Sicilian Pizza Dough and Pizza

Sicilian pizza dough is a classic Italian style pizza dough that is thick, yet soft and delicious. It is made with a combination of high gluten flour, water, salt and yeast, and is allowed to rise for several hours before being formed into a crust. The dough is then spread out into a greased pan, where it is pre-baked for about 10 minutes before toppings are added and the pizza is finished cooking. The result is a thick, yet soft pizza crust with a chewy texture and a slightly crunchy crust on the outside. Sicilian pizza dough is perfect for thick, loaded pies that can handle a lot of toppings and are still able to hold their shape.

Suggested equipment

Ingredients

Method

Start this dough around 11:30 am so you have plenty of time and aren’t rushed.

In a large zip lock tub add the water and the salt and swirl to dissolve.

Add the yeast and let sit for a few minutes to hydrate and dissolve.

Add the flour and mix by hand until fully incorporated then let rest with the cover on for about 20 minutes.

Take the dough out of the tub and place onto a lightly floured surface (can use bread or all-purpose flour here) and knead for about a minute, until nice and elastic and smooth. Form into a nice big dough ball, coat tub lightly with olive oil, and put dough ball back into tub seam side down and cover for 4 hours.

Spread the 1/4 cup of olive oil onto a half sheet pan (18×13) evenly to cover all of its surface. Take the dough out and place it on the baking sheet, use your fingertips to push the dough towards the edges and corners. the dough will bounce back some and that is okay.

Repeat the stretching process, every five minutes, until the dough fills the entire baking sheet. This could take upwards of 30 minutes. The dough doesn’t have to be perfectly toughing all of the sides, just close.

Sicilian Pizza

Place pizza steel on next to lowest rack and heat the oven to 550 degrees.

Spread sauce on top of the dough and place the pan on top of pizza steel and par-bake for 10 minutes (you’ll adjust this depending on your oven) or until the bottom looks cooked like white bread but not golden.

Take out of the oven. You can immediately finish topping, or par-bake other crusts.

Spread some more sauce onto the par-baked crust, top with cheese and other toppings.

Place back in the oven on the pizza steel and bake 12-15 minutes (again, you’ll adjust for your oven) until the bottom is a nice golden color and cheese is melted and browned in spots.

Take the pizza out of the oven, and tip pizza out onto a large cutting board

Let rest a couple of minutes before cutting.