Making homemade pizza dough tastes delicious when prepared and stretched correctly, and with a few tips & tricks on how to roll out pizza dough with a rolling pin, any home cook will be able to do it with ease.
Contents
🍕 Rolling Out Pizza Dough
🔪 The process of rolling out
📖 Related Helpful Articles
🙋 Frequently Asked Questions
🍕 Rolling Out Pizza Dough
It's incredible the number of tasty things you can make when mixing a bit of flour, water, and yeast together. Those 3 magical ingredients are the starting block for various loaves of bread, cakes, and pizza doughs.
All of that goodness comes with many preparation methods to make the dough turn into a soft, delicious masterpiece, and today we are talking about how to roll it outhomemade pizza dough.
There are alternative ways forstretching pizza doughthat require specific hand techniques. However, rolling it out is much easier and gives similar results.
🔪 The process of rolling out
Once you have made your pizza dough and shaped it into balls, you are ready to begin rolling.
The best place to stretch the dough is on the kitchen counter. However, if you don't have enough space, you can always use your kitchen table.
With that in mind, here’s the step-by-step guide onhow to roll out pizza dough.
Warm the dough
The first step on rolling out pizza dough starts with letting the dough sit at room temperature for around 30 minutes to relax the gluten. Warming cold dough makes it easier to roll out or hand stretch pizza dough because of the protein in gluten that makes pizza dough chewy and stretchy.
Additionally, if you have proofed pizza dough at room temperature for an hour or two, and turned it into a dough ball, you can skip this step.
An excellent way to check if the dough ball is warm and ready for rolling is by pressing the ball with your finger. If the dough springs back, it is soft enough for rolling out.
Clean the surface
Like any form of cooking, cleaning your surfaces before starting the preparation process is essential, especially when rolling or stretching the dough.
A thorough clean of the surface you intend to roll the dough onto must be free of debris because the dough is sticky and will easily collect any bits lying around, which will eventually end up as part of your pizza crust.
There's nothing worse than biting into a great pizza crust with hairs and crunchy debris from leftover food.
Grease the surface with olive oil
Once the dough ball has warmed up, it might be a bit sticky, and one way to prevent it from sticking to your work surface while rolling it out is by drizzling a tablespoon or so of olive oil over the surface. Some methods require lightly dusting the ball in flour, but it can make the pizza dough tough to stretch.
Using olive oil will also help it stretch easier while rolling it, and the crust becomes crispier during the cooking process.
Alternatively, roll the dough on a pizza peel lined with parchment paper.
Press your pizza dough
Press down in the center of the ball with the palm of your hand to let the air out, and let it rest for 5 minutes before rolling it out.
Rolling out pizza dough
Grab your rolling pin and start rolling the dough outwards while evenly distributing your hand weight across it to create a perfectly round shape.
Keep rolling backward and forwards until the flat disc becomes oblong-shaped, then rotate it around and repeat rolling it out. You will need to flip it and roll it a few times to make the dough stretch to your desired shape.
If you want a thicker crust rather than an even crust, roll the dough out until the edge is thicker than the center by half an inch.
Transferring the dough
Now that the dough is stretched into your desired shape, you need to transfer it to a baking sheet, pizza stone, or sheet pan.
Using the rolling pin, fold one end of the dough over it, then gently lift the rolling pin so that the dough hangs in the air and move it over your baking sheet, pizza stone, or sheet pan.
If you end up with any dough tears from lifting the pizza dough, do not worry, as they can easily be fixed by pinching the dough together, and with the sauce and toppings covering the dough, you will not notice any imperfections from the crust when it's baked.
Making pizza dough takes a few attempts to perfect, so do not stress if the dough isn't perfectly rounded the first time around.
If you don't have a rolling pin to the dough, you can use an empty wine bottle, an empty glass bottle of olive, or something similar.
How do you fix pizza dough that won't stretch?
Pizza dough needs to rest at room temperature before stretching the dough for the gluten to relax. If you find that your dough doesn't stretch when rolling it out, leave it longer in a warm place until it has warmed up.
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If you're using frozen or refrigerated pizza dough, allow it to come to room temperature in a greased mixing bowl. Bringing the dough to room temperature before the shaping process makes it easier to stretch and less likely to tear.
Stretch the dough from Whole Foods by adding 1 tbsp flour to a large cutting board. Add the raw Whole Foods pre-made dough on top of the flour, then flip to coat each side with flour. Stretch the dough by pinching the outside in a circular motion to spread it out.
Before you begin stretching, warm up your cold dough for at least 30 minutes at room temperature. Gluten, the protein that makes pizza dough chewy, is tighter in cold conditions like the fridge, which is why cold pizza dough will stretch out and snap back just like a rubber band.
