Pizza! Pizza!

I've got to give credit to Mom for this next recipe.  Well, Mom and King Arthur Flour.  A couple Christmases ago in Ohio, Mom suggested that we make some pizza for dinner one night using a new recipe that she'd found in the King Arthur Flour catalog.  It was a simple recipe and the pizza really turned out great!  Needless to say, I've been making it a lot ever since then... more then I'd like to admit.  It's just so good!  And Joe really likes it too, so that helps.  

When I first started making this dough, I would make the entire recipe as shown, but it makes a pretty thick crust for our 16" pizza pan.  So I started making only a 1/2 recipe for a thinner crust.  Then finally I had a little "ah ha!" moment.  Just make a whole batch and freeze 1/2 of it!  Duh!  When I used the 1/2 that I'd frozen, it worked just as well as the fresh dough.  Here's the recipe:

Quick Beer Pizza Crust
From King Arthur Flour

4 cups All purpose flour
1 1/2 cups Beer (room temperature)
2 t. (1 packet) Instant yeast
1 t. Baking powder
1 1/2 t. Salt
2 T. Olive Oil

Pour the beer into a mixing bowl and sprinkle the yeast over it.  Mix the flour, baking powder, and salt together in a medium bowl.  Add flour mixture and olive oil to yeast/beer mixture.  If using a stand mixer then mix with dough hook until everything pulls together and a soft dough forms.  You can also stir it together and knead it by hand until soft and pliable.  The place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl, cover, and let sit for at least 30 minutes.  If you're going to freeze 1/2 of it, then go ahead and split it before letting it sit.  Just wrap the half to freeze in plastic wrap then place it in a Ziploc freezer bag before freezing it.

If you don't be like me and you remember to add the olive oil, your dough will look better than this.  And that is a good thing :)

After the dough has rested, preheat the oven to 450 degrees and shape the dough into the size needed for your pan.  Place in the oven *without toppings* for 5 minutes.  Remove from the oven, add all your toppings then bake for 10-12 minutes.  Enjoy!

Notes:
- I've made this with whole wheat flour before, but it sometimes turns out a bit dry.  I think that maybe using both all purpose and whole wheat flour would probably be a good compromise.
- Sometimes I add Italian seasoning or some Parmesan cheese to the dough and that tastes great too.
- Pretty much any type of beer works.  We just use whatever leftover beer we may have on hand.

I hope that you enjoy this if you decide to try it out!  Oh, and I would have put more pictures of the making of the dough, but I forgot to add the olive oil, so I tried to do it after I'd already mixed everything else and it ended up looking kind of funky.  But, it still turned out fine, which just goes to show you that it's hard to mess up!