7 easy steps to make a soft and chewy pizza dough

Pizza dough is the most important foundation of a great pizza. Why don’t we buy a frozen pizza dough and make it? Because the biggest problem when you get the frozen pizza dough is you don’t know after roasting, how crispy will be the crust? Follow A Tavola’s pizza dough recipe to get a soft and chewy crisp.

INGREDIENTS FOR TWO 10 – 12 INCH PIZZAS

All the pizza dough still has the same basic ingredients: 00 flour, yeast, salt, water, olive oil,.etc.  

• 1 and 1/2 cups (355 ml) warm water 40^oC – 45^oC (105^oF – 115^oF)
• 1 package (2 1/4 teaspoons) yeast
• 3 3/4 cups (490 g) 00 flour
• 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil 
• 2 tbsp salt
• 1 teaspoon sugar

INSTRUCTIONS

• STEP 1: Sift the flour and salt onto a clean work surface and poke a hole in the center.
• STEP 2: In a pitcher, mix yeast, sugar and butter in warm water, let it sit for a few minutes, and then pour it into the hole.
• STEP 3: Use a fork to gradually add the flour from the side, and then turn it into a liquid. Continue to stir to extract more flour and mix it with clean flour after all the remaining flour has accumulated. Wipe your hands with dust. Knead until smooth and flexible.
• STEP 4: Place the dough balls in a large bowl sprinkled with flour and flour, cover the bowl with a damp cloth, and place in a warm room for about an hour until the dough doubles.
• STEP 5: Sprinkle with flour, knead a little, and release the air with your hands. This is called a reset test.
• STEP 6: You can use it immediately or pack it in plastic wrap in the refrigerator (or freezer) until you use it immediately, divide the batter into as many small balls as you want to make a pizza. This amount of batter is enough to hold six to eight medium-sized pizzas.
• STEP 7: In terms of time, it’s best to spread the pizza 15 to 20 minutes before cooking, but don’t spread it out and let it hang for several hours. If you work in advance, it’s best to use the dough and leave the plastic wrap in the refrigerator. Roll the dough in a large circle about 0.5 cm thick, then place it on a large piece of aluminum paper, sprinkle with olive oil and flour, then fold the pizza, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate.

NOTES

THE DOUGH – If you stick to the weights listed, the batter should be great. If the dough gets too sticky, just add more flour while kneading. If it’s too dry, add more water. If you don’t want the pizza dough to rise rapidly, put it in the fridge.

USE THE RIGHT FLOUR – 00 Flour is considered as the golden standard for pasta and pizza dough. If you want to know why, check it out.

If you use bread flour instead, make sure it has high gluten. Because the bread dough will not tear when you stretch it, but it will be a little difficult to shape the cake according to your wishes, the cake will be continuously resilient due to its high gluten content (12-14%)

STRETCH NOT ROLL – Gluten makes the pizza crunch and chewiness. Stretching the dough makes gluten work which rolling doesn’t.

SHAPING THE DOUGH – Use your fingers, press into the dough to spread it out and preserve its circular form. Each dough yields approximately 9.5 inch (24 cm) round normal pizza crust. Don’t press too hard on the edge, since this will result in a rim. I squeeze the edges by placing my hands inside and outside the edge of the dough.

CONCLUSION

We wish you a soft and chewy pizza crisp with A Tavola’s recipe. At A Tavola, we focus exclusively on Italian premium products and look forward to sharing the passion and culture behind the Italian culinary tradition with our customers.

Check A Tavola website or social media to get a bunch of useful Italian food recipes.