Pioneer Woman Pizza Crust

This is a really easy and yummy pizza crust. You can make as thick or thin as you want it. We like a thin crust so we usually make 3 crusts out of this recipe. I got it from the Pioneer Woman website which is a very good website with good recipes. Also, this crust can live in the fridge up to a week so I usually make some dough and we use it throughout the week. And if you don't have a mixer you can totally mix it by hand - I had to mix it by hand while i was in Crimea with girls and it came out well.

1 teaspoon Instant Or Active Dry Yeast

1-½ cup Warm Water

4 cups All-purpose Flour

1 teaspoon Kosher Salt

⅓ cups Olive Oil




1. Sprinkle yeast over 1 1/2 cups warm (not lukewarm) water.
2. In a mixer, combine flour and salt. With the mixer running on low speed (with paddle attachment), drizzle in olive oil until combined with flour. Next, pour in yeast/water mixture and mix until just combined.
3. Coat a separate mixing bowl with a light drizzle of olive oil, and form the dough into a ball. Toss to coat dough in olive oil, then cover the bowl tightly with plastic wrap and store in the fridge until you need it.




***It’s best to make the dough at least 24 hours in advance, and 3 or 4 days is even better.

***Makes 2 crusts.

Bread Video

There are some videos on Youtube from the authors of the book telling all about this dough recipe. I am posting one video that i found helpful:

Arisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day

I don't know if you heard of this bread or not, but it's pretty cool. I am not a yeast dough person. Dough doesn't like me. But this recipe is very simple and the cool part is that you can put the dough in the fridge up to 14 days and just make bread whenever you feel like it. The more it stands in the fridge the more sourdoughy it gets.

There is a book about all this dough and they have more recipes like that. The book is "Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day" by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois.

So here's the recipe that i found on the New York Times website, but now you have to register in order to view the recipe.

Time: About 45 minutes plus about 3 hours resting and rising

1 1/2 Tbs yeast

1 1/2 Tbs kosher salt (it's about 2 1/4 tsp of normal salt)

6 1/2 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour, more for dusting dough

3 cups lukewarm water (about 100 degrees)

Cornmeal

1. In a large bowl or plastic container, mix yeast and salt into lukewarm water. Stir in flour, mixing until there are no dry patches. Dough will be quite loose. Cover, but not with an airtight lid. Let dough rise at room temperature 2 hours (or up to 5 hours).

2. Bake at this point or refrigirate, covered, for as long as two weeks. When ready to bake, sprinkle a little flour on dough and cut off a grapefruit-size piece with serrated knife. Turn dough in hands to lightly stretch surface, creating a rounded top and a lumpy bottom. Put dough on pizza peel sprinkled with cornmeal; let rest 40 minutes. Repeat with remaining dough or refrigirate it.

3. Place broiler pan on bottom of oven. Place baking stone on middle rack and turn oven to 450 degrees; heat stone at that temperature for 20 minutes.

4. Dust dough with flour, slash top with serrated or very sharp knife three times. Slide onto stone. Pour one cup hot water into broiler pan and shut oven quickly to trap steam. Bake until well browned, about 30 minutes. Cool completely.

Yield: 4 loaves.

Variation: If not using stone, stretch rounded dough into oval and place in a greased, nonstick loaf pan. Let rest 40 minutes if fresh, and extra hour if refrigirated. Heat oven to 450 degrees for 5 minutes. Place pan on middle rack.

Dasha's notes: You don't have to do the broiler thing on the bottom of the oven. I forgot that with my second loaf anf the bread still turned out crusty and tasty. I read that some people just put the bread on parchment paper and on the cookie sheet and it still turns out well.

and here's the picture of my two loaves that i made yesterday.