, debris free surface to work on you’re ready to make your first pizza from scratch. Always toss the dough ball in some flour (or semolina, or a mix of the two) before beginning to open by hand.

You’ll notice that your dough ball will have puffed up somewhat and feel airy, what you’re trying to achieve with your hands is to move that air the edge to form a crust, this will naturally create a thinner round centre which will be your base.

At this point it should look like a very small pizza. To stretch it, you can lift the base up off the counter and it will naturally stretch. Pass the dough between your hands like a steering wheel keeping a watchful eye for any thin bits until required size. Place back on the workbench, gently reshape into a circle (it’ll be oval or the shape of Africa as you put it down) and you’re ready to top!

The best guides for how to stretch pizza dough are visual. Our 5 part Neapolitan pizza video has some great tips, as does this ‘How To Make Pizza From Scratch’ video with Peddling Pizzas, Adam Atkins. The trick is to watch as many pizza chefs online as you can and practice practice practice.

It’s been said that to become a master at something you have to do something 10,000 times and I know that sounds like a lot of pizza right now, but once you’ve made your very own pizza from scratch you’ll get closer to that number that you expect.

Baking The Pizza

With a pizza base opened (and possibly or possibly not thrown above your head) the next step is baking. Almost all pizza styles are cooked at much higher temperatures that can be achieved in a regular home oven. But as the proud owner of an outdoor pizza oven you can now hit those temperatures with ease!

Whether it’s the simple dough recipe or something more adventurous, whatever pizza you are about to bake there are a few key things to check every time you go to pull a constructed pizza onto the placement peel. In my experience, there are three key things to check. Is the peel; dry, cold and clean? Avoiding food debris on the peel as well as making sure it isn’t warm to the touch or wet at all will make your pizzas journey from peel to pizza oven much more likely to end in an awesome pizza, as opposed to an ‘Accidental Calzone!’

Just like stretching dough (and every other stage) practice will improve your skills no end as you’ll develop a feel for the relationship between the fire and the dough. Every single pizza maker had to start somewhere so I hope reading this is just the beginning of your journey to pizza nirvana!

How to Make an Italian Pizza: The Simple, Step-by-Step Guide

January 08, 2013

Want to know how to make a real Italian pizza? The very best way is to get an after-hours tutorial from the chefs at one of Rome’s finest pizzerias. But if you aren’t going to be in Rome any time soon, your next best option is to check out this recipe from the Walks of Italy crew.

The most important part is getting the Italian pizza dough right! More than just the base of the pizza, the dough is what gives the pizza its texture, holds together the flavors, and – if done right – can make you feel like you’ve been transported right back to Italy.

Just a bit about pizza in Italy…

Even though it’s become the most popular Italian food abroad, pizza and Italy didn’t weren’t always synonymous. In fact, pizza wasn’t even invented until the 19th century, when it started out as a fast food on the streets of Naples. In the beginning (and, we’d argue, even today), the simpler the pizza, the better: The classic pizza napoletana was just dough with a tomato sauce of Marzano tomatoes, oregano or basil, a little garlic, salt, and olive oil. (for all you need to know about choosing the best olive oil, check out our post.)

It’s another pizza from Naples, though, that has the neatest pedigree. When Queen Margherita came to visit Naples in 1889, she was charmed by a local pizza baker who had made, in her honor, a pizza with the colors of the new flag of the just-unified Italy—red tomatoes, white mozzarella, and green basil. Yep, you guessed it. It’s now called the pizza margherita (or margarita, on some menus).

Of course, Italian food is very regional, and so are Italian pizzas. (Although any real Italian pizza should always be cooked in a wood-fired oven; in fact, a pizzeria without one can’t even, legally, call itself a pizzeria!). That world-famous pizza in Naples is known as “pizza alta” (thick crust), while pizza in Rome is traditionally thin-crust and crisp.

