Jordan Cooks!

Some cooks say “no” while others say “yes,” but pizza dough can certainly be frozen for later use. Doing so can potentially deactivate and kill the yeast so I like to let the dough completely rise before storing it in the freezer. Some people will freeze the dough, defrost it and then let it rise which is fine as well. You may have to experiment a bit to see how to freeze your dough recipe for the best results. Afterwords, I usually make dough balls, cover them completely in plastic wrap and place them in a freezer bag for storage.

To defrost, simply take the pizza dough ball out the night before and place it in the refrigerator. It should be ready to go the next day although you may notice a few changes. First, the dough may become a little wetter due to the defrosting process. Second, the crystallization of ice can will break down some of the gluten in the dough. Both can cause a range of problems depending on the dough recipe being used but most people shouldn’t have any issue working with defrosted pizza dough. Just let the dough get to room temperature, stretch it to make a crust and you should be good to go!

If you’re going to be making a homemade pizza, then a pizza stone is a must in my opinion. It will provide an even baking surface with a consistent temperature which is particularly necessary for a crispy crust. Unfamiliar with using a pizza stone? Don’t worry, it’s quiet simple and I’ll step you through it.

First, we need to get a pizza stone. Typically they can be purchased online for cheap or, if you need one now, get one at your local grocery or department store. An alternative to commercial pizza stones would be a stone floor or counter-top tile, which can be gotten from any large hardware store (Home Depot or Lowes) or local flooring companies. If you do go the tile route, make sure to buy one that is unfinished, large enough to fit a pizza on and small enough to be place in the oven.

Sprinkle some flour on the pizza stone or tile, which keeps the pizza from sticking to the stone, and place it on the lowest rake possible. Also, be sure to preheat the oven with the stone inside so that it can preheat as well. The stone cannot aid in the cooking process as much if it’s thrown in cold with the pizza.

Cleaning a pizza stone can be tricky as cleaning chemicals shouldn’t be used, unless you’d like said chemicals to soak into your stone and pizza. The best bet is to bake it at a high temperature and scrap as much as you can off with a wire brush, knife or whatever you might have. It’s perfectly fine if your pizza stone gets a little grimy or burnt looking. Unless it’s smoking or adding a weird taste to your food, then I wouldn’t worry about it as the stone is getting baked at over 300 degrees F and killing off the germs. If it does worry you, then simply go out and buy a new stone.

For storage, there’s no real reason to take the stone out of the oven. Nothing will happen to the stone with repeated use and it will help keep the oven’s internal temperature consistent while baking other things.

Using a pizza stone really isn’t all that complicated even for a first time user. Simply putting one at the bottom of your oven will greatly help baking not only pizza but lasagnas, pies, potatoes, and other foods placed in the oven. I really cannot recommend one enough, particularly for owners of older ovens.

For whatever reason, people seem to be puzzled about the use of a pizza stone. The purpose of the pizza stone is to deliver direct heat to the dough, which provides a nice evenly crisp crust. If you place the stone into the oven cold with the pizza it cannot do this job, making the stone pointless to have in the first place.

So please home pizza cooks, preheat your pizza stones. It will improve your pizza’s crust considerably and help properly cook the ingredients all the way through.

Pizza doughs can be quite picky and tough for most people to work with. With all the chemistry going on between the yeast, flour, water and other ingredients, much can go wrong while preparing it for the oven.

One common issue is the dough being inelastic while getting prepared for the oven. Basically, as you’re rolling or stretching everything out to make a nice round pizza crust, the dough sometimes shrinks or retracts back to it’s previous form. This occurs most after a few minutes of working the dough.

If you’re wondering why your pizza dough shrinks, well that’s a nice little chemistry problem at work which I’d rather not get into here but it does have a simple fix most of the time. Cover the dough with something clean, a towel or plastic wrap will do fine, and let it sit for 5 to 10 minutes without touching it. The gluten should relax and you can go back to shaping the crust again. If that doesn’t solve the problem, then it’s likely that you need to knead the dough longer in the beginning phases of your recipe, which obviously sucks if you’re now making the crust.

Homemade pizza is one of the most delicious things a home cook can make while avoiding the pitfalls of the commercial counterparts. Of course, not everyone has the time to both create the dough, let it rise, and create a wonderful pizza ready for baking all at the same time. That’s where freezing dough or crust ahead of time comes in handy. Luckily it’s very easy to do.

For Pizza Dough

Make your favorite dough recipe and then let the yeast rise. Make sure to let it rise first as freezing tends to deactivate the yeast. When that is done either ball the dough up or roll it out and place into a pan to ready it for packaging. I then wrap it up in a plastic wrap and place the dough into a freezer bag but if you have a different method of freezing things then I’m sure it will work for dough as well.

I typically let my dough defrost in a greased pan over night in the fridge. Definitely wouldn’t suggest trying to defrost in the microwave, the uneven heat and the speed of which you’re heating everything up will mess up the dough. When dough becomes pliable again your pizza can be assembled and placed in the oven.

For Pizza Crust

Freezing pre-baked pizza crust is just as simple as freezing the dough. Simply bake the entirely assembled pizza or the dough by itself as you normally would. Afterwards let the pizza sit and cool before covering in plastic wrap and placing in freezer bag. If you froze a completed pizza, then simply reheat the pie in the oven. Otherwise, take the crust and let it defrost before assembling for best results.

I find people can be really particular about how they go about cooking their brats, and to a point so can I. If you let them cook for to long they’ll dry out and health concerns come into play if you under cook them. Everybody has a certain way they like to go about cooking brats as well, for me it’s all about the grill. Why the grill? Well brats and hot dogs speak nothing but summer to me, even if I’m having them in the winter, and summer food just does best on the grill. Typically I’ll give the brats a good run for about 7 to 10 minutes on the bbq before they’re done. Generally one rotation mid-way into cooking will help evenly cook the dog. Adjust the time if you’re dealing with large hot dogs or smaller ones.

Grilling for everyone isn’t always an option, perhaps it’s winter and making food in the snow doesn’t appeal to you. The next best option to me is the oven broiler. Put the dogs in a pan, line the pan with aluminum foil for easy clean up, and set the oven for broil. How close the brats are to the broiler will determine how quickly they’ll cook. Typically six inches between the broiler and the food is fine, but everyone’s ovens or stoves are all different so some experimentation may be needed on your part. It also takes 7 to 10 minutes to using this method, again sometimes depending on the broiler.

There are a few other options for cooking brats as well but they don’t usually turn out so good. Baking one or more typically dries them out to much. Like wise, the microwave will do the same, only giving the brat rubbery texture as well. I’ve never been a fan of boiling meat of any sort, you lose to much of the flavor and the nutrients. Surely that’s something you’re not concerned with if your eating hot dogs but still should be known. I would recommend sticking with broiler and grill as the best way to cook up a mean brat. Those are the best ways I’ve found to do it.