This is hands down the best pizza dough! It makes a New York-style pizza crust that is a thin crust pizza in the center with beautifully puffed edges. You will love this crust – it’s crisp, chewy and so satisfying. Make this and you will never want a store-bought crust again. And, you’ll be known for your pizza!
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Why We Love This Pizza Dough:
This is a make-ahead pizza dough recipe that just gets better with time and it keeps really well refrigerated for at least a week. Here’s more good news: our classic red pizza sauce and creamy white pizza sauce also keep really well in the fridge so you can fire up a pizza whenever the craving strikes. An overnight crust also makes throwing a pizza party stress-free and everyone will be super impressed by your pizza-making skills.
The #1 Secret to the Best Pizza Dough:
Since most pizza dough recipes have the same ingredients: flour, salt, water, yeast, it’s the process that makes all the difference. This pizza dough seriously tastes like it came out of a high-end pizzeria and in fact, most New York pizza doughs are fermented for at least 24 hours.
The pizza bosses of the world know the secret to an incredible dough is to let it rest and give it time. This process makes the dough much easier to work with and forms the coveted texture, rise, and bubbles at the edges.
The #2 Secret to the Perfect Crust:
Do not use too much yeast! Many of the quick pizza doughs out there use way too much yeast which makes the crust doughy and makes the center of the pizza rise while baking. If you use too much yeast, you will never achieve that thin crisp crust in the center.
The Takeaway: use less yeast and let the dough rest.
How to Make Pizza Dough Video Tutorial:
Watch the pizza dough video tutorial once and you will be a pro in no time. Here is a quick overview of the process for easy reference:
- Mix together water, salt and honey. Sprinkle with yeast and set aside 5 min then stir.
- Pour water mixture over your flour and stir to combine with a spatula then knead by hand 2 minutes. Cover and let rise 4-5 hours at room temperature.
- Transfer dough onto a floured surface and divide in half. Fold each piece of dough 8 times (rotating book fold) and form a ball. Transfer to an oiled bowl, cover and refrigerate overnight or up to 7 days. Your dough is done.
Why Fold the Pizza Dough?
Folding the dough balls 8 times with that book fold, and turning the dough between each fold, makes the gluten threads stronger and traps carbon dioxide created by the yeast to help form those beautiful bubbles in the dough.
How to Form and Bake Pizza Crust:
- Remove dough from the fridge 1 hour before using then preheat the oven with a pizza stone in the center to 550˚F.
- When the oven is preheated, place room temperature dough onto a floured surface, dust lightly with flour.
- Gently press dough down in the center with fingertips then place the dough over the back of your knuckles with both hands together and roll over your knuckles rotating around the dough as you go, keeping a 1″ thicker border. Place 10-12″ diameter crust onto a floured pizza peel.
- Add white sauce or red sauce then cheese and toppings. Give the pizza a shake over your pizza peel to make sure it’s not sticking then immediately slide it from your pizza peel onto the preheated pizza stone and bake at 550˚F for 8-10 minutes.
Tools for Making Pizza:
The right tools will make the pizza dough making the process even easier. It will also make you look like a pizza ninja to transfer your pizza from a pizza peel onto your hot pizza stone.
- Pizza Peels (a set of 2 makes the process easier).
- Flexible Food Scraper – to scrape the dough out of bowls and cut the dough in half
- Round Pizza Stone – to bake your pizza on in the oven
- Pizza Cutter – the easiest way to slice a pizza
- Instant Read Thermometer – to check water temperature
What is the Best Flour for Pizza Dough?
You don’t need any fancy flours to develop a gorgeous crust. We used organic all-purpose flour for making pizza. Bread flour will work equally well if that is what you have on hand and it will give you a slightly chewier crust. You can substitute bread flour for all-purpose flour in equal parts.
Note: We haven’t tried making a gluten-free version or any other flour, so let me know if you experiment.
Can I Freeze Pizza Dough?
Yes! It’s very easy to freeze this dough and once it’s thawed, it tastes just as good as freshly made. See our tutorial for How to Freeze Pizza Dough.
What to Serve with Pizza:
Once you have your pizza-making skills down, you will want to throw a pizza party. Pizza pairs really well with these easy sides.
- Avocado Ranch – because everyone loves a great dipping sauce
- Caesar Salad – a fresh green salad with light homemade dressing
- Avocado Corn Salad – so vibrant and satisfying
- Cobb Salad – beautiful and delicious
- Instant Pot Corn on the Cob – the juiciest way to cook corn
Pizza Dough Recipe - The Best Pizza Crust!
