Easy Homemade Pizza Dough

This recipe is so simple and easy. It makes two large pizzas which was perfect cause my sister was over with her two daughters, So I made one pizza for the adults and one for the girls. You can even freeze this dough if you want to make it in advance for a dinner party. For more information on freezing the dough, head over to Annie's-eats fabulous blog.

Basic Pizza Dough
Recipe from Annie's-eats

Makes: 2 Large pizzas

Ingredients:
½ cup warm water
2¼ tsp. instant yeast
4 cups (22 oz.) bread flour, plus more for dusting
1½ tsp. salt
1¼ cup water, at room temperature
2 tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil

Directions:
Put warm water into a bowl. Sprinkle the yeast over the top. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the bread flour and salt, mixing briefly to blend. Measure the room temperature water into the bowl with the yeast-water mixture. With the mixer on low speed, pour in the yeast-water mixture as well as the olive oil. Mix until a cohesive dough is formed. Switch to the dough hook. Knead on low speed until smooth and elastic, about 5 minutes. Transfer to a lightly oiled bowl, turning once to coat. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise until doubled in size, 1½-2 hours.

Press down the dough to deflate it. Transfer the dough to a lightly floured work surface. Divide the dough into two equal pieces. Form each piece of dough into a smooth, round ball. (If freezing the dough, wrap in plastic wrap and freeze at this point.) Cover with a damp cloth. Let the dough relax for at least 10 minutes but no longer than 30 minutes.

To bake, preheat the oven and pizza stone to 250C for at least 30 minutes. Transfer the dough to your shaping surface, lightly sprinkled with cornmeal. Shape the dough with lightly floured hands. Brush the outer edge lightly with olive oil. Top as desired. Bake until the crust is golden brown, and cheese is bubbling, 8-12 minutes.
I topped the girls pizza with pizza sauce and cheese and for the Adults I put Bacon, Onion, tomatoes, mushrooms, feta and cheese of course. Now I didn't get to take a photo of the adults pizza because it was all gone before I could even get my camera.