The Best No Knead Pizza Dough Recipe (2024)

FAQs

Is no knead pizza dough better? ›

Generally, no knead dough has a slower fermentation than other pizza doughs. The gradual fermentation process helps develop more flavor as the dough sits.

There are many tricks to achieving a tasty, homemade pizza dough that rises into a beautiful pizza crust, such as making sure your ingredients are at right temperature, using half bread flour for a stronger dough and half all-purpose flour for a nice rise, substituting honey for sugar to help caramelize the crust and ...

What happens if your no-knead dough fails to rise? You need to wait a little longer or you need to have some leavening agent like yeast. Water and flour won't rise. Water and flour and yeast will.

Kneading your pizza dough helps build up gluten. If your pizza dough has not been kneaded for long enough, it may not have had the chance to build up a strong gluten network. When mixing your pizza dough, the flour and water create a chemical reaction that results in a build-up of gluten.

New York has been known to have “soft water” which may have some influence on the quality of bread, bagels, and you guessed it: pizza! The majority of the city's water comes from the Catskill or Delaware watersheds, where it is then transferred to the Hillview Reservoir for chemical treatment and pH balance.

With very soft water, the dough tends to get soft and sticky. As Smithsonian Magazine puts it, New York City tap water is sort of the "Goldilocks" of water when it comes to dough-making.

Flour is the main ingredient in pizza dough, and the type you use can have a big effect on the end result. All-purpose flour will work fine, but if you want a chewier crumb and a better hole structure, you should consider buying yourself some high protein bread flour.

Although oil in pizza dough is not required, it may be helpful. The oil improves the dough's stretchability while also keeping it hydrated. When you bake the dough, you can see how this process works, and the oil keeps the dough supple even after cooking.

If you don't let pizza dough rise, then it will not be able to trap the air bubbles that make for a light and airy crust. This will result in flat and dense bread that won't have much flavor or texture.

Par-baked and live dough crusts require no proofing. Dough balls, on the other hand, require fermentation. Proofing activates the yeast cells in the dough recipe. The yeast “eats” the sugar in the dough, converting it into alcohol and carbon dioxide — generating the bubbles that make the dough rise and double in size.

How to make pizza dough rise more? ›

Too little yeast and your dough won't rise enough, and the pizza base will taste bland. Use too much yeast and your dough may over-ferment. Tell-tale signs are your dough expanding too much or tasting and smelling a bit sour, with an almost alcoholic aftertaste (the yeast produces alcohol as it ferments).

Docking the dough gives this air room to escape and so, it doesn't stay in the crust. Many restaurant owners think they can't dock their frozen pizza dough, since it is frozen. However, you'll still be able to pierce this dough slightly and even those very tiny holes will be enough to make a difference.

Kneading bread dough allows the protein molecules in the flour to form, creating healthy gluten strands. Gluten is what helps the mixture create gas, which helps it rise and build texture. When the dough has been adequately kneaded and the gluten has formed properly, it will take on several different characteristics.

Yes, but the amount of time and effort it would take to do it by hand would require a lot of strength and endurance - maybe 20 - 30 minutes of constant kneading. Over kneaded dough will be tight and tough and won't stretch properly and the resulting bread will be flat, hard, chewy and unappealing to eat.

Gluten forms when proteins in the flour mix with water, and kneading helps align these proteins to create a strong, stretchy network. Properly kneaded dough will be smooth, elastic, and easy to shape, ensuring a perfect crust for your pizza.

I recommend sprinkling it with cornmeal or semolina flour so the dough doesn't stick. You can also use parchment paper but the edges will burn in the oven. Does kneading the pizza dough make it chewy? Yes!