Like the rest of Italian food, Italian pizza is best – and most authentic – when it’s made with fresh, local ingredients, especially any that are DOP (You can read a full explanation of this wonderful little term in our blog about DOP foods). We’re not talking the microwaved dough and synthetic cheese that you see now both in Italy and abroad, but something completely different.

The best way to try it, short of going to an authentic pizzeria with great ingredients and a wood-fired oven? Make it at home!

What you need to make an Italian pizza

Makes dough for 4 pizzas, each one about 12 inches in diameter:

*A note on the flour: In Italy, “00”, or “doppio zero,” flour is the most highly-refined and finest-ground flour available. Not available where you are (or too expensive?). An all-purpose flour should work just as well!

How to make your authentic Italian pizza

Just follow the following steps:

Learning about food is one of the greatest joys of traveling in Italy. If you’d like to learn about pizza-making in the most authentic way possible, check out our Rome Food Tour with Pizza-Making Class. As you can see in the video below, we’ll take you inside a real Roman pizzeria for an after-hours class in all the little secrets that expert pizzaiolos have developed over generations.

And thanks to Walks of Italy’s Loredana of Le Marche, Italy for providing her tried-and-true, authentic Italian pizza recipe!

How to
Make Pizza

A guide by Sam Sifton

You can make pizza at home. In fact, you can make pizza that will equal some of the best on the planet. With planning and practice, you can become good at it — even if you are a relatively novice cook. We are here to help that happen.

Before You Start

Plan ahead. Make the dough at least a day before you intend to make pizza, to give it enough time to rise.

Buy a food scale on which to weigh the ingredients for dough and toppings. It’s a smart investment: In baking, weight is a more accurate measurement than volume.

You will need a cooking surface. This could be a pizza stone or steel, or four to six unglazed quarry tiles measuring 6 inches by 6 inches from a building supply store. Whichever you use, heat in a very hot oven for at least an hour before cooking.

Roberta’s Pizza Dough

Melina Hammer for The New York Times

This recipe, adapted from Roberta’s, the pizza and hipster haute-cuisine utopia in Bushwick, Brooklyn, provides a delicate, extraordinarily flavorful dough that will last in the refrigerator for up to a week. It rewards close attention to weight rather than volume in the matter of the ingredients, and asks for a mixture of finely ground Italian pizza flour (designated “00” on the bags and available in some supermarkets, many specialty groceries and always online) and regular all-purpose flour. As ever with breads, rise time will depend on the temperature and humidity of your kitchen and refrigerator.

Ingredients

Preparation

Adapted from «Roberta’s,» by Carlo Mirarchi, Brandon Hoy, Chris Parachini and Katherine Wheelock

Storing the Dough

Allow for a minimum of three to four hours for your dough to rise. But planning further ahead pays dividends: You can store that dough in the refrigerator until you are ready to cook, which means any weeknight can be pizza night.

Melina Hammer for The New York Times pizza dough..Published 04-09-2014

We put our pizza dough in the refrigerator to rise, placing the balls of dough on a floured baking pan covered loosely with a clean, damp kitchen towel. The chill leads to a slow rise, so we generally allow it to go overnight, or for at least six to eight hours. For a faster rise, leave the dough out on a countertop, similarly covered. It should be ready — that is, roughly doubled in size — in three or four hours.

Time imparts a marvelous tanginess to pizza dough, but it extracts a price as well. What you want to avoid is a skin developing on the dough. When the dough has risen, if you are not going to use it right away, wrap it tightly in plastic wrap, or place it in a quart-size plastic bag. Pizza dough so wrapped will last in the refrigerator for three days or so.

Another option is to freeze the dough using this incredibly easy freezer dough recipe. Make it, put it in the freezer in a freezer-safe plastic bag, and then move it to the refrigerator on the morning of the evening you want to cook.

If you end up making pizza at least once a week, consider investing in a few pizza dough pans, available in restaurant supply stores.

Shaping the Pizza

Shaping a pizza takes practice. The goal is to make a thin circle of dough, with a raised edge around circumference of the pie. Don’t worry if that doesn’t happen the first few times. Pizzas shaped like trapezoids or kites taste just as delicious.

