What Is The Best Way To Make Homemade Pizza?
- Fabio
- Feb 21
- 5 min read
Updated: Mar 19
If you’ve never made pizza before and you’re worried you might mess it up, you’re not alone.
So, how to make pizza dough from scratch? You can really make a good one on your first try and you definitely won't need to buy M&S pizza dough. Like any skill, it improves with practice, but you don’t need special flour, fancy tools, or complicated procedures to get started. The pizza dough ingredients are just four!
If I had to start over tomorrow, I would do it in the simplest possible way. Average supermarket flour, normal kitchen oven, basic tools, and a straightforward process you can follow in your own kitchen. The pizza dough recipe here below is based on my simple pizza dough calculator, a nice free tool many have been using.
Once you finish reading, why not see how is done? Here's a nice, complete video:
Start Simple: No Special Ingredients
We begin with a basic pizza dough made from scratch:
🌽 160 grams flour
💧 100 grams water
🧂 3.5 grams salt
🎈 0.3 grams instant dry yeast
No special flour, just any supermarket flour, the one you alreay have in your pantry will do. No extra-long procedures, and no fancy equipment.
Use a simple kitchen scale [affiliate link] for flour and water so you can repeat the recipe consistently. For tiny amounts like yeast and salt, volumetric measures are fine.
If I had to start again, I would focus only on the skill and on the feel of the dough. Technical explanations about flour or yeast can come later. As a beginner, you don’t need them yet.
Most of the time, the full amount of flour in the recipe will be enough. Always keep a little aside in the bowl and use it only if the dough really needs it.
Kneading: What Beginners Should Watch For
While kneading, two opposite problems can happen: The dough might feel sticky, or it might feel too dry.
To prevent dryness, keep a bit of flour aside. But remember that dough is often sticky at first, and this is normal. Many beginners panic and add all the remaining flour too early. Instead, keep kneading, folding from the edges toward the centre. The stickiness usually goes away with time. If the dough is still difficult, take a short break. Cover it and rest it for five or ten minutes, then continue.
Only if it is still unmanageable should you add the remaining flour, because adding too much flour is a classic rookie mistake that leads to a dry dough later.
When the dough is ready, it should not feel too tacky. You should be able to touch it without it sticking to your hand, and the surface should feel elastic and bounce back slightly when you press it.
How long can pizza dough be left to rise?
In theory, pizza dough can rise for many hours, sometimes even days, depending on temperature, yeast amount, and flour strength. But if you are just starting out, I see no reason to complicate things right from the start!
For now, keep life simple: Let the dough rise in a bowl with a bit of oil inside so it comes out easily. If the room temperature is around 20°C, the dough will usually be ready in less than four hours with the amount of yeast in the provided recipe.
That is enough to make a very good pizza, especially on your first attempts. There will be plenty of time later, when you become more experienced... and I promise I've got you covered, my videocourses are pretty thourough!
For now, start easy and get confidence. Explore later.
What to put on a homemade pizza? Keep the Toppings Simple
If I had to start over, I would make a simple margherita: tomato sauce and mozzarella, or any cheese you like.
A common beginner mistake happens with fresh mozzarella, which releases a lot of moisture on the pizza. Cut it beforehand and leave it in a colander so it drains. The longer the better, even overnight.
For sauce, you can buy a ready-made pizza sauce. If you want to make your own, crush some good peeled tomatoes roughly, add a pinch of salt, and that’s enough.
When choosing toppings in general, buy the best quality you can afford. As a beginner, this is one of the few things you fully control. Good toppings can compensate for an imperfect dough, but poor toppings can ruin a good one.
Can you make homemade pizza in a regular oven?
Oh yes, definitely!
Understanding the magic of your kitchen oven takes several rounds of trial and error, but to start, simply set it to the highest temperature, usually around 250 °C.
When the oven light shows it has reached temperature, wait another ten minutes. During preheating, leave a metal tray or dripping pan inside on the middle shelf to create a very hot surface for baking.
Stretching The Clever Way
Stretching is often the hardest part for beginners, so for your very first pizza I suggest you start with a workaround my Nonna taught me back in the days.
Flour the table, put a little flour on the dough, pat it round, and flatten it gently. Then place it on an upside down salad bowl and pull all the edges. It won’t be perfect, but it works until your skills improve.
Baking the Pizza
Now that your pizza is perf... erm... decently stretched, you can add the toppings and build your first Margherita. As a rule of thumb, use about 100 g of tomato sauce and 100 g of mozzarella.
To load the pizza into the oven, you don’t need to buy a peel on day one. Use a chopping board, a piece of cardboard, or even an old pizza box lined with parchment paper, then slide the pizza onto the hot tray in the oven.
Bake in two rounds. First one with only tomato sauce. Halfway through, remove the parchment paper and add the mozzarella. Like this, it doesn’t overcook or even burn. Add any other toppings at this stage, but keep them light so the pizza can bake properly. Bake until the cheese melts and the pizza looks ready.
After a few tries, making a good pizza becomes easy. With time and practice, making a great pizza is definitely a realistic goal.
Rookie mistakes beginners make (click to expand)
Obsessing over special flour or equipment instead of focusing on skill & feel.
Adding too much flour too early when the dough feels sticky.
Not resting the dough when kneading becomes difficult.
Forgetting to oil the bowl before rising.
Using fresh mozzarella without draining it first, which makes the pizza watery.
Overloading toppings, preventing proper baking.
Buying new tools immediately instead of starting with simple kitchen items and workarounds.
Not preheating the oven long enough or not using a hot tray inside.
Your First Homemade Pizza: The Real Secret
Start simple.
Focus on skill and feel.
Use normal ingredients.
Learn your oven.
Choose good toppings.
That’s enough to make a good first pizza, everything else can come later.
If this article was useful, you’ll find a few ways below to support the channel and help me keep nerding out about pizza. And if you have questions about making pizza, leave a comment, I love those conversations.
Ciao, see you next time 🍕
Here's how you can support me!
🍕 You can get my first book or the second one
🌾 You can simply buy me a bag of flour
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