Mix Water and sugar together in a large container or stand mixer bowl until mostly dissolved.
Add Yeast, Flour & Olive Oil & Mix until combined.
Cover Loosely & Let mixture rest for 20mins. This stage is called "Autolyse" and helps the yeast activate before adding salt and helps the flour fully hydrate before we start building gluten structure.
After the mix has rested add in your Salt.
If you're using a stand mixer, with the dough hook attachment - run mixer on low to knead the dough for approx 10mins.
If you're not using a stand mixer, just mix the salt through the dough until fully incorporated as best as possible.
You can hand knead if you want, but the mixture will be very sticky and this step isn't 100% necessary as sufficient gluten will form over time.
Cover your bowl well (with clingfilm, gladwrap, etc.) or transfer dough to a sealed container & refrigerate for 1-2 days.
This period is called the bulk ferment.
Bring your dough out of the fridge after bulk fermenting (Approx 2.5hrs before you want to eat).
It should have doubled in size. Push down with damp hands and knead the dough just until it returns approximately to it's original size.
Seperate bulk dough into individual pizza portions and allow to come to room temperature (covered) over the next 1-2hrs.
If using pizza stones, place carefully in cold oven before turning on.
Preheat Oven to 240°C (or 464°F)
Prepare squares of baking paper for each dough portion, just a bit bigger than your final pizza will be.
Also have on hand either a thin chopping board, pizza peel or flat baking sheet to transfer/slide the raw assembled pizza and paper onto the pre-heated stone in your pre-heated oven.
If you aren't using a pizza stone - you'll want to a metal cookie sheet / baking tray ready.
With clean, damp (not wet) hands - take one of the dough portions from earlier. Use your hands to gentle flatten and stretch the dough, working from the inside out in a circular spiral motion. You want to tease the dough into a flat round shape. As the dough disk gets larger, you can place it on your baking paper square and complete the final stretching / shaping as desired.
Top the base with your desired toppings without overloading it.
When you're ready to cook, slide the baking paper square onto your transfer tool of choice (i.e. pizza peel).
Moving quickly so you don't lose too much heat from the oven, open the door and thrust the pizza onto the stone (it should be a sharp movement that allows the prepared pizza & paper to slip off your transfer tool and land on the stone).
You don't want to launch it so dramatically that the toppings fall off, but just enough that you are able to place the pizza directly on the stone without burning yourself or having the pizza bunch up at the front of the stone.
If you are baking the pizza on a tray without a stone - just put the tray into the oven. It will be fine.
Bake for approx 10-15 minutes, keeping an eye on it to ensure it's not browning too quickly. You may need to turn the temperature down if things are happening too quickly, because you want to make sure the base is cooked before the toppings burn.
Once cooked, remove the pizza from the oven and allow to cool slightly before cutting & serving.
0 servings
* The % Daily Value (DV) tells you how much a nutrient in a serving of food contributes to a daily diet. 2,000 calories a day is used for general nutrition advice.