How To Roll Out Pizza Dough

Making pizza from scratch at home is much easier than it sounds.  The best shortcut to making your own pizza dough is to make pizza dough in a bread machine.  This way, you just put in the ingredients, press the Start button, and the bread machine does all the work.  When the Dough cycle finishes, there will be a ball of pizza dough, ready for rolling into pizza crust. Take that pizza dough ball, put it on the counter, take a rolling pin and roll out that pizza dough into a large circle.

You can roll out pizza dough on the kitchen counter, or you can also do it on the kitchen table.  If you are not tall, you might find the kitchen table more comfortable.  You need to be able to press down with the rolling pin on the dough as you roll.  See if you are tall enough to do it on the kitchen counter.  If using the rolling pin doesn’t feel comfortable on the kitchen counter, then use the kitchen table, since the kitchen table is not as tall as the counter.

Here’s how to roll out pizza dough step-by-step:

Step 1 Of How To Roll Out Pizza Dough:

Sprinkle the counter with the flour.  Sprinkle the flour in the shape of the circle (the size of the pizza crust you are planning to make) This is done to prevent the dough from sticking to the counter.  Flour prevents sticking.

Here’s the picture of the counter sprinkled with flour:

Step 2 Of How To Roll Out Pizza Dough

Shape the dough into a ball, and put the dough ball on the counter.

Step 3 Of How To Roll Out Pizza Dough

Sprinkle the top of the dough ball with the flour.  This is done so the dough doesn’t stick to the rolling pin.

Step 4 Of How To Roll Out Pizza Dough

Roll with the rolling pin back and forth, pressing down on the rolling pin as you roll:

When you keep rolling in one “back-and-forth” direction, the dough ball turns into an oval:

When the longer side of the oval is the same size as the desired size of the pizza, stop rolling this direction.

Step 5 Of How To Roll Out Pizza Dough

Now switch the rolling direction, so you can turn the dough oval into a circle.  If you were rolling up and down, now you need to roll side to side.  Either move yourself to the perpendicular side of the counter, or lift and turn the pizza dough so now you can easily roll it in the other direction.

Now the dough oval is turned into a circle!

That’s all there is to rolling out pizza dough.  Here’s the perfectly round pizza dough ready for pizza toppings!

See also: Bread Machine Pizza Dough Recipe and How To Make Cheese Pizza