Pizza
Learn to make homemade pizza with the most delicious and easy dough!
Servings: 1 pizza
Equipment
- Stand mixer optional
- pizza pan we use a 16 inch large pizza pan
Ingredients
For the dough:
- 4 cups all purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons active dry yeast
- 1/4 teaspoon sugar
- 1 cup warm water
- 1/4 cup 7-up or Sprite, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup milk, lukewarm
- 1/4 cup vegetable oil
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon semolina (fine or thick) or cornmeal see notes
For the toppings:
- 4 oz pizza sauce
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- pepperoni, as much as needed
- 8 oz white mushrooms, cleaned and thinly sliced
- 1 green pepper, washed, dried and thinly sliced
- 2 ¾ cups grated mozzarella cheese
Instructions
- Place the flour in a medium size bowl.
- In a separate small bowl, combine the dry yeast, sugar, and warm water. Stir to combine and allow to sit for approximately 5 minutes. You should see the yeast bubbling up on the surface of the water.
- To the flour add the yeast mixture, 7-up, milk, oil, and salt.
- Knead with your hands until smooth, for approximately 5 – 7 minutes. Alternatively you can use the hook attachment of your stand mixer. Mix for a few minutes until smooth. If you find the dough too sticky, add 1 tablespoon of flour at a time. Transfer the dough to an oiled bowl and cover loosely with a clean kitchen towel. Allow the dough to rest in a warm, draft-free place for a couple of hours until it has doubled in size.
- (Note: you can actually freeze the dough at this point, prior to it rising. Once you are ready to use it, remove the dough from the freezer, let it thaw, and then allow it to rise prior to rolling it out.)
- Once your dough has risen to double its size, punch it down and knead it again. (If you decide to freeze your dough at this point, you can. Once you need the dough, just remove it from the freezer for a few hours to defrost prior to rolling it out; it doesn’t need to rise again).
- Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
- Take a rolling pin and rub it with a little bit of oil so the dough doesn’t stick. Flour your surface, and roll out the dough into a circle large enough to be slightly larger than your pizza pan. Here we use a a 16 inch pizza pan.
- Grease your pizza pan with a little bit of olive oil. Sprinkle 1 teaspoon of semolina (thin or thick) or cornmeal on bottom of pan; this will add a little bit of a crunch.
- Fit your rolled out dough on top of the pizza pan.
- Add the pizza sauce first, then sprinkle with the oregano.
- Then add the rest of the ingredients in the following order: pepperoni, mushrooms and green peppers. Top all of your ingredients with the grated mozzarella.
- Trim the excess dough from around the pan.
- Bake your pizza on the bottom rack of your oven for approximately 20-30 minutes. You will know your pizza is done when the bottom is nicely browned and your cheese has melted.
- Enjoy!
Notes
If you don't have a pizza pan, you can use a sheet pan.
We like to sprinkle a bit of semolina or cornmeal on bottom of the pan, prior to placing the dough; we find it gives it a nice crunch. But this is optional.
If you'd like to freeze the pizza dough, rub it first with a bit of oil, then wrap it with plastic wrap, and then place into a freezer bag, squeezing out as much air as possible. Freeze for up to 3 months.
To reheat leftover pizza: Preheat your oven to 350 degrees, placing the pizza pieces on a baking sheet in the oven while the oven preheats. Once your oven reaches 350 degrees, remove the pizza from the oven.