We’ve been eating pizza like it’s going out of style the last few weeks. There’s a couple reasons for that 1. I accidentally bought 4 bricks of unsmoked gouda and pizza makes a great home for it 2. I’ve been working on a killer new pizza crust recipe, and 3. I just really love pizza. I had a slice of pizza for a late lunch/early dinner on Saturday and a couple hours later, I was crying for pizza.
And then Sunday morning, still crying for pizza. If there’s such a thing as an unsatiable pizza lust, than I’m pretty sure I have it. Let’s call it sympathy pizza cravings because I’m so acutely aware of college students moving into their dorms the last few weeks. Whatever it is, I guess I can’t say I really want to be cured of it. With crust this good, and pretty healthful/nutritious, why stop myself from enjoying pizza almost every day?
One recipe makes enough for two medium/large pizzas and clocks in at 100 calories a slice + 3 g of fiber. While most people turn to white flour for baked goods and doughs, I fully embraced using 100% whole wheat flour. I even threw in some bran for good measure — bran is a good source protein and potassium and a great source of fiber, B6, and iron. All that nutritious stuff makes it totally okay to smother it in cheese, I checked.
1 tbsp. agave nectar (or other liquid sweetener such as honey or pure maple syrup)
2½ c white whole wheat flour + extra (can swap for regular whole wheat)
¾ c wheat bran
1 tsp salt
3 tbsp. vital wheat gluten
extra virgin olive oil or spray
Instructions
Mix warm water, yeast, and agave. Let sit 5 minutes until foamy (if it doesn’t get foamy, your yeast was dead or your water was too hot)
In a large bowl in a stand mixer whisk flour, bran, salt, and wheat gluten.
Using a stand mixer with a dough hook (or a lot of elbow grease!) slowly add the yeast mixture to the flour and stir until it forms a ball. Add additional water one tablespoon at a time, if necessary, to incorporate any flour remaining in the bottom of the bowl or extra flour if the dough is very sticky (this will depend on your flour and time of year, I normally need an additional 2 tbsp. flour). You may need to knead by hand to incorporate all of the flour.
Using the hook on a medium/low setting or kneading by hand, knead for 5 minutes.
Cut the dough in half. At this point, you can freeze the pizza dough (up to 3 months) or stick it in the fridge (overnight – 1 day). Simply thaw and bring to room temperature prior to letting the dough rise. Refrigerating the dough overnight will give you a softer crust.
Spritz the dough with nonstick spray or a drizzle of olive oil and cover. Place in a warm area and let rise for approximately 40 minutes to an hour, until doubled in size.
Meanwhile, preheat your oven to 400ºF and prepare a baking sheet with nonstick spray.
Stretch or roll out the pizza dough to your desired size/shape. Half the recipe should yield a medium/large size pizza. Brush the dough with olive oil, if desired, and add toppings. I recommend rolling over the edges to create the crust.
Bake for 10 – 14 minutes, until your crust has reached your desired level of crispiness.
Let rest for a few minutes before cutting.
Notes
Serving size is 1 slice of a pizza, assuming you make 2 pizzas with this dough and cut into 8 slices, excluding any toppings and 1 total tsp of extra virgin olive oil. I highly recommend you eat more than one slice of pizza though 😉
[…] maybe a pinch of truffle salt. You can see the crust for this pizza isn’t quite as tan as my whole wheat crust with bran, and that’s because this was in the early development stages for it. Needless to say, […]
[…] had the painful task of making a million kinds of pizza while I was working out an amazing whole wheat pizza dough, so not even breakfast was safe from the reaches of pizza. I’ve made a lot of breakfast […]
I’ve made whole wheat pizza dough before, but I’ve never thrown bran into the mix! Way to add even more health….so it can totally be a breakfast/lunch/dinner kind of thing!
Pizza is my favorite! Or, one of my favorites. 😉
I rarely am able to find a recipe that uses all whole wheat flour. It’s usually a mixture of white and wheat. But I’m all about the whole grains so I love this recipe!
Fantastic crust recipe! I haven’t had gouda on a pizza, but it sounds heavenly! I also really love the flavor and texture of whole wheat crusts, this is a must try!
[…] 1 medium/large pizza’s worth of pizza dough, rolled to a medium-thickness (like ½ of this recipe) […]
[…] maybe a pinch of truffle salt. You can see the crust for this pizza isn’t quite as tan as my whole wheat crust with bran, and that’s because this was in the early development stages for it. Needless to say, […]
[…] had the painful task of making a million kinds of pizza while I was working out an amazing whole wheat pizza dough, so not even breakfast was safe from the reaches of pizza. I’ve made a lot of breakfast […]
[…] wheat pizza dough (1/2 recipe or 1 pizza’s worth prepared but not […]
I’ve made whole wheat pizza dough before, but I’ve never thrown bran into the mix! Way to add even more health….so it can totally be a breakfast/lunch/dinner kind of thing!
Bran was basically my way of justifying eating pizza for every meal. If it’s good for me, it’s almost bad for my health to NOT eat pizza, right? :-p
Pizza is my favorite! Or, one of my favorites. 😉
I rarely am able to find a recipe that uses all whole wheat flour. It’s usually a mixture of white and wheat. But I’m all about the whole grains so I love this recipe!
I always think it’s a bummer when something says it’s whole wheat and then it’s only a little bit whole wheat. No false advertisement here ;-D
We’ve been on a pizza kick here too! I’ll have to give this dough a try!
Wow, this looks delicious- I love a good crust! Pinned!
PERFECT pizza crust!!
Fantastic crust recipe! I haven’t had gouda on a pizza, but it sounds heavenly! I also really love the flavor and texture of whole wheat crusts, this is a must try!