This easy pan pizza is wonderfully cheesy and soft; you want this!

Well, gosh, what a time… Shall we just take it nice and easy and throw together a pan pizza? So easy that it only needs to be ready tomorrow, that it requires just a few ultra-simple ingredients, and that you can even make it if you’ve never baked anything doughy, like bread or pizza, before! Really, you want this…

The reason it only needs to be ready tomorrow, or can be, is that the dough—which requires just a few minutes of active work from you—wants to rest overnight in the pan. Like all of us, really, right? We came across this recipe on the American site Food52, and the entire video explanation is so relaxed that we thought everyone could use a little tranquilo pizza comfort. Because even though these may look like a lot of steps—they’re so easy!

How to make the simple pan pizza dough with just 5 ingredients (apart from sauce, mozzarella and toppings)

• Put the flour, salt, yeast, water and 1 tbsp olive oil in a medium-sized mixing bowl. In about 1 minute, mix with a flexible (silicone) spatula or your hands into a rough ball of dough, scraping the dough from the sides as you go.
• Loosely cover the bowl with a clean tea towel. Set a timer for 5 minutes.
• Then wet your hand and slide it underneath the dough ball as if you were going to lift it out. Instead, pull the edge up slightly and fold it towards the centre of the ball. Turn the bowl a quarter turn and repeat this 3 times. The 4 folds you have now made take the place of kneading.
• Cover the bowl with the towel again and set the timer for another 5 minutes. Repeat the 4 folds. Cover with the towel again, set the timer and fold again. Repeat.
• This whole process must be done 4 times in total.
• After the 4th fold, cover the bowl with the towel again and let it rest for 40 minutes.
• Then, still covered, place it in the fridge and leave it for at least 12 hours and no more than 72 hours.
• About 3 hours before you want to serve the pizza (or eat it on your own on the sofa), start preparing the pan.
• Take a heavy, deep, ovenproof frying pan, preferably cast iron, about 22 cm in diameter.
• Grease it with the 1.5 tbsp olive oil, making sure (for example with a brush) that the bottom and inside wall of the pan are well coated with oil.
• Place the dough in the pan and turn it over once so that both sides of the dough are coated with oil.
• Then use your fingers to push the dough towards the edges, making dimples with your fingers at the same time.
• If the dough wants to shrink back, that’s fine; cover it again with the towel and let it rest for 15 minutes, then repeat the pushing and dimpling.
• The dough should now touch the inside wall of the pan, but if it doesn’t, let it rest under the towel for another 15 minutes once more.
• Cover again and let it rest and rise at room temperature for 2 hours.
• Half an hour before baking, place one rack at the bottom and one rack at the top of the oven, and preheat it to 220° C. No problem if you only have one rack; you can simply carefully move it up later.
• Just before baking, distribute 3/4 of the mozzarella over the dough, making sure nothing is left uncovered; this gives you deliciously crispy cheese edges.
• Spoon the tomato sauce over it, but don’t spread it out.
• Sprinkle the remaining mozzarella over it.
• Place the pizza on the rack at the bottom of the oven and bake for 18–20 minutes, until the cheese is bubbling and the edges and bottom are golden brown (carefully check with a spatula). If the bottom is brown but the top is still a little pale, move it to the top rack. If the top is done but the bottom isn’t brown yet, leave it at the bottom for another 2–4 minutes. Ovens vary, so keep an eye on it and decide when your pizza is ‘done’.
• Remove the pan from the oven and place it on a heatproof surface.
• Carefully run a spatula around the edges to prevent the cheese from sticking to the sides as it cools.
• Let it cool slightly, then carefully remove the pizza from the pan with a wide spatula and place it on a rack or board so it doesn’t become soggy in the pan.
• Cut and serve while still nice and hot.

This is a deliciously thick-style pizza that falls somewhere between focaccia and pizza. Add an ice-cold Italian beer and your evening is sorted! And if you’d also like to watch the soothing video from Food52, check it out below:

Read also:

• https://favorflav.com/nl/eat-drink/food-stories/pizza-pepperoni-waarom-wij-krijgen-er-geen-genoeg-van/
• FOOD QUIZ! How good is your pizza knowledge? Take part in the pizza quiz, presto!
• Deliciously Important: Hawaiian pizza

Source and header image: Food52