Ingredients
- 1 1/4 cups warm water, 105-110˚F
- 1/2 tsp active dry yeast
- 1 tsp honey
- 1/2 Tbsp fine sea salt
- 3 1/3 cups all-purpose flour, (measured correctly) plus more to dust*
Instructions
How to Make Pizza Dough:
- In a small bowl, stir together water, honey, and salt then sprinkle the top with 1/2 tsp yeast and let sit 5 minutes then stir.
- Measure 3 1/3 cups flour in a large mixing bowl and make a well in the center. Pour yeast mixture into the center then stir with a firm spatula until the dough comes together. Knead by hand 2 minutes (dough will be sticky). Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let rise at room temperature 4-5 hours or until doubled in size.
- Transfer dough to a floured surface, turn to coat lightly in flour so it isn’t sticky then divide in half. Fold each piece of dough in half 8 times, gently pulling the sides over the center like closing a book, turning the dough each time and repeating for 8 folds. Form a ball in your hands and transfer each piece of dough to a lightly oiled bowl seam-side-down, cover and refrigerate overnight (18 hours) or up to 1 week.
How to Form a Pizza Crust:
- PREP: Remove the dough 1 hour before using to let it relax and come to room temperature. Before forming the pizza crust, fully preheat your oven so pizza can be baked right away. Place a pizza stone or inverted baking sheet onto the center rack of the oven and preheat to 550˚F. Also, lightly flour a pizza peel and prep toppings.
- When dough is about room temperature and oven is preheated, transfer 1 piece of dough to a floured surface, turning to lightly coat in flour. Pat the center of the dough gently with fingertips. DO NOT pop any bubbles present.
- Lift the dough over both knuckles and roll your knuckles under the center of the dough, working outward as you rotate the dough along your knuckles and leaving a thicker crust at the edge. Continue working the dough until a 10-12” pizza has formed. It will shrink slightly so make it a little bigger than you think. Place the dough down on a lightly floured pizza peel. Give the pizza peel a little shake to make sure the pizza slides over it and is not sticking.
- Spread on desired pizza sauce and toppings. Give the pizza another jolt to make sure it slides on the pizza peel (you don’t want it to stick while transferring it into the oven). Slide pizza onto the preheated pizza stone and bake at 550˚F for 8-10 minutes or until crust is golden brown and some of the larger bubbles on the crust are lightly scorched to ensure a crisp crust.
Notes
Nutrition Per Serving
If you make this recipe, I’d love to see pics of your creations on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter! Hashtag them #natashaskitchen
Best dough recipe. I used it to make a French baguette. 450F Convection 12 min, then 4 min on Broil. Amazing!
Thank you so much!
Made this dough yesterday, the dough has been in the fridge for 24 hrs and I am about to taste the pizza. I will update my review when the taste test is done, but I wanted to note that my dough was not as sticky as yours. Also, after refrigerating it, I could not use my knuckles to thin it out as it was too think, I ended up using a rolling pin.
Sounds good Ria. Please share with us how it goes!
Hi I made this yesterday – great taste and seemed to come out great but I did notice that after staying on the fridge for 24 hours the dough doubled again in size. In your video the dough seems to be the same size as when you made it into balls. Did I do something wrong or does it rise again when it’s in the fridge? I did use active yeast (not instant).
Hi Renee, Great question! It does rise slightly but won’t double. I put it into a bowl that can hold dough twice the size of the ball. As the dough sits up to a week in the fridge, it will slowly expand more. so if you have a 1 1/2 cup portion of dough, you should have a 3 cup bowl to give it some room.
Hi, I tried your recipe and it came out amazing. May I use wheat flour on this? Thanks.
Hi C, without testing that, I’m not sure what the substitution would be or how it would affect the rise and texture of the dough.
I’m so glad you enjoyed it! I haven’t tried wheat flour but I think it would make the dough tougher to just use whole wheat.
Hi,
Can you make this pizza with instant yeast. It has been hard to find yeast during the pandemic. I finally found instant yeast today & would love to make the pizza.
Thank you
Hi Janice, I always make this with active dry yeast because it seems to keep better for longer, but that should work fine and there would be no need to wait 5 minutes. You could mix the instant yeast right into the flour before adding the liquids. Please let me know if you experiment with instant yeast.
Best pizza ever!
I’m so happy you enjoyed that! Thank you for sharing that awesome review with me, Natalia!
Hi Natasha, I seldom write comments for recipes that’s I’ve tried. But this pizza dough recipe is a real keeper! Thank you very much for this amazing recipe!!!!!
You’re welcome! I’m so glad you enjoyed that1
Made this tonight for Mother’s Day with my daughter. Who always turns cooking time into a food fight. Pizza dough turned out great. Thanks for the memories. Brandy
So nice you enjoyed making this with your daughter. Hope you had a nice Mother’s Day celebration!
