Sourdough Pizza Crust

~Nimz~'s Note:

My sourdough starter has been severely neglected over the past several weeks, so I decided to use it to try to come up with a pizza crust for our Sunday Pizza. I adopted Po's pizza crust Pizza Dough and adapted it to use my sourdough. I am very pleased with the results. Hope you will give it a try if you are a sourdough lover like I am. The cook time includes the time it takes to rise and prebake the pizza crust.

• Total Time: 2 hrs 20 mins
• Prep Time: 20 mins
• Cook Time: 2 hrs

Ingredients:

Serves: 3-4

Yield: 1.0 large p ...

• 1/2 cup warm water
• 2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons italian seasoning
• 1 1/2 cups proofed sourdough starter
• 2 -3 cups bread flour (You may need to add a little more flour)
• olive oil
• yellow cornmeal

Directions:

1. Using a standup mixer, such as the Kitchen Aide,dissolve the yeast in warm water in the mixing bowl and let sit for 8-10 minutes.
2. Add olive oil, salt, sugar and Italian Seasoning and mix well.
3. Add the sourdough starter and mix well.
4. Add 2-3 cups of flour (add additional flour until the dough pulls away from the sides of the mixing bowl. If it becomes too dry, just add a little more starter.
5. Using the dough hook, knead for about 8 minutes.
6. Transfer with slightly greased hands to a greased bowl, turning once.
7. Cover with a light cloth and let rise for about an hour and a half, or until double in size.
8. Punch down and let it rest for 2-3 minutes.
9. Spray a pizza pan or pizza stone with Pam and lightly dust with yellow corn meal.
10. Transfer dough to the pizza pan and roll out.
11. Or transfer the dough to a floured work surface and gently pick up one edge of the dough and let it stretch, gradually working your way completely around the dough.
12. Then transfer the dough to the pizza pan and spread the dough with your greased hands so the dough fits your pan.
13. Using a fork, punch tiny holes all over the spread dough, being careful not to tear the dough.
14. Bake in preheated oven at 425 degree for 10 minutes.
15. Remove and very lightly brush with olive oil.
16. Add your favorite toppings.
17. Bake at 400 degrees until the edges are golden brown and the cheese is melted, usually about 20 minutes.

Reviews

[jbozziee]

Tasty dough with a good texture, although I didn't get too much of the sourdough flavor. (My starter is 8 months old, I thought there should be more.) I made this for the first time today. I made a x3 batch in my mixer, because I like to save dough to use later. I ball it up in 10oz portions and freeze it after the first rise. This is a great way to just have dough ready when I want to make pizza. Anyhow, at our house we like pizza in more of the East Coast style: Thin and chewy, but NOT crunchy!! So I did not do a par bake, I cooked it how I normally do, raw with the sauce and toppings right on it, and it worked as well as my old dough recipe. It spread very nicely with rolling and stretching, but I had to be careful because it can tear easily, as I discovered. I liked that it didn't need to rest much in the rolling process and didn't just shrink back when I rolled it out or pulled it to an edge of the pan. I think I will use this recipe again when my frozen dough is depleted, it was a good use of the sourdough starter.

[Erin R.]

Truly excellent sourdough crust. What a great idea to put the Italian seasoning right into the dough! I used 2 c whole wheat flour, a little white and a little bit of semolina to give it some crunch. We like thin crust pizza, so I was able to put half into the freezer for next time. I parbaked on my pizza stone for 7 minutes, decorated and baked another six minutes. Perfection. We finished the entire thing. I will definitely rotate this recipe with my regular whole wheat crust. Thanks a bunch, Nimz.

[Susie D]

I followed along during your excellent cooking demo on this recipe and knew I had to try it. I am so glad I did! It really is a great crust. I made two smaller pizzas with the dough. The flavor of the dough worked well with both sets of toppings. This will be one of my favorite pizza dough recipes to use again. Thank you for sharing the recipe and the demo. You made the process easy and I learned something. Thank you!