My homemade whole-wheat pizza crust keeps evolving and getting better.
We make pizza every week during football season. I have been extremely happy with my homemade crust for a while, but it is always tempting to tweak and make recipes even better.
Letting the dough sit overnight in the refrigerator makes such a difference in the final product. This post talks about cold-proofing the dough.
Our latest improvement in the final product involves folding the dough. Hubby came across this idea from Brian Lagerstrom. As food lovers, we both consume a lot of media with new and fun recipes.
I was a little skeptical. I couldn’t imagine how much difference it would make to folding the dough over a couple of times before sticking it in the refrigerator for overnight proofing. But I was wrong.
Folding the pizza dough really strengthens the gluten, helping the crust turn out light and fluffy. The crust is crispy on the outside and tender inside. It is absolutely delicious.
After you mix together the dough, cover it and leave the dough on the counter at room temperature. After 20 minutes, wet your hand with water, grab one side of the dough. Stretch that side away from you and the rest of the dough, and then fold it back on top of the remaining dough. Rotate the dough a quarter turn and repeat this process a few more times, stretching and then folding the dough back over itself. Cover the dough again. After another 20 minutes repeat the process. Keep wetting your hand if the dough is starting to stick to it. Don’t worry about getting too much water in the dough, since more water equals more steam when baking, giving those nice air pockets.
Once you have done the folding process twice, refrigerate overnight to allow the cold-proofing process.
Time to Make Pizza!
Pull your dough from the refrigerator about two hours before you plan to make pizza. Place your dough on a piece of parchment paper. Shape your dough by gently molding and stretching it into a circle for a rectangle. A little olive oil on your hands helps the dough not stick.
Cover the dough and allow it to rise. An inverted sheet pan works well to cover the dough. Allow the dough to rest and rise for 1 1/2 -2 hours.
A hot oven is a necessity for a good crust. I bake my pizza at 525 degrees, hubby cranks the oven to 550 degrees and uses convection. We talked about how fun it would be to have an outdoor pizza oven. But since we make most of our pizzas in the fall and winter during the cold Minnesota months, it wouldn’t be ideal. Neither of us would relish the idea of standing outside with a pizza oven in the snow and cold.
Now the fun part, add your sauce, toppings, and cheese! My homemade whole-wheat pizza crust is topped with lots of veggies. Bake until the cheese is melted and browned to your liking. Let it set for a few minutes, then slice and enjoy.
Whole Wheat Pizza Crust
Ingredients
- 1 tsp dry yeast
- ½ cups all-purpose flour
- ¾ cup whole wheat flour
- ¼ tsp kosher salt
- ½ cup of room temperature water
- Topping of your choice
Instructions
- Start by combing dry yeast, all purpose flour, whole wheat flour in small bowl. Mix until ingredients are well combined. Add water and stir to thoroughly mix. Continue to mix until mixture forms a ball.
- Loosely cover the dough and allow it to sit at room temperature for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, wet your hands and flip the dough around a few times in the bowl. After another 20 minutes, repeat the process of flipping the dough.
- Cover the dough and store in the refrigerator, overnight or up to two days.
- Two hours before baking your pizza pull the dough out of the refrigerator. Lay parchment paper on the counter. Coat hands lightly with flour or olive oil and pull dough from the container. Using your hands spread the pizza dough out into desired size and shape. If desired use a rolling pin to roll out the dough.
- Once the dough is shaped on the parchment paper cover with a kitchen towel or inverted sheet pan.
- After two hours pre-heat oven to 525 °F
- Spread pizza dough with sauce, toppings and cheese of your choice. Transfer pizza to baking stone or a baking sheet. If using a baking stone be sure the stone is in the oven while it preheats to assure the stone is hot. To transfer the pizza to the stone slide a cookie sheet under the pizza then side the pizza dough onto the stone.
- Bake for 10-13 minutes depending on the thickness of your crust. Let set for a few minutes after pulling from the oven. Then slice and enjoy!
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