Sunset's Best Pizza Dough

I love pizza. Especially homemade pizza. But I have yet to find the ultimate homemade pizza crust.


The packaged ones you can purchase at the store, mix with warm water, and bake are OK. But just OK. Not great.

So now that I've realized working with things like yeast isn't so hard, I've been on the lookout for a good pizza crust recipe.

I found one that looked easy—and good—as I was flipping through some recent issues of Sunset (one of my favorite magazines, despite the fact I no longer live out West). So, naturally, I decided to give it a try.

I began by stirring 1 package (2 1/4 tsp.) active dry yeast into 1 1/2 cups warm water (100 to 110 degrees) in the bowl of a stand mixer. I let it stand until the yeast dissolved, about 5 minutes.


Then I added 1/4 cup olive oil, 4 cups flour, and 1 1/2 tsp. salt.


Next I mixed it with a dough hook on low speed to blend, then mixed it on medium speed until the dough was very smooth and stretchy, 8 to 10 minutes.


The dough felt tacky. (But, fortunately, I wasn't feeling tacky myself.)


I covered the dough and let it rise at room temperature until doubled in bulk, about 1 1/2 hours.


Then I punched the dough down and let it rise again until doubled, 30 to 45 minutes.

From here, I moved on to making calzones, which I'll share with you tomorrow.

This recipe actually was made for grilling, which I'm pretty excited about trying once it's grilling weather (read: not 10 degrees). You can get the rest of the recipe for grilling here.

I'd definitely make this crust again (for regular pizza or calzones). It was incredibly tasty. But I'd also like to try it with whole wheat flour. Any great crust recipes you can't live without? I'd love to try them if you're willing to share!