How to Make Homemade Pizza

How to Make Homemade Pizza

Though dialing up your favorite pizza joint may seem like the easiest dinner ever, you might be surprised to find that making homemade pizza in the comfort of your own kitchen is even easier (and helps save money). Here’s our comprehensive guide to making homemade pizza that’s just as delicious as your favorite restaurant’s.

What Flour Should You Choose for Homemade Pizza Dough?

When it comes to pizza dough, you can choose to buy special flour or stick with all-purpose flour that you likely already have in your cupboard. If you’re up for making a special purchase, you’ll want to look for 00 flour, which is sometimes even called pizza flour. 00 flour is the most finely milled flour available, and it’s this extremely fine texture that results in a chewy, airy pizza crust. Plus, gluten-free 00 flour is available in many areas, making delicious homemade pizza accessible to those on gluten-free diets.

Do You Have to Make Homemade Pizza Dough?

Making restaurant-quality pizza dough from scratch doesn’t have to be difficult, and in fact it can be quick and simple once you get the hang of it. If you’re interested in trying an easy pizza dough recipe, check out our How to Make Pizza Dough article and watch the video to get started.

If kneading dough isn’t your style, you can use store-bought pizza dough too. Just be sure to let the pre-made dough come to room temperature for at least 30 minutes and up to 3 hours (follow the packaging directions). This will allow the dough to soften and rise, making it easier to stretch into a pizza crust.

What Pizza Sauce Should You Use?

The options are endless when it comes to pizza sauce, and you can choose to use a homemade pizza sauce or go for a store-bought favorite. Popular pizza sauces are tomato sauce, alfredo, barbecue sauce and pesto.

Plan to use about ½ to ¾ cup of sauce spread in a thin layer across the crust. You can adjust the amount of sauce to taste, but be aware that making your pizza extra saucy could run the risk of making it soggy, too.

What Cheese is Best for Homemade Pizza?

When it comes to everyone’s favorite melty pizza topping, it’s best to stick to a cheese with a low melting point and not much moisture, like part-skim mozzarella or provolone. However, it can be fun to experiment with other options. If you’re up for it, try using goat cheese, a flavored cheddar or a combination of your favorites. You’ll likely need about ½ cup of shredded cheese spread evenly across your pizza, but again, this can be adjusted to taste.

How to Prepare Pizza Toppings

The greatest part about making homemade pizza is that you can make it exactly how you like, and that’s especially true when it comes to the toppings. Just be sure to take these factors into consideration when choosing pizza toppings.

First, always cook meat and tougher vegetables ahead of time. These ingredients need to be cooked thoroughly to make sure they’re safe and delicious to eat, and it’s never a good idea to take chances with undercooked meat. Softer vegetables like onions, peppers and mushrooms don’t need to be cooked ahead of time, but you can do that if you prefer.

Second, try to minimize the amount of ingredients with a higher water content. Popular toppings like pineapple, zucchini and tomatoes are full of moisture that gets released while cooking. Since the oven won’t be hot enough to evaporate this moisture, using too many of these ingredients at once can make your pizza soggy. To combat this, you can sprinkle the ingredients with a small amount of salt to release the moisture, then drain on paper towels before adding to your pizza. You can also cook them on the stove over high heat before use.

Do I Need a Pizza Stone to Bake Homemade Pizza?

The benefit of a pizza stone is that it can retain heat for a long time, providing a hot surface for the pizza crust and mimicking a brick pizza oven. A hot pizza stone gives the pizza’s crust a jumpstart in cooking and can help a homemade pizza crust to taste gourmet.

If you don’t have a pizza stone, it’s possible to get the same benefits by using a metal sheet pan. While you’re preparing your pizza, preheat the oven and place a sheet pan on the rack. Continue to prep your pizza, but do so on a large piece of parchment paper. Once the pizza is ready to bake, carefully slide the parchment paper and pizza onto the hot sheet pan. The already-hot surface of the pan will start cooking the crust just as a pizza stone would.

Homemade Pizza Recipes

Ready to create the homemade pizza of your dreams? Check out a few of our cheesiest pizza recipes below, plus get our list of popular pizza ingredients. Once you’re ready to get started, you can build your shopping cart for pickup or delivery, or make a list to shop in-store. You can also find more recipes, how-tos, and tips and tricks on our blog, The Fresh Lane.