If your pizza dough is quickly snapping back or difficult to stretch, your dough is too tight. Cover your dough with plastic wrap and let it sit for 10-15 minutes. After a bit of rest, the gluten in the dough will relax, making the process of stretching much easier.
Punch down and turn out onto a floured surface.Cover lightly and rest for 5 minutes before forming crusts. To refrigerate pizza dough, cover loosely with plastic wrap and place in the fridge for up to 24 hours. Allow dough to stand at room temperature for 20-30 minutes before forming into crusts.
It's best to make the dough at least 24 hours in advance, and 3 or 4 days is even better. You can shape the dough into any shape you prefer – circle, square, oblong. This recipe will make one 14-inch thin crust pizza. You can cut the dough in half and make two personal pizzas if you prefer.
Stretching or rolling will create a different style of pizza so it's down to personal preference. A rolled dough makes styles such as “thin crust” or cracker thin. Stretched dough is more suited to Neapolitan and New York style pizza.
The stretch and fold method helps to gently develop the gluten in your dough. It works very well with these higher hydration doughs. We like the technique very much because although you get to use your hands and feel the dough, it is not as tiring as actual kneading.
Keep the stone clean. Blackened pieces of leftover pizza or bread crust can stick to the stone and cause the next item for baking to adhere directly to the charred pieces, thus "sticking" to the stone.
Rolling out using baking paper means the dough will have an even thickness and won't stick to the table or baking dish. If you cut a ready sheet of paper the same size as the dish or oven tray, you can transfer the dough and the paper directly to the dish after rolling out.
Overworked dough can happen when using a stand mixer. Dough will feel “tight” and tough, as the gluten molecules have become damaged, meaning that it won't stretch, only break, when you try to pull or roll it. Underworked dough on the other hand, won't form a ball shape easily.
A: Parchment paper or plastic wrap can both help you roll out a thin dough without adding flour. To keep it in place, try the old kitchen trick of spreading out a thin dish towel, then place the paper on top. Make sure you use natural parchment that isn't coated with silicone.
If the gluten in your pizza dough hasn't developed enough, it can cause your dough to tear easily. Developed gluten is what gives your dough its pizza crust texture. If not processed enough when stretched, your dough will try to bounce back to its original ball shape.
Your dough will be shaggy and lumpy to begin with, but once you've kneaded it for a while it should be smooth and slightly tacky to touch. If your dough holds it shape and doesn't ooze or sag when you hold it up, that's another good sign that your dough is well kneaded.
You need to knead pizza dough before it rises. If you try to knead after rising, you will destroy the gas bubbles built inside the pizza dough. These are necessary for an airy and lightweight crust.
Yes, letting your dough rise for too long is bad. Most pizza doughs are done within 24 hours (although some can handle up to 48!). Anything longer than that will cause the yeast to convert the sugar, which will negatively affect the flavor and texture.
Properly stored, homemade pizza dough will last up to five days in the fridge or up to three months in the freezer. However, the best storage time will depend on the amount of yeast in the dough. Generally, the less yeast in the dough, the longer it can keep.
When you're going to use the dough, take it out of the fridge at least 1 hour before you're planning to bake pizza, to let it come to room temperature. You can now use it just like any room temperature fermented pizza dough.
Take the dough out from the fridge at least 1 hour prior to making the pizza. Let the dough come to room temperature. Stretch, shape, top with your favorite toppings and bake your pizza.
Whether you should hand stretch or roll pizza dough depends on your preference. If you like thicker, airier crusts, stretch your dough, or if you want thinner, chewier crusts, roll your dough. Each method is suited to different kinds of pizza and can be adapted to your preferences.
It's best to make the dough at least 24 hours in advance, and 3 or 4 days is even better. You can shape the dough into any shape you prefer – circle, square, oblong. This recipe will make one 14-inch thin crust pizza. You can cut the dough in half and make two personal pizzas if you prefer.
Throwing pizza dough extends the dough and stretches it into the perfect shape. Using your fingers to stretch the dough, rather than throwing it may seem like a simple solution, unfortunately pressing into the dough causes small tears, resulting in it drying out leaving you with a tough and crumbly pizza.
The process of hand-tossing pizza is involved, but rewarding. First, the pizza chef will take the dough and shape it into a ball. They'll put the dough on a floured surface, dust the top of the dough ball with flour, and begin pressing it out into the shape of what will become the crust.
The main reason pizza dough is not stretchy is improper gluten development, the gluten strands are too tight because the dough doesn't get enough time to relax, you're using the wrong type of flour, the dough is too dry, or the dough is too cold.
Upon forming, gluten is very tight and strong, which causes the dough to tear when stretched. Giving your dough time to proof will prevent tearing and make it easier to spread. While a few hours will do the trick, longer is always better.
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