Dear Natasha, followed your Recipe to the T and it came out perfect. Including the hollow bubbles you showed on your video. Also made & used your Pizza White Sauce (Minus the Parmesan. Yet it was nice). Thanks a ton for sharing the wonderful Recipe. It was my first time making Pizza at home and feeling so happy to have nailed it with your help of course..😁
You are very welcome. I’m so glad that you enjoyed making pizza! Thanks for giving this recipe a try.
Natasha,
I make my pizza with, Italian sausage, onions, mushrooms and green chile, with lots of oregano at the end! I love your segments!
I shot a cooking segment for 14 years in the 90’s and early 2000’s for local TV news. I shot, chopped and produced it with two different chefs, all over the US. I like yours because it’s simple and good food! Keep up the good work
Wow, that is awesome Dennis. Thank you for sharing that with us, thank you for your great feedback!
I have tried many pizza dough recipes but this one is certainly the best. The dough turns out perfectly, not too sticky. It is really very easy to make too! Thank you for this recipe. Our family uses it every Friday night.
You are very welcome! Thanks for trying out this recipe and for giving it an excellent review, Melanie.
I had problems with the dough being too soft after one hour. It stretched way too easy and didn’t allow the full circle to form. I think it may need to be a bit chilled before stretching. The first pie (next day) was okay. The second one (three days later), was a flop. Not sure if anyone has had this and figured out a solution as to what went wrong.
Hi Marcy, I haven’t had that experience – it can soften faster in a warmer room so you can keep it out for less in a warmer environment. Also, make sure you are measuring the wet and dry ingredients the same way. Check out our tutorial on how to measure.
I only have premium instant yeast, can I use that instead of active yeast? If so do I just add it to the flour?
Hi Sheri, I always make this with active dry yeast because it seems to keep better for longer, but that should work fine and there would be no need to wait 5 minutes. You could mix the instant yeast right into the flour before adding the liquids. Please let me know if you experiment with instant yeast.
Thank you! Making it now, with the shortages in the store, this is all I could get!
Can the dough be frozen I would like to make more than one batch at a time thanks for the great recipe
Hi Lisa, This would work fine for freezing. To Freeze Pizza Dough: 1. Let the dough do it’s cold ferment overnight before freezing. 2. Lightly coat the dough with oil and transfer to a resealable freezer-safe zip bag and squeeze out the excess air then freeze up to 3 months. 3. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator then transfer to a lightly oiled bowl, cover with plastic wrap and let it rest on the counter and come to room temperature 1 hour before shaping.
The water and flour proportion seems totally off. My dough turned out to be extremely dry and didn’t rise. Also adding yeast and salt together in water looks like a bad idea.
Hi Katie, Bummer it did not work out for you and I’m always happy to help troubleshoot. The liquid to dry ingredients proportion is accurate and make sure you aren’t substituting with a different type of flour. Check out our post on how to measure ingredients – measuring flour the wrong way can result in 25% more flour than you need. Also, make sure your yeast is not expired and be sure not to overheat the dough while it proofs or it can deactivate and kill the yeast.
I really like your recipes and presentation. I made this tonight and I’m hearing a lot of “This is so good!” From the fam. Thanks, keep up the good work!
That’s just awesome!! Thank you for sharing your wonderful review Richard!
Best recipe ever. Thanks for sharing. Wondering if you have tried with a different Flour? Whole grain or sprouted spelt flour?
Hi Yordy, I have not tested that with other flour to advise. If you experiment, let me know how you liked the recipe.
What’s the serving size
Servings: 8 people (makes 2, 10-12 inch crusts)
An amazing recipe! I still have some leftover dough from the last time i made this, however i donot get the crispy edges or the thin centre, could you help me out with what i might be doing wrong, also can this me made without a pizza sone?
Hi Nafisa, the pizza stone aids in that crispy edge. Having a heavy-duty pan that is already oven hot to place the dough on helps that effect. You can still use a pan but it may be less crispy.
If you have instant yeast do you still put it in the water? Or in the flour?
Hi Christine, I always make this with active dry yeast because it seems to keep better for longer, but that should work fine and there would be no need to wait 5 minutes. You could mix the instant yeast right into the flour before adding the liquids. Please let me know if you experiment with instant yeast.
Hi Natasha, I just made the pizza dough, I followed your recipe exactly, but it is not sticky as yours. Not sure what went wrong…
Hi Lana, flour is usually the culprit in the manner it was measured. This post on measuring should help. I hope this helps.
Came out a little doughy but still yam. Thanks Natasha.
I’m glad you enjoyed that!
Just a bit confused as to why you add salt to the liquid, rather than the flour. I was always taught that salt kills yeast if it comes in direct contact. Thanks so much