Working on a floured surface, with floured hands, softly pat down the risen ball of dough into a circle, rotating it as you do.

Using the tips of your fingers, push down gently around the perimeter of the pie, rotating it as you do, to create the edge.

Pick up the dough and lightly pass it back and forth between your palms, trying to rotate it each time you do, using gravity to help the dough stretch. At approximately 12 inches in diameter, the pizza is ready to go.

Return the pizza to the floured surface, making sure that the side that you first pressed down upon remains facing upward, and gently slide the pie back and forth a few times to make sure that it does not stick. Add a little more flour to the surface beneath the pie if it does.

Gently slide a lightly floured pizza peel beneath the pie, or place it carefully on a floured cutting board or the back of a baking pan. Make sure again that the dough can slide back and forth. If it does, the pie is certified for topping.

Toppings

The act of topping a pizza is a gentle one. Use a light touch. Above all, try not to overload the pie, particularly its center, which will lead to an undercooked crust. Two to three tablespoons of sauce are all you need, and perhaps a small drizzle of olive oil, accompanied by a couple of other toppings.

Pizza sauce does not need to be cooked ahead of time, and is so simply prepared that there is no reason to use the store-bought variety. Instead, use a food processor to combine a can of whole, drained tomatoes with a splash of olive oil and a sprinkle of salt.

Spread the sauce out on the dough using the back of a spoon, stopping approximately 1/2 inch from the dough’s edges. Do not use too much; two or three tablespoons is enough. Keep leftover sauce refrigerated.

Mozzarella is the traditional pizza cheese, but depending on the sort of pie you are creating, really any good melting cheese will do: fontina, Cheddar, Colby, blue, provolone and smoked Gouda, among others, make for delicious pizzas.

Meat on a pizza is an option for some. Sausage and meatballs are both traditional toppings and should be cooked beforehand. Pepperoni, ham and other cured meats do not need to be, though delicate sheets of air-dried beef or pork should perhaps go onto the pie midway through or at the end of the cooking process, lest they dry out in the heat.

Anchovies are a marvelous addition to pizzas, and so are clams and mussels, even sheets of smoked salmon, particularly when paired with crème fraîche and capers.

Making a fried egg breakfast pizza is not for freshman-class pizza makers. Sliding a pizza topped with a raw egg into a hot oven takes patience and practice. In the meantime, while your pizza is cooking, gently fry an egg in olive oil in a small skillet on the stove, and when the pizza is done, slide it gently on top of the pie.

You can put anything on a pizza. The question is where, and when. Herbs can go below cheese to protect them from the heat of the oven, or onto the top of the pie when it’s done.

Pineapple can take heat like a fireman and can go on from the start, raw. Grapes can, too (a nice pairing for sausage). Mushrooms, though, should be cooked on the stovetop before you use them as a topping for pizza. Likewise peppers both red and green. (Thinly-sliced jalapeno pepper is an exception.) Potatoes can go on a pizza raw only if you’re cooking in a very, very hot oven and you’ve sliced them very, very thinly – otherwise, parboil them before slicing and adding them to the top of a pie. Grilled asparagus is an excellent addition to a “white,” or tomato-free pizza. We like thinly sliced Brussels sprouts, sometimes, on similar pies (pair with pancetta!), and leeks melted slowly over butter as well.

As a rough guide: Precook anything that won’t cook fast, or cut it so thinly that it will. Anything delicate, like a pile of arugula dressed simply in lemon juice and oil, can go on the pie when it’s done, to cook gently in the pizza’s residual heat.

Cooking the Pizza

We cook most of our pizzas in the oven, on top of a stone or a steel. But you can bake pizza in a sheet pan as well, or grill it outdoors. You can even cook a pizza on a stovetop.

Baking in the Oven

To bake a pizza in an oven, you’ll need either to do it on a stone or metal surface, or in a sheet pan. Either way, you should set the oven to its highest temperature and let it heat it for a full hour before you intend to cook.

