Easy pizza dough

Ingredients:

1.5 cups warm water
1 tsp instant yeast

1 tsp powdered milk
1 tsp sugar
3 cups all purpose flour (sifted)
1 tsp kosher salt

1 tsp olive oil (optional)

Directions:

In the past, I was intimidated by the process of bread making and subsequently pizza dough. That's why it took so long for me to try making it. But now I know how easy it is to make because the bread maker does all the hard work.

Add water, sugar, powdered milk and yeast into the vessel of your bread maker and stir for a few seconds. I use water from my Brita filter as some people say chlorinated water retards  the yeast activity. It makes sense since chlorine is added to our potable water to kill off bacteria, which is essentially what yeast is.  You can also add the olive oil at this stage if so desired.

Let the yeast sit for 5 to 30 minutes. You want to confirm that the yeast is active when it starts to bubble. Add flour. Set the bread maker to knead mode. The cycle will take one and a half hours to complete. You can add the salt once the water and flour have mixed together. The reason behind adding the salt later is that salt will inhibit yeast activity by sucking out moisture known as hygroscopy. This is why people use salt to cure meats to preserve food for much longer periods of time. Sugar is also hygroscopic and will do the same, but salt is more efficient at this. Adding the salt later in the kneading process will allow the dough to rise much more. If you don't want to wait around to do this, you can certainly add the salt to the flour at the beginning. Just make sure not to add the salt to the water. Add it to the flour. The flour will act as a barrier to prevent the yeast from dying off. Alternatively you can skip the salt, but your pizza dough won't be as flavourful.

Once the kneading is complete, pull the dough out of the bread maker. If you have the time place the ball of dough in an oiled bowl. You should coat the entire surface of the dough with olive oil and cover with saran wrap to prevent it drying out. Let sit for 8-12 hours to allow it to ferment where it will become more like a sourdough. This step isn't mandatory, but it does add another dimension to your pizza.

Split the dough in half. Take one half of the dough and spread onto a floured surface. Using your fingers flatten the ball of dough starting from the center and moving out to the edges in a spiral fashion. Afterwards you can stretch out the dough by holding it in the air and let its own weight stretch itself out. Just continue rotating it and pinching the edges with your fingers until you get it to the desired shape and thickness.  Alternatively you can rotate the dough across your fist. Now that I've done this numerous times, I prefer the latter. It's likely the pizza dough will be irregularly shaped, but  your guests will know it wasn't store bought.

Place the flattened dough on a parchment  paper lined tray. Do not use aluminum foil! A marble or stone tray would be best, but a metal tray is acceptable so long as you use the parchment paper underneath the pizza. Add whatever ingredients you desire and bake at 375F for 30 minutes. You can refrigerate the other half of the dough for up to 48 hours. In the past, I have found pizza made with the refrigerated dough to have a tougher texture. But by adding milk into the dough, the enzymes gives it a softer texture. So if you plan to use all the dough immediately, you can certainly skip the milk. Another tip is that adding fat to your dough will extend the life of your bread products before they go stale. However, pizza never lasts long enough to go bad in my house. 

Here are some of my typical pizza topping combinations. Under no circumstances should you use low fat cheese. And for the best pizza, don't use pre-shredded cheese as these often have the following ingredients: potato starch, powdered cellulose and natamycin. Natamycin is a naturally occurring anti-mold agent. In the past, I used shredded cheese due to the convenience, but now I shred my own cheese as I find the cellulose and starch prevents the shredded cheese to melt together nicely.

Combo 1: pizza sauce, pepperoni, green peppers, mushrooms, salted anchovies, mozzarella cheese.
Combo 2: pizza sauce, prosciutto, mushrooms, truffle oil, asiago cheese, topped with fresh arugula.
Combo 3: pizza sauce, genoa salami, roasted red peppers, pesto, mozzarella cheese.
Combo 4: pizza sauce, provolone, asiago, parmesan, and mozzarella cheese.
Combo 5: pizza sauce, roasted red peppers, onions, olives, pesto, feta cheese, black pepper, mozzarella cheese.

Combo 6: pesto, anchovies, mushrooms, mozzarella cheese, cherry tomatoes, arugula. 

After I've added all the toppings I will let the pizza sit in the oven with the heat off for 2 hours. This is to let the dough rise. To speed up the process, you can turn on the light bulb as it will add a little extra warmth to the inside of the oven. Once the pizza has risen to your satisfaction, you can bake. I usually bake at 375F for 30 minutes.

Low yeast alternative:

In light of the yeast shortage during the pandemic, the dough can be modified to use less yeast. It just requires more time to ferment. This recipe was modified using the same technique from the no knead country bread recipe. The only difference is the addition of sugar, which provides food for the yeast.

1.5 cup cold water
3 cup all purpose flour
0.75 tbsp sugar
1/8 tsp yeast
1 tsp kosher salt

Dissolve the yeast and sugar in water. It is important that the water is cold as this dough will sit overnight. The cooler temperature will prevent the yeast from being too active. Place flour in a bowl and add the yeast water. Using a spatula or wooden spoon, stir the mixture until the water is absorbed by the flour. Add salt in mid blend. The dough will be less stiff than normal. Scrape the sides until the dough forms a ball in the center of the bowl. Cover the bowl with saran wrap and let sit at room temperature for 12 hours. Use a spatula and scrape the dough from the side of the bowl folding the dough toward the center. Don't overdo the folding. I usually do one rotation of the bowl. The folding is to stretch out the gluten. Cover the dough and let sit for another 4-6 hours. 

Now split and place half the dough on a well floured surface. It will be sticky so make sure your hands are floured as well. Stretch the dough in several directions. Roll the dough into a ball. Add more flour to stiffen up if it feels too gooey. Form pizza dough as normal. Place on a cookie sheet and add sauce and pizza toppings. Let sit for 2 hours to allow the dough to rise. I usually place it in the oven with the heat turned off but with the light bulb on to keep the interior of the oven just slightly above room temperature. This will help the dough rise. You may need to rotate the cookie sheet periodically as the side of the dough closer to the light bulb will rise faster. Once the dough has risen to your satisfaction, bake as normal. You can take the other unused half of the dough and place in refrigerator for the next day. Just keep it covered with saran wrap. Take it out in the morning and let it warm up to room temperature before working the dough.