6 Rules for Perfect Pizza Dough

Stop the piling of pizza boxes! Instead of delivery again, wow your roommates with a homemade pie that can be customized to your liking rather than selecting limited topping from a menu. Plus, portion control, ingredient oversight, and cheese-to-sauce ratio are all in your hands!

But before becoming a fancy pizza artisan, you must first learn the art of creating the perfect dough. After mixing together the ingredients, it’s time to start making pizza art.

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Life check: Wash your hands. Making pizza dough is a tactile experience, so you don’t want any crazy germs to soil your memory of this flawless dough.

Knead the Dough
Lightly flour your work surface and your hands. Slap the dough onto the counter, pulling it toward you with one hand and pushing it away from you with the other.

Scrape it
Use a bench scraper or a wide knife throughout the process to scrape the dough from the work surface and help shape it.

Let it Rise
The dough will need to be covered in an oiled bowl and kept in a warm place.

Divide it
After the dough rises, it will be soft and malleable. Scrape it out of the bowl onto a floured surface, and cut it into 4 pieces.

Shape it
Once the dough has relaxed, start shaping each ball into a round. Hold the top edge of the dough in both hands, and let the bottom edge touch the work surface.

Stretch it
Help the process by holding the dough on the back of your hands, letting its weight stretch it into shape.

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