If you are using a pizza stone, steel or a set of tiles, begin by placing it on the middle rack of the oven before you turn it on, allowing it to preheat for a hour.

When you’re ready to cook, carefully place your shaped dough on a lightly floured pizza peel or cutting board, or on the back of a baking pan. Gently shake the peel, board or pan back and forth a few times to make sure the dough can move, then add your toppings.

Pick up your pizza peel with the topped pie on top of it, and gently slide the pie onto the stone or tiles, starting at the back of the oven and working your way toward its front. Bake for about four to eight minutes, until the edges are a beautiful golden brown, and the sauce and cheese are bubbling nicely. Slide the peel back under the baked pizza to remove it from the oven, and then slide the pizza onto a cutting board, where it can be cut into slices.

If you are using a sheet pan, lightly oil the pan, then stretch the risen dough into the shape of the pan, then top and place in the oven until golden brown and bubbling.

Pan-Frying on the Stovetop

Cooking a pizza on top of the stove is a simple way to get started in the pizza-making game, and a single ball of dough will yield two pan pizzas.

Simply heat a 10-inch cast-iron skillet over medium-high heat, then film it with olive oil. Take one half of a ball of risen pizza dough and press it out into a circle just smaller than the pan.

When the oil shimmers, put the dough in the pan and adjust the heat so it browns evenly without burning. Prick the dough all over with the tines of a fork. Cook this round in the pan for a minute or so, then turn it over with the bottom is browned and cover with toppings. Either top the pan with a lid to melt the cheese or run it under a broiler to achieve the same result.

Grilling Outdoors

Grilling pizza really means grilling one side of a flatbread over fire, then turning it over and topping it. And while you can certainly use our essential pizza dough recipe to do that, a sturdier dough recipe that is less prone to ripping will yield a better result.

To cook a pizza on a grill requires some planning. You need to cook one side of the pizza before turning it over and topping it, and cooking the other side. So take time to assemble all the ingredients you’ll need to make the pizzas beforehand.

Prepare a hot fire; if your grill grate is clean, you shouldn’t need to oil it. Slide the pizza dough from the peel onto the rack. After a few minutes, use tongs to lift the dough and check whether it’s browning on the bottom. Watch closely so it doesn’t burn. When it’s nicely browned, use the tongs to flip the dough over, then brush it with olive oil and cover it with toppings. Place the lid on the grill for a few minutes more until the cheese is melted.

Throughout the history of human civilization meals of flatbreads or rounds of dough with various toppings were common and used consistently. People of ancient Greece, Persia and Rome used this kind of sustenance for centuries, until meal that we call today pizza found its home in the Naples area in Italy. During the period of Middle Ages, cooks from that city managed to improve the process of pizza creation, adding new ingredients and toppings with the goal to make best dish possible. After the arrival of tomato from the New World, the most important ingredient was present and pizza started slowly to spread across the world.

In order to make pizza, first we need to revisit its official definition: «A pizza is a round, open pie made with yeast dough and topped with tomato sauce, cheese, and a variety of other ingredients as toppings».

The step and most important step in making pizza is creation of dough by mixing flour with water and or some other liquid (for example milk) and yeast. After the ingredients are perfectly mixed together, leave the dough must be placed in the bowl that is coated with small amounts of olive oil and be left to grow (yeast extract oxygen from starch in flour, and produce carbon dioxide which causes flour to rise). After around 1 to 1 1/2 hours of being in a warm environment, the dough will double in its size (if you don’t have access to the warm environment, heat up your oven to 150 degrees, let it cool until its just a little warm and place dough inside it.

While the dough is growing you can prepare you topping ingredients, and preheat the oven to 450°F for at least 30 to an hour. When the dough is ready, put it on the surface that is slightly floured. With your hands stretch the pizza into oval shape and flatten it to be 1/2-inch thick. The most common diameter of pizza is 10 to 12 inches. For the end use your palms to create lip on the edge of dough, which will hold all the ingredients and sauces on the pizza.

