Chicago Style Thin Crust Pizza
Ingredients
- 1 1/4 cups luke-warm water
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 2 1/4 teaspoons yeast (1 packet)
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled
- 3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 cup butter, room temperature
- 1/2 cup pizza sauce
- 4 ounces pepperoni, sliced thinly
- 2 cups mozzarella (and/or provolone), shredded
- 1 pinch oregano
- 1 pinch red pepper flakes (optional)
Instructions
- Mix the sugar into the water followed by the yeast and let it sit for 10 minutes, or until the yeast starts to foam/bubble.
- Mix in the butter followed by the mixture of the flour, cornmeal, and salt, until it forms a dough.
- Knead the dough on a floured surface until it is soft and elastic (a finger pressed into it will leave an indent that will bounce back out a little) before dividing in two and transferring to two greased bowls, covering it and letting it sit at a little higher higher than room temperature until it rises to double in size, about 2 hours.
- One at a time, knock the dough down, roll it out into a large disc, spread half the butter over half of the dough and fold the other half over onto the buttered half before folding in half again and again and again, before forming into balls and rolling them back out into thin discs and placing them onto large baking dishes.
- Spread the pizza sauce out over one of the crusts, sprinkle on the cheese and topping and bake in a preheated 500F/260C oven until the cheese has melted and the crust is crispy and golden brown, about 10 minutes.
