The Ultimate Pizza Crust, from King Arthur Flour

If I didn't love my life in California so much, I'd be pounding on King Arthur Flour's headquarters in Vermont-- looking for a job with them.  I love their products! I love their recipes, and I especially love their Blog.  Their Golden Pull Apart Buns are amazing! I recently made their Puff Turnovers, which my son is begging me to make again.  Pizza dough has been on my radar for some time. You see, I cannot help buying KAF's wide array of ingredients and "enhancers" that they sell.  Two products I bought, on my last KAF shopping spree, were their Pizza Dough Flavor and their Dough Improver.  On Sunday, I finally decided to use a King Arthur Flour recipe for pizza dough.  What I liked about this recipe was semolina flour plays a role in the dry ingredients. I already had semolina flour, from my successful experiment in making Semolina Gnocchi:

I used King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour, semolina*, King Arthur Easy-Roll Dough Improver (optional, but helpful),  Pizza Dough Flavor (optional, but delicious), SAF instant yeast,  salt, and   olive oil, and cool water.
*If you don't want to use semolina, use all-purpose flour, and reduce the water (printable recipe follows).

Mix and knead together all of the dough ingredients--by hand, mixer or bread machine–till you've created a smooth, very soft, fairly sticky dough. Don't over-knead the dough; it should hold together, but can still look fairly rough on the surface. Allow the dough to rise, covered, for 45 minutes; then refrigerate it for 4 hours (or up to 36 hours); this step will develop the crust's flavor.
NOTE: My dough fermented in the fridge for two days, without any problems.

Tonight, I let this sit at room temperature for about an hour.  I preheated a pizza stone at 450F, while I rolled out the door. I found the dough to be super easy to work with.  Per KAF's instruction, I eased the dough onto my hot pizza stone, and baked it for about 8 minutes.  NOTE TO SELF: Buy a pizza peel! When I checked the crust, there was a bubble. I deflated it by poking it and flattening it, gently.  For the toppings, I had made some homemade basil pesto (last week)...

 and...

...I had some Roma tomatoes.  After par-baking the pizza crust, I drizzled a little olive oil, and then some pesto.  I almost used fresh mozzarella, but instead...
NOTE: I've been asked why I par-baked the crust. The answer is, I didn't want a soggy crust. Since then, I have purchased a baking stone that I preheat to 475F.  I roll out my pizza dough on parchment paper, add my toppings and, using a pizza peel, I can slip the unbaked pizza onto the hot stone. The hot stone makes the bottom of the pizza nice a crunchy and I never have soggy pizza again! (A pizza peel makes this easy, but you can make your pizza on parchment paper on the flip side of a large baking sheet.) 

Good Ole Trader Joe's... I love this cheese blend!

I'm ready to bake this for about 10-15 minutes, at 450F.  I kept a sharp eye on it, though...

10 minutes later... Mama Mia!  That's a beautiful pizza crust!

How 'bout that cheese?

I didn't photograph the ice cold BirraMoretti  that I poured to go with this...

King Arthur Flour got this recipe right!  OMG!!!  This crust had so much flavor.  The crust was crunchy, and it wasn't soggy in any way!  I am so glad that I bought the pizza dough flavor, because it makes this pizza taste sublime.   

I don't need to look anywhere else-- this is the pizza dough that I will make from now on! I do think that the fermenting of the dough makes a flavor difference, too.  One day, I am going to make it to Vermont. I've never been there, but it's been on my wish list for many years. You can bet, that I will take classes at King Arthur Flour.  If you love pizza, please try this dough recipe.  It's amazing.  Tell King Arthur Flour that I sent you... maybe they'll invite me to come play in their test kitchen.  I wish.

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Enjoy!