Pizza Dough – Quick & Easy Recipe

This easy Pizza Dough recipe makes the perfect thick, chewy and crisp crust. The recipe makes enough dough for one homemade 12-inch pizza. If you haven’t made a homemade pizza before, you should give it a shot, because homemade tastes so much better than store bought or delivered pizza!

If you prefer gluten-free pizza dough, check out my Almond Flour Pizza Crust Recipe.

Easy pizza dough recipe for beginners

This has been my go-to recipe since college. You can make it by hand or with a stand mixer. All it takes are 6 basic ingredients.

The secret to making Pizza Dough quickly

Treat yourself to a Kitchen Aid stand mixer. It comes with a dough hook which makes it so easy to make pizza crust. The dough twirls around the hook until a ball is formed. I used to kneed the dough by hand but my stand mixer really speeds up the process, so I can make pizza on the fly. You can definitely make this recipe without a stand mixer, but if you have one, take advantage of the dough twirler.

The ingredients in Pizza Dough

These ingredients are in all pizza doughs:

• Dry yeast
• Granulated sweetener of choice – I use zero-calorie monk fruit. The recipe, however, only calls for one tablespoon of sweetener, so you can use refined sugar if that’s all you have in the house.
• Lukewarm water – A bit of lukewarm water helps activate the yeast.
• Salt
• All-purpose flour
• Olive oil – to coat the bowl and dough when the dough rises. Olive oil also adds an element of softness to the crust which otherwise doesn’t contain any fats.

Additional seasonings

I prefer to infuse my toppings with seasoning, but you can add the following seasonings to pizza dough:

• Garlic powder or garlic salt
• Italian seasoning, i.e., a blend of herbs and spices

How to make Pizza Dough

1. Mix the yeast, sweetener and 1/4 cup lukewarm water in a bowl.
2. Let it stand for 15 minutes.
3. Stir in the salt and remaining 2/3 cup water and mix well.
4. Slowly start adding the flour. Note: If you don’t have a stand mixer, use a spoon or spatula and your hands.
5. Use a stand mixer or flour your hands and kneed the dough until it is smooth, elastic, and firm but not stiff or sticky. If you are doing this by hand, kneed the dough in the bowl and eventually transfer it to a floured work surface and kneed it there a bit more.
6. Depending on the humidity, you may have to add a little more flour or water.
7. Roll the dough into a ball and place it on your lightly floured work surface. If you are using a stand mixer, remove the dough from the hook. Roll it into a ball and place it on your floured work surface.
8. Clean and dry the bowl and brush with olive oil.
9. Put the dough in the bowl and roll it around in the bowl until all sides are coated with olive oil and let it rise there.
10. Cover with a damp cloth and let it rise in a warm spot – such as a sunny window or an oven you recently turned off – for upwards of 50 minutes or until it has doubled in size. In fact, you can let the dough rise for several hours at room temperature, i.e., you can make it in the morning and punch it down at lunch time.
11. Remove cloth and punch it down.
12. Then stretch it into a round disk.
13. Using a floured rolling pin, roll the dough from the center, but I often simply stretch and press the dough into the pan.
14. Add toppings and bake at 350 F for 12-15 minutes or until the pizza is golden brown.

Or try Keto Chicken Pot Pie in a Cheddar + Chive Crust.

Pizza pans

There are 3 options:

• Pizza pan with holes on the bottom – I use this type of perforated pan which promotes air flow for even cooking and a crispier crust. You can also easily glance at the bottom to see if it’s done. Specifically, I use a 12.5-inch, perforated, nonstick Faberware pizza pan – the pizza also easily slides out of the pan.
• Classic pizza pan with no holes – I haven’t used one before but the flat surface apparently takes longer to heat and the pizza may take longer to bake.
• Pizza stone – I haven’t tried one before.

The equipment needed for this recipe

• A bowl
• A stand mixer with dough hook (optional)
• Your hands
• A 12-inch pizza pan or stone.

Other easy FAILPROOF recipes:

• Keto Chicken Pot Pie
• EASY Teriyaki Sauce Recipe (Healthy)
• Cheddar-Chive Savory Keto Pie Crust