Beer Pizza Dough

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This Beer Pizza Dough is the perfect option when you have no yeast on hand, but want a homemade pizza with crisp, yet chewy crust! The beer replaces the yeast and helps the dough to rise while imparting the very slightest hint of beer flavor. And don’t worry, the alcohol cooks off while it bakes so it’s a totally family-friendly meal!

You’ll Love This

• It’s made with beer, friends. Need I say more?! Well, I will! This pizza dough uses your favorite beer – in our house, that’s a hoppy IPA – and combines in with classic, simple pizza dough ingredients, just minus the yeast!
• That’s right, it requires no yeast! While we sometimes have yeast on hand, we ALWAYS have beer in our fridge. My husband is a fan of super hoppy IPAs so I always try to order a new one each time we get groceries. The beer takes the place of the yeast in this recipe and not only adds flavor but also helps the dough to rise and get that perfect chewy texture.
• It’s unexpected! This recipe is a welcomed departure from your traditional pizza dough recipes. It bakes up perfectly crispy on the outside, but chewy on the inside – which is my personal favorite – with just a hint of beer flavor in the finished product.

Instructions

Add flour, salt, and baking powder to a large bowl. Stir to combine.

Add beer.

Stir with a fork until it cleans the sides of the bowl.

Transfer to a lightly floured work surface. 

Form into a ball.

Knead the dough for 5 minutes. 

Transfer back to the bowl. Oil dough ball on all sides.

Cover and let rest for 1 hour. 

Preheat oven to 500 degrees. Transfer to a lightly floured surface and divide dough evenly in half. Gently work it into two round crusts. Place crusts on pizza pans and brush with olive oil. Poke all over with a fork.

Par-bake crusts for 3-5 minutes.

Top as desired and bake for another 10-15 minutes. Enjoy!

What Kind of Beer

• Use whatever kind of beer you enjoy drinking. If you’re not a beer drinker, I’d recommend a lager, pale ale, or wheat beer as those have a more mild flavor. My husband likes super hoppy IPAs, so that is what we’ve used for most of our recipe tests and they’ve all turned out great!
• Depending on what kind of beer you use, you may not taste the beer in the cooked pizza at all. Lighter tasting beers (like lagers, pale ales, or wheat beers) are going to give you a lighter flavor and more flavorful beers (like IPAs or stouts) are going to give you more of beer flavor.
• This article describes the different types of beers and their flavors if you’re having trouble deciding.

Tips

• This beer pizza dough recipe makes about 2 pounds of pizza dough. For our family, we use this to make two 12-14″ pizzas.
• You can use cold or room temperature beer for this recipe and your results will be quite similar. We’ve tested both and didn’t notice much of a difference between them.
• Don’t worry – this is still kid-friendly. The alcohol in the crust will cook off as the dough bakes in the oven. Which means it’s totally safe for kids to eat!
• The dough isn’t going to rise quite as much as a regular dough made with yeast. However, the baking powder will help to puff it up a bit and make it a bit lighter than if you made it without.
• If you need some pointers for rolling out the pizza dough, this video is super helpful. Basically, you want to be as gentle as possible as you’re shaping the dough, and touch it as little as possible.
• This dough freezes like a dream too! It will stay good in the freezer for up to 3 months. Just let it thaw in the fridge overnight before baking, then bake according to recipe card directions!

Family Favorite Pizzas

• Easy Sheet Pan Pizza
• Cast Iron Skillet Pizza
• BBQ Chickpea Pizza
• Loaded Baked Potato Pizza
• Tomato, Spinach & Feta Pizza

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