Homemade Pizza Dough

October 23, 2019

Our last trip to Utah, we went to a restaurant where children could "make" their own pizzas. My kids loved it so much, I decided to re-create it at home. I bought these pizza stones and a pizza peel to help me with the job. I like these square pizza stones, because you can either use one to make a child-sized pizza or put four of them together to make a large one. Six of them fit in our oven, so we have the option to bake six child-sized pizzas at a time, three adult pizzas at a time OR one adult and two child-sized pizzas. The recipe I use only takes 5-7 minutes of baking time. If you're making these pizzas in a group setting, I learned to keep the oven closed as much as possible to keep in the heat. If it's open too long, the heat escapes and it takes longer to bake remaining pizzas.

There are so many options available to make pizza. Every one gets exactly what they want and there's something special about children creating their own thing that they're proud of. I love this recipe, because you have the option to make it the night before to use for dinner or a party the following day. It also freezes well and is so simple, without any added sugar. This recipe is from Ciao Florentina.

Note: If you're making the dough the day of, you need to allow TWO hours of rise time. If you make the dough the night before, allow the dough to rise for TWO hours and place it in the fridge over night. An hour before dinner, take the dough out of the fridge and allow it to come to room temperature.

Ingredients:

5 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp active dry yeast
1 1/2 tsp sea salt
2 1/4 cups COLD water
1 Tbs extra virgin olive oil

Directions:

1) Add the flour, yeast and salt into a Kitchen Aid. Using a dough attachment, do a quick stir.

2) Add in the water and olive oil. Using the dough attachment, knead the dough for a few minutes. The dough should not stick to the side of the bowl, but be barely sticky and smooth to the touch. If the dough sticks to the side of the bowl, sprinkle in a little more flour, if it's too dry then add in a bit more water.

3) Place the dough on the counter and cut it into eight even pieces (for a child-sized pizzas) or six even pieces (for adult-sized pizzas). Place them on a lightly oiled cookie sheet and then lightly spray the tops of the dough. Cover with plastic wrap and allow to sit a room temperature and rise for TWO HOURS.

At this point, I cut out pieces of parchment paper. For the child-sized pizzas, I match the size of parchment paper to the size of one of our square pizza stones. I knew we had six kids coming to our party, so I cut out six pieces of parchment paper. We use Reynold's Parchment Paper with Smartgrid - and for the child-sized pizzas we cut out four by four squares. For the adult-sized pizzas, we cut out six by six squares.

AN HOUR BEFORE: An hour before you bake the pizzas, place your pizza stones in the oven and preheat the oven as high as it will go. Mine goes to 500 degrees.

READY TO MAKE: Place a child-sized ball of pizza dough on a child-sized piece of parchment paper and have your child push the dough out to the edge of the parchment paper to make a circle pizza. This dough recipe is easy to push out with your hands. I give my kids little containers of sauce, cheese, veggies or whatever they'd like (containers from the Dollar Store) to decorate their pizzas. Use a pizza peel to put the pizza in the oven and bake for 5-7 minutes or until the edges are golden brown.

This past week, we had a Jack-o-Lantern Party at our home. The kids and adults decorated pizzas into pumpkin shapes and we carved pumpkins afterward. Here's some pictures!

Risen Dough on a Pumpkin Platter from the Dollar Store. There are six smaller pieces of dough for kids on the left and eight medium sized pieces of dough on the right for the adults.