Beer Pizza Dough (With Make-Ahead Directions)

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This beer pizza dough gives you a crisp, thin crust with those delightful air bubbles and just the right amount of chew. The beer adds a depth of flavor, and who doesn't look cooking with beer?

Plus, you can make this dough three days ahead, and it freezes beautifully. This means you'll always have homemade pizza dough on hand for that impromptu pizza night or easy entertaining.

A glass and can of beer with make-ahead beer pizza dough balls.

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Why You Need to Make This Recipe
Ingredients
Step-by-Step Instructions
Recipe FAQs
Expert Tips
Perfect Pairing
Looking for More Pizza Ideas?
📖 Recipe

Why You Need to Make This Recipe

If you're looking for the perfect homemade pizza dough, you've come to the right place. With its crisp texture and wonderful flavor thanks to the beer, this is the pizza dough of your dreams.

If you've never made dough from scratch, the process may seem intimidating, but I promise this recipe is plenty forgiving and simple for even the novice bread-maker. Matt and I are huge fans of at-home pizza nights, so I've made this beer pizza dough recipe many times over, and it always comes out perfectly. I have no doubt anyone can successfully put together this easy pizza dough.

A KitchenAid mixer makes the process even simpler, but you can still make this beer pizza dough recipe without one and still get a tasty crust. You'll just have to hand knead instead, which is simple and actually therapeutic. As much as I love my mixer, sometimes I like to ditch the KitchenAid just to get my hands in there and really feel the dough.

I also love that you can turn this into a make-ahead pizza dough recipe. Want to prepare the dough and bake the same day? No problem. But you can also make this recipe up to three days before baking or even store in the freezer. It makes entertaining as easy as it gets.

Ingredients

For our beer pizza dough ingredients, you'll notice I specify bread flour rather than all-purpose flour or another type. So why bread flour? Bread flour has more protein than all-purpose flour, which gives us more gluten power for a chewier crust.

And then there's our star ingredient -- the beer. I used Pretzel Amber from Denver Beer Co for this batch. Amber ales are malt-forward beers with a bread-like quality and just a touch of sweetness, so they're perfect for this homemade pizza dough.

If you don't have access to Pretzel Amber, just about any amber ale should do. Fat Tire from New Belgium Brewing is widely available and a great option for this beer pizza dough, or use an ale from your favorite local brewery.

Showing some of the beer pizza dough ingredients for this recipe, including the beer used with the rest of the dough in the background.

Step-by-Step Instructions

How to Make Dough

Step 1: We begin by mixing together bread flour, salt and instant yeast (photo 1). Now we add olive oil and beer and mix just until it all comes together and forms a shaggy dough (photo 2).

Beer poured into the flour mixture of beer pizza dough.

Step 2: And now we knead. If using a KitchenAid, attach the dough hook and knead on speed two for about five minutes. The dough is ready when the ball becomes elastic and tacky like so (photo 3).

For those kneading by hand, flour your countertop or a pastry board and place the ball of dough on top. Now fold the dough ball in half and press down with the heels of your hands. Give the dough ball a quarter turn and repeat until the dough is elastic and tacky like mentioned above. This should take about seven minutes, but judge by the state of the dough.

A ball of smooth, elastic, tacky dough after it's been kneaded on a pastry board.

Step 3: We now divide our dough into five even pieces -- about half a pound each -- and shape them into balls (photo 4).

The dough formed into equal-size balls on a floured pastry board.

Making ahead tip: We tightly cover each ball with plastic wrap and let them sit in the refrigerator for a minimum of overnight, but it's ideal if we can give our dough three days to age. The flavor and texture improve if we give the dough more time to ferment, so let's try to plan ahead if possible.

However, if we want to bake right away, we place the number of dough balls we plan to use in a mixing bowl, tightly cover with plastic wrap and let sit in a warm spot until the dough about doubles in size, approximately an hour. If you'd like, you can bake some right away and place the others in the refrigerator for another day. What you don't use in three days then goes to the freezer but more on that later.

Step 4: After our dough rests, we're ready to start making pizza. For refrigerated dough, we need to place it on a floured surface, gently press into a 5-inch circle, cover with plastic wrap and let it sit for two hours to come to room temperature (photo 5). This not only makes the dough easier to shape but it also serves as the dough's rise, so don't skip this step.

If your dough didn't go into the refrigerator, it's already risen and the right temperature, so you can hand stretch right away.

Covering the dough with plastic wrap on a pastry board with flour around it.

How to Hand Stretch Dough

Step 5: To shape our dough, we hand stretch it. We start by using the beds of our fingers rather than our fingertips to press into the dough, working our way to the edge (photo 6).

Don't press your fingers too much in the center. We really want to focus on working away from the center to the edge for a better structure. Otherwise, we'll break down the middle of the crust and end up with limp pizza. If you'd like to see this in action, please refer to the video in the blog post.

Hand-stretching the dough with the beds of fingertips on a lightly floured pastry board.

