Friday Night Pizza: Our Simple Homemade Dough Recipe

Looking for the perfect homemade pizza dough recipe? After 5 years of Friday pizza nights, we’ve discovered the ideal flour blend and simple technique. Continue reading for our easy method!

by Chad Steiner

Most Friday’s since COVID we’ve had homemade pizza. That’s about 5 years or potentially 100’s of pizzas. We started with gluten free flour for the crust, and it was “ok” but a bit challenging. Then we discovered the amazing flours of Chimacum Valley Grainery and Bluebird Grain Farms. It’s great pizza dough using 100% of either of these flours, but we’ve landed on a 50/50 mix of ‘00’ and Bluebird Grain Farms flour. We’ve found we really enjoy the routine of having a couple meals set each week – like Taco Tuesday, Soup Sunday and Friday Night Pizza Night. With busy schedules this helps us think more about the meal prep and executing on it vs. deciding what the meal is going to be. But of course, there’s still times we get to topping with cheese and are like “oops”, we’re out of cheese. I like to make the dough Friday morning, then let it sit on the counter. This recipe also works ok right before go time too. Someday we’d love to have a pizza oven – but for now our kitchen oven works great. Enjoy y’all!

Chelan Valley Farms Pizza recipe:

• Ingredients for one pizza –
  • Combine These:
    • 153 grams ‘00’ flour (It’s been hard to find a local source, we order the Antimo Caputo brand from Italy via Amazon).
    • 153 grams Bluebird Grain Farms Organic Methow Hard Red Wheat Flour
    • 8 grams of sea salt.
  • Combine These:
    • 2 grams of yeast (we get Redstar active dry yeast from the local grocery store).
    • 200 grams of water 120F water (ours comes out of Lake Chelan).
    • 6 grams of olive oil.
  • Simple Pizza Sauce Recipe:
    • One 6 oz can of organic tomato paste. Make sure there’s no added sugar.
    • ½ cup of water.
    • ½ cup of olive oil.
    • Mixed Italian herbs to taste (we like a lot).
    • Chopped garlic for a bonus.
• Detailed Directions –
  • I like to get the yeast going first so it has a little time to activate. You’ll combine the water, yeast and oil. Grab a regular sized kitchen bowl, add 200 grams of 120F water (great temp to help activate the yeast and not so hot it kills it), then add the 2 grams of yeast, then the 6 grams of olive oil. No need to stir, but let it sit a few minutes.
  • In a separate but similar kitchen bowl, use the kitchen scale to combine the two types of flour for a total of 306 grams. Then add the 8 grams of sea salt.
  • Your mixes are ready to go. We use our Kitchen Aid mixer with the dough hook. Pour the flour in first, then pour the water and yeast mix on top (while the machine is off). Then crank it up. I like to let it go fast at first and then manually slow it down as it turns to dough. Let it mix until it’s all consolidated into a ball of dough. Remove from the mixer bowl and put it into one of the mixing bowls used to combine the flower and/or water. I like to let the bowl be very slightly moistened when putting the dough in. Cover the bowl with a wet towel or plastic wrap and let sit. I usually make our dough Friday morning then let sit on the counter most the day.
  • Before baking, about an hour before if using the fridge, about 15 mins before if using the freezer, place the bowl with dough into the fridge or freezer.
  • Ready to bake? Turn the oven to 485F. Prepare your pizza stone or baking sheet. We like to use the pizza stones, but baking sheets also work. We lay a sheet of parchment paper over the pizza stone or baking sheet, then sprinkle with flour. Grab your dough ball from the fridge or freezer and work it into as big a circle as you can using your hands. I don’t seem to be able to get it to its full size, so I lay it on the stone and sprinkle the top of it with flour to then use a rolling pin. Roll the dough out to the edges of the pizza stone. When ready, we pre-bake the pizza dough for 5 minutes. Leave in for up to 12 minutes if you want a crispier crust.
  • Pull the pre-baked crust out and you’re ready to decorate your pizza.

The fun of making pizza at home for us is everyone being able to have the toppings they love. Whether it’s simple pepperoni or all the fixings. Even more fun is sharing it with friends.

We certainly hope you enjoy this recipe. And, please if you have any pro-tips, share away. We love finding ways to make our Friday night pizza nights even better.

Cheers,