After you have finished with the toppings, pizza is ready for baking. The usual amount of baking in a pre-heated oven lasts between 10 to 15 minutes. You will know that pizza is ready when crust is browned and the cheese is golden.

How To Make A Pizza In A Frying Pan By Yourself

UPDATED April 1, 2022
by Lisa Lore

Not every pizza lover knows how to make a pizza. Most rather buy pizza in sold stores and restaurants. Commercial pizzas are visually appealing and delicious, but the taste of homemade ones is a lot more different and extra special. Gladly, you can try and learn how to make a pizza in a frying pan at home. Keep reading to learn more.

Steps to Cook Pizza in a Pan

From perfecting the dough and picking the best toppings, making pizza may sound complicated. Thinking about ovens also make it a little challenging, but not with pan-fried pizza. Pan-fried pizza has gained its popularity because making it involves a simple process. It is known as thin or thick pizza that is baked in a deep-dish pan. The crust’s bottoms and sides turn fried and crispy in the oil used to coat the frying pan. The following are steps on how to make a pizza in a frying pan.

Prepare your Ingredients

It is essential to prepare all your needed ingredients ahead, such as the toppings, sauces, and cheese. So you can avoid burning the pizza crust, it is better to cook your raw toppings before making the pizza. Cooking them halfway through can also be done. Organize all your ingredients and place them on within easy reach to the stove.

Roll the Dough

Prepare your dough and put some flour on it to avoid the dough from sticking to your hands while kneading and rolling it on your countertop. Shape the dough, form a circle shape, and carefully roll it to fit it to your pan’s size. The size of your pizza depends on your pan. Preferably use steel iron or nonstick skillet type of pan.

Pre Heat the Pan

To pre-heat the pan, turn the stove to medium to high and let it sit for a couple of minutes. Then, add a teaspoon of oil; you will need just enough oil to keep the dough from sticking into the pan.

Cook the Dough for 1 Minute

Place the dough into the pan. Let it cook and wait until you see the formation of bubbles on top and golden spots at the backside. You can deflate the bubble by using your spatula or leave it. It will be turned into crispy bits once you flip the pizza, anyway. Making the perfect dough is very important in learning how to make a pizza in a frying pan.

Add the Toppings

After cooking the dough for about a minute, flip the dough using your spatula. Carefully add the sauce; a few spoonfuls will be enough. Then, add a generous amount of your grated cheese, and place your other toppings. It depends on how you would want to put the toppings, but remember that the more toppings, the better. It is also an excellent opportunity to be creative and do some topping experiments on your pizza.

Cover the Pan and Reduce the Heat

Covering your pizza in the pan will help cook your toppings and melt the cheese since heat will be trapped inside the pizza causing the toppings to be cooked enough. You also have to reduce the heat of the stove to avoid burning the bottom of your pizza. It will help you achieve that perfect crusted pizza.

Cook the Pizza for 4 to 5 Minutes

After covering the pan, cook the pizza for 4 – 5 minutes. Check under the lid if the cheese has already melted. You can also adjust the heat if you want your pizza’s bottom to be golden brown; adjust it lightly to avoid burning it. The pizza is considered ready when the cheese melted based on how you want it to be.

Transfer to a Cutting Board

When the pizza is now ready, you need to transfer it to a cutting board using a spatula and make sure to let it cool before you slice it. After knowing how to make a pizza in a frying pan, serve it proudly. Continue doing the same process and cook other pizzas with your remaining ingredients to enjoy more of them. Find out more about baking pizza dough.

Conclusion

Pizza is almost everybody’s favorite. And surprisingly, it’s not necessarily that you make one using an oven. More pizza recipes are available online, and you can make your homemade pizza using your frying pan. When you learn how to make a pizza in a frying pan, you are not only saving money, but you are also challenging your creativity as you create your first-ever pizza. Bon Appétit!