Migmom 3 Hour Pizza

One of my husband’s and my kiddo’s favourite foods is pizza — so much so that we have pizza once a week! I won’t deny that fast food, for all its countless downsides, has become one of everyone’s eating habits. So I decided to roll up my sleeves and make something my family would actually prefer to the restaurant version.

I’m willing to guarantee it: if you let your dough rest properly and control your oven temperature and baking time, you’ll get the same result after two or three tries.

Working with dough is a brand-new experience every single day. If you put in a little time each day, those experiences start to become consistent and you’ll reach the result you’re after. Taking your time — and writing down your mistakes — also helps you arrive at an ideal you can be happy with.

Many things go into a delicious pizza, but in my view two matter more than all the rest: the dough and the sauce. I’ve tried plenty of recipes for both, and in the end two dough styles and one sauce became my personal standards for pizza night. Here they are.

Migmom 3 Hour Pizza

Our family’s weekly pizza — a slow-rested, 80%-hydration dough and a rich homemade sauce that my husband and kiddo prefer to any restaurant pie.

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Prep Time 3 hours hrs

Cook Time 12 minutes mins

Total Time 3 hours hrs 12 minutes mins

Servings: 6 people (two 3-person pizzas)

Ingredients Method Notes

Ingredients

  

Dough (serves 6 — two 3-person pizzas)

• 1/2 tbsp instant yeast
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp sugar
• 350 g flour
• 3 tbsp cornmeal
• 3 tbsp oil
• 280 g water 80% hydration — weigh it on a scale rather than measuring by volume; grams and millilitres aren’t the same for warm liquids. If that much water feels hard to handle at first, start with 1 cup instead.

Pizza sauce

• 2 tbsp tomato paste
• 1 tomato grated
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1 small onion grated
• 1 large garlic clove grated
• 1 tbsp parmesan
• 1 bay leaf take it out once the sauce is ready
• 1 tbsp basil, parsley and oregano
• salt and pepper to taste

Toppings

• anything you love ham, pepperoni, sausage, onion rings, eggplant, zucchini, pineapple and meat, ground beef and mushrooms (blanch the mushrooms briefly first), sun-dried tomatoes, all kinds of cheese, tuna, bell pepper, corn, black olives
• mozzarella be generous — the more cheese, the tastier the pizza

Method

 

The sauce

1. Put the olive oil and butter in a pot — ideally an enamelled one, which is best for any kind of sauce — and warm it over gentle heat. Sauté the grated onion and garlic until golden.
2. Add the tomato paste and grated tomato, then the remaining sauce ingredients, stirring constantly. After a few minutes, once the sauce has come together and everything is fully combined, turn off the heat and remove the bay leaf.

The dough

1. Mix the water with the flour and cornmeal and let it rest at room temperature for half an hour — this is the autolyse.
2. Add the yeast, salt, sugar and oil to the flour-and-water mixture and work them in by hand. Let the dough rest about half an hour, then do three rounds of stretch-and-fold (or coil-and-fold), one every fifteen minutes.
3. Let the dough rest about two hours, until it doubles in size. Divide it into balls and give it time to double again. This batch makes two dough balls — or shape it into one large rectangle or round, depending on your pan.
4. Using a stand mixer? The steps are exactly the same: once the remaining ingredients are mixed into your autolyse, carry on working the dough on the counter until it is smooth and uniform.

Assembly

1. How you stretch the dough depends on your pan — but either way, once it’s opened up, dock it all over with a fork and brush on a little olive oil before the sauce goes on.
2. Spread the sauce with a spoon, scatter a little mozzarella, arrange your toppings, then cover everything with another layer of cheese. Finish with thyme sprinkled over the top.
3. For an extra-stretchy melt, lightly spray the top with water just before it goes into the oven.

Baking

1. Before you start arranging the toppings, preheat the oven at its highest setting — around 500–510°F. If the oven isn’t fully preheated, the base won’t bake through and crisp up properly.
2. Ideally, put a pan of water in the oven beforehand to create some steam.
3. Baking time varies a little between ovens, but check at around 10–12 minutes — the pizza is ready when the cheese is nicely browned.

Notes

Blanch your mushrooms and slice toppings thinly, or they’ll release water and change the pizza’s texture. Don’t overload the dough — a pizza is at its best when the toppings and the thickness of the crust are in balance. Rising time depends on room temperature, the season and the water temperature: with a proofing oven or a home warmer than 23°C, the whole process takes about 3 hours. I hope I can get you to fall in love with working with dough and all its floury adventures — questions welcome in the comments!