Step by Step guide to making the best Pizza you've ever made

Final product first. This recipe is super easy and I hope some of you actually try it. I found this recipe originally from an imgur post several years ago and stated making them last year. I have changed the recipe slightly, but it's pretty firmly based on the Serious Eats recipe https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2013/01/foolproof-pan-pizza-recipe.html They may call it foolproof, but dammit all if I didn't prove them wrong. My tweaks have made it Jason-Proof, which is like reinforced foolproof for Idiots. Now, I'm warning you, this process takes a total of approximately 12-26 hours, but with about 30-40 active minutes spread out over that time, so we're good. Just nut up and do it once.

I put the recipe in a google doc so that you can just have a straightforward guide instead of looking at all of these pictures, too. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xGqzj8-SJozqzTOgeFiZPoS-T5diJtcGrz_7Nf4qUuI/edit?usp=sharing

Crust ingredients:
Makes enough for 3-4 people. I double these numbers and save the rest for a few days later, it gets better after a few days in the fridge
400g Bread Flour
10g Salt
5g Active Dry Yeast ( 4g Instant)
275g water
8g Extra Virgin Olive Oil (Plus more for cooking in later)

I’m going to be honest, it doesn’t need to be exact. We’re not building pianos here.

Start by mixing your yeast with your water, slightly warmer than room temp is ideal. With instant yeast, you don't really need to do this, but I usually don't use instant, plus, I like to watch it bubble, sue me.

Measure your flour and add it to your biggest bowl (during the rise it will get to be about 4 times larger than what you end up with so plan accordingly). I added the salt here, also.

Mix the yeasty water and flour, then add the oil.

Mix until fully combined. It will be ugly and you will want to buy Dominos. Don’t do that. It'll look slightly worse soon but it will look fabulous tomorrow night.

Cover it with either plastic wrap or foil.
Let it sit in a warm spot for 12-24 hours. It will get extremely big. Don't be alarmed.

This is after about 4 hours

This is just before I used it, about 22 hours.

This is what you need for the next step, Whatever you're making it in and, if you made extra like I did, whatever you're storing it in, I do sealable plastic containers like these. I oil the skillets with about 2 tablespoons of olive oil, and then add salt and garlic powder. The containers if you made extra, you can oil or not.

I oiled, salted and garlicked my leftovers this time since I haven't done so in the past and I'm curious about if the flavor will change when I pull them out in 3-4 days. This time, I cooked them in the skillet and the Pyrex baking dish to show that you can really do this with whatever you have available.

Roll it out onto a lightly floured work space. There will be stringy remnants of bubbles trying to stick to the bowl, just use your fingers to scrape those out.

This is what it looks like.

Make a ball and divide it into 2 or 3 depending one what you’re making it in. I usually use 8 inch cast iron skillets, so, I get about 2 and a half pies out of the recipe (Also a reason why I double it).

And here are my 5 piles of dough before I (roughly) shaped them.

Alright, the three in the back are ready to go away for now.

Press the dough balls into the skillets and spread them out. They will pull back somewhat and not spread to the edges. That’s fine. Cover them with plastic wrap, lids or handtowels and let them sit for about 2 hours.

About 1-1.5 hours into the second prove, turn the oven on to 550F and get yuour ingredients ready .
Here we have:
Crushed tomatoes for the sauce
Low moisture Mozzarella
Black Olives
Pepperoncinis, pre sliced (The secret weapon and best topping to put on pizza that no pizza shops ever have)
Freshly picked basilAnchovies.

Really, you can do anything that you want, I have done Margherita, smoked brisket, pulled pork, mushrooms, and all kinds of cheeses, it really doesn't matter. The brisket is fucking fire on a pizza and it only gets better the second time it's cooked, highly recommend that if you have brisket, you save some for some 'Zas

About 10 minutes before I start the bake, I throw the olives and pepperoncinis into the oven to dry out a little bit. This prep you would do differently depending on what toppings you are using. If I'm doing a Margherita Pizza, I usually pat dry the Fresh, M O I S T mozz and set it on the oven so the warm air helps to dry it out.

Almost ready to go here.

Alright, we're ready for our prep. Dough is spread towards the edges of the pans, cheese is shredded and toppings are ready.

Now, here’s where I really differ from the Serious Eats recipe. I sauce pretty lightly and cheese pretty lightly.

That’s it. Use about 50% of the ingredients that you plan on using in the final draft.

Then I bake it for 10 minutes first. This prebake is to make it actually idiot proof. It makes sure that the crust fully cooks and doesn't stay a soggy and uncooked mess in the middle, even after you load it with sauce, cheese, and moist toppings (Olives, pepperoncinis, anything else).

Note that I try to leave the middle pretty open on that first bake. You don’t have to if you are using few wet toppings, I suppose, but it’s a hefty crust that has strong flavors, so it’s pretty good to hold up against substantial toppings. Load this bitch up.

Anchovies. If you've never tried them, I recommend that you do, as long as you like fish. i would actually say to break them up more than I did and use only a little if it's your first time trying them. They are awesom and add some crazy salty and umami flavors to a pizza, but it's extremely powerful. Shout out to my friend Chris who introduuced me to these when we made them on Halloween last year. Chris, I know that you don't use Imgur at all but if you see this by any chance, goddamn it, Bill Gates is not trying to fucking microchip you, I doubt he gives a fuck where you are and if he did, he could call his frenemies at Apple and ask them to look at your cell phone's location. Goddamn, dude.

Pizzas going in the oven.

After 10 minutes or so, I pull it out and slather the rest of the toppings on it.

Extra sauce, then olives, pepperoncinis, basil and garlic, then the rest of the cheese.

I usually bake it for 5-7 minutes more or so.

Really just until the new cheese gets to the brown color that I want it to.

That’s it! Cut it up and eat it! I never said that I was a food photographer, so sorry these pictures are shit, but it's really fucking delicious

Notice the delicious, flavorful crust in every bite.

This is the bottom of the pizza, through the Glass Baking Dish. Notice that it browned beautifully, it's essentially frying the dough in the olive oil and making it crispy

This is the bottom of the Cast Iron one. If it's not browned to your liking, the cast iron is cool because you can just throw it over a burner to finish up for a minute if you need to.

The crust is thick but still light because the second prove lets it get air bubbles all throughout it. Thanks J.Kenji Lopez-Alt! You're a fucking genius. Have a great night everyone and send me pictures of your pizzas if you make them!