Homemade Whole Wheat Pizza Dough Recipe Menu Board Card #5

Who doesn’t love homemade pizza? Today I’m going to share with you my homemade whole wheat pizza dough recipe that is universally loved by kids and adults alike. It also happens to be Menu Board Card #5. You can view Menu Board Cards #1-4 here. A post that describes my menu board system and how quick and easy it is to implement can be found here.

I was never a whole wheat pizza type of girl, then I started writing for and participating in the Today’s Parent Healthy Family Challenge and they had recipes for whole wheat muffins. I was skeptical until I took my first bite and then… I couldn’t really tell the difference.

We had whole wheat flour in the house so I decided to try to adapt my regular pizza dough recipe and add whole wheat flour to it. The result was delicious, we could see that there was whole wheat flour in the dough but we couldn’t taste the difference.

I love this recipe because it is quick, easy and makes enough pizza dough that I can freeze some and save it for our next pizza night. If you don’t want to freeze any just half the recipe.

Ingredients for Whole Wheat Pizza Dough (makes enough dough for four 12 inch pizzas):

• 3 cups warm water (105°F-115°F)
• 2 package (4 1/2 teaspoons) of active dry yeast
• 3 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
• 3 1/2 cups all purpose or bread flour
• 4 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 Tbsp salt
• 2 teaspoons sugar

Suggested Ingredients for Pizza Toppings (these are just a few of our favorites to inspire you):

• Pizza sauce jarred or homemade (recipe for our famous homemade sauce coming soon)
• Pesto sauce
• Mozzerella Cheese
• Feta
• Olives
• Italian Sausage
• Genoa Salami
• Mushrooms
• Peppers
• Oven Dried Tomatoes (our recipe available here)

Directions for making pizza dough:

• In the bowl of your electric mixer add the warm water and yeast. Allow to sit for 5 minutes until the yeast has dissolved and is slightly bubbly. (If you don’t have an electric mixer this can all be done by hand or even in a food processor in smaller batches.)
• Add the olive oil, flour, salt and sugar to the bowl of your electric mixer. With your dough hook ingredients on low to medium low speed until all ingredients are incorporated and the dough becomes smooth and elastic.
• Transfer dough to your work surface and knead by hand for another minute or so.
• Pat the dough into a ball. Put a small amount of olive oil on your hands and rub it over the dough. 
  
• Put the dough back into the bowl, cover with a clean towel and leave in a warm place to rise for about an hour. The dough should double in size. If you don’t have a warm spot in your house, preheat your oven to 200 degrees as you prepare your dough. Once the oven is preheated turn the oven back off then set the bowl inside with the oven door slightly ajar.
  
• Once your dough has risen transfer it to your work surface, punch down the dough and knead it again for a minute or two. At this point you can either start preparing your pizzas, let the dough rise a second time or if you aren’t using the dough that day put it in a ziplock bag and put it in the fridge or freezer.

Preparing your pizzas:

There is much debate over the best way to cook your pizzas. We have a pizza stone that we used for years but we found that the dough stuck to the stone and was hard to clean. This is how we now prepare our pizzas.

• Preheat your oven to 425 degrees.
• Cut out a piece of parchment paper. Take a quarter of your dough and put it on the parchment paper. Using a combination of your hands and a rolling pin, roll and stretch your dough to roughly the size and shape that you would like your pizza.

For years I LOATHED rolling out the pizza dough. I found that it kept shrinking back as I was trying to roll it out. I find that this usually happens with dough that has been in the fridge or freezer. If this happens to you roll the dough out until it starts shrinking back in. Stop and let the dough sit for 10 minutes, roll again until the dough starts to shrink again. Leave for another 10 minutes then continue to roll. Repeat until your dough is the size and shape that you would like it. Allowing the dough time to rest gives the gluten time to relax and become less springy.

• Once your pizza has reached the size and shape that you would like it, dust a baking sheet with corn meal then peel the dough off of the parchment paper and put it on to the baking sheet (alternatively you can skip the corn meal and just put the parchment paper with the dough onto the baking sheet).
• Bake the dough by itself in the oven for 10 minutes.
• Take the dough out of the oven and add your ingredients.
• Put the pizza back in the oven for another 10 minutes or until the cheese is bubbly and the edges of the pizza browned.

• Cut, serve and enjoy!

If you are freezing the remainder of your dough- Take the dough out of the freezer in the morning. Brush the dough with a bit of olive oil, transfer to a bowl, cover with a clean towel and leave in a warm place to thaw.

Do you make homemade pizza? What are some of your favorite toppings?