As we stretch the beer pizza dough, we can also pick it up on the edge and let the rest of the dough hang down. That allows gravity to work its magic. We keep moving our hands along the edge to uniformly stretch the dough. The process is similar to turning a steering wheel.

Our dough is perfectly hand stretched once it hits 10 inches in diameter. If any holes form in the dough, just pinch them back together.

Step 6: Now we move our crust to either a corn meal-dusted pizza peel or parchment paper on the back of a baking sheet, add our toppings (photo 7), brush the edge of the beer pizza dough crust with an egg wash and place it on our stone that's been preheating in a 500-degree oven.

The pizza dough on a pastry board with sauce and cheese.

If using parchment paper on the back of a baking sheet, I like to pull out the oven rack so that the baking sheet is even with the pizza stone, grab the edge of the parchment paper and smoothly glide the pizza over to the pizza stone and then bake it for two minutes.

After two minutes, we remove the parchment paper by holding the edge of the crust with an oven mitt while sliding out the parchment paper with the other hand. Parchment paper can catch on fire, and we're using a blazingly hot oven, so we don't want the parchment paper spending too much time in there.

After our pizza finishes baking, we give it a few minutes to cool and set and then dig in for one tasty homemade pizza night.

Recipe FAQs

How do you freeze pizza dough?

After the beer pizza dough has a chance to age in the refrigerator for three days, we can freeze the dough balls we don't plan to use right away. They should last in the freezer about three months.

We simply wrap each dough ball individually with plastic wrap and store them in an airtight zipper freezer bag. And that's it. Easy, huh?

How do you thaw pizza dough?

Typically, I thaw my pizza dough by placing it in an airtight container with the plastic wrap in the refrigerator overnight. But sometimes I'm forgetful or those last-minute engagements come up. In those cases, you can leave the frozen pizza dough ball wrapped in plastic on the counter for an hour or two. Once it thaws, store it covered in the refrigerator until you're ready for it.

If you need a quicker thawing method, you can also place the frozen pizza dough in an airtight zipper bag and submerge it in a bowl of warm water. Your pizza dough should be ready to go in about 15 minutes. Just make sure water doesn't seep into the bag. Honestly, I can't tell you how many times having frozen pizza dough has saved me, and I'm sure you'll find it as handy as I do.

How many servings does one pizza dough ball yield?

This makes a 10-inch pizza, which is a good-size meal for two or an appetizer for four. If you need multiple pizzas, simply remove one pizza from the oven and serve. As everyone is enjoying the first pizza, you can bake your next pizza, and it will be ready to go by the time everyone finishes round one.

Expert Tips

A pizza stone makes a big difference in the end results. That’s not to say you can’t use a large baking sheet, but if you enjoying making pizza at home, a baking stone is well-worth the purchase. It gets so much hotter than a baking sheet, which makes for a crisper crust.
If you plan to bake the beer pizza dough immediately, we want to warm the beer to 105-110 degrees, but if you'd like to make it ahead of time and keep in the refrigerator, cold beer is fine. It will slowly ferment in the refrigerator.
When measuring the beer, allow the foam to dissipate to ensure you're using enough liquid. We want measurement to be actual beer, not foam.
To ensure the pizza stone is sizzling hot for the perfect crispy crust, heat it in a 500-degree oven at least 45 minutes before baking.
Please don't use a rolling pin to flatten the dough. That will push out those delicate air bubbles. Hand stretching is the way to go.
I like to weigh my dough balls to make sure they're the right size, but you can certainly eyeball them if you don't have a kitchen scale.

Perfect Pairing

Ultimately, the perfect pairing for pizza really comes down to your toppings. If you asked my dad, he'd tell you pepperoni and sausage are the only acceptable pizza toppings, but he's wrong. (Sorry, Dad!)

Pizza is a beautiful blank canvas for so many toppings, and they all command their own pairings. That said, I'm happy to give some general pairing ideas.

Pepperoni: Double IPA or American brown ale for beer; chianti or shiraz for wine.
Sausage: Belgian pale ale or dunkel for beer; zinfandel or syrah for wine.
Margherita pizza: Hefeweizen or pilsner for beer; rosé or chenin blanc for wine.
Vegetarian: American wheat ale or kolsch for beer; sauvignon blanc or unoaked chardonnay for wine.
White pizza: Witbier or pilsner for beer; Champagne or pinot grigio for wine.
Mushroom/truffle pizza: Doppelbock or stout for beer; chardonnay or Burgundy for wine.
Pesto and chicken: Biere de garde or tripel for beer; sauvignon blanc or vermentino for wine.
Buffalo chicken: IPA or pilsner for beer; riesling for wine.
BBQ pizza: Bourbon barrel-aged imperial stout for beer; zinfandel for wine.
Baked potato pizza: Pilsner for beer; riesling for wine.

If you love pizza as much as I do, I hope you try your hand at this homemade beer pizza dough. I'm sure you'll find this recipe surprisingly simple yet delicious.

Cheers!

The finished make-ahead beer pizza dough with mushrooms, chicken, red onion and parsley.

Looking for More Pizza Ideas?

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