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So you want a good pizza dough recipe? That uses fresh milled flour? AND it’s a bread machine recipe?  I’m your girl and I’ve got the perfect crust for ya.

If you follow me on social media, you know I’m smitten with my bread machine.  It does a far superior job with kneading and dealing with fresh milled flour than my stand mixer.  Especially pizza dough.  I can’t describe it, but for some reason this bread machine I got is perfection for making the best pizza crust.  I only use it to rehydrate the grains and to knead because I then add my dough to the refrigerator to slowly rise overnight and all day… or at least all day, but you could absolutely proof your dough in it on a different cycle than I use and use it sooner.  

Preferably, make your pizza dough about 24 hours before you need it and refrigerate it to do the dough rise slowly and you will get the best, yeasty flavor and chewy crust imaginable.  Add in fresh milled grains and you’ve got a complex flavor that the whole family is going to enjoy with nutritional and health benefits abound!  Plus… dinner is easier cause your crust is done for ya in advance!  This literal whole wheat pizza crust has all the nutrition packed in.  By milling your own grains as you use them, you’re preventing nutrient loss from oxidation and heat and making a super food disguised by pizza.  All purpose flour ain’t got nothin’ on fresh milled.  Promise!

By making your own homemade dough, you’re guaranteeing what ingredients you have.  Store bought prepared doughs normally have enriched bleached flour in them, seed oils, NaTuRaL fLaVoRs, preservatives, and dough conditioners that I really don’t want to be eating.  Get used to eating food that’s homemade and wholesome and that store bought stuff won’t taste very good anymore.  

I hear things frequently from folks like “but the dough from such and such brand is so good.”  Is it good because they’re making it good or is it good because there’s additives that make our brains think it’s good?!  You do have to train yourself to enjoy wholesome food if you’ve been on the highly processed wagon.  Once you detox, you won’t go back.  Whole grains have so much better flavor than anything you can buy at the store and homemade pizza dough is so insanely easy to make you won’t need to buy it again.

Sundays are always homemade pizza nights for us, so if I don’t get the dough made Saturday night, I start making it early on Sunday morning while I get ready for church.  This is why the bread machine comes in clutch.  Mine allows me to pause it and it will automatically restart after 15 minutes, which is perfect for fresh milled flour.  Add the ingredients, let it mix just til the dough starts to come together, pause to rehydrate the grains, then walk away and it will restart.  When I walk past it again I check to make sure the dough has come together nicely and let the bread machine do its thing.  It will beep obnoxiously when its done and I then transfer it to an oiled bowl, slap a lid on it, and into the fridge it goes before dinner.

Equipment

• Grain mill
• Bread machine
• Large glass bowl with a lid
• Cast iron pizza pan

Ingredients

• Hard white wheat berries
• Spelt berries
• Active dry yeast
• Water or whey
• Unrefined sugar
• Olive oil
• Salt

Homemade pizza is in; pizza delivery is out!

Step 1: Mill the Wheat Berries

The night before you want to make pizza, measure out 400 grams of hard white wheat berries and 60 grams spelt berries.  Mill them through your grain mill on a medium fine setting.  I use “bread” on the WonderMill.  Set aside.

The mixture of flours gives a really nice nutty flavor to your pizza dough so don’t leave the spelt out or you’ll definitely be missing it.  Also, don’t increase the spelt because I have found if I use to much, the dough doesn’t knead as well or have a good gluten formation since spelt is an ornery one.

Step 2: Bloom Yeast

To the loaf insert of your bread machine, add:

• 1 1/2 cups warm water or sweet whey
• 1 Tablespoon unrefined sugar or honey
• 2 teaspoons of active dry yeast (not instant yeast)

Mix water, sugar, and yeast to dissolve and allow to rest about 5 minutes, or until mixture is foamy and yeast is active.

Step 3: Make the Dough

To the yeast mixture in the bread machine pan, add in in order:

• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, tallow, or even coconut oil
• 3 1/2 cups of flour, the hard white and spelt mixture
• 2 teaspoons salt

Place bread pan in bread machine and turn bread machine on to a program that will mix and knead; it’s normally called a raw dough cycle.  If you are using the KBS bread machine like mine, this is menu #11 called raw dough.  It will knead the dough and beep when it’s done.  Easy peasy!

Allow the bread machine to mix the dough just until is starts to come together.  Scrape down the sides as it works.  Add flour in 1 tablespoon at a time until it forms a very soft dough that is just starting to come together into a very messy ball.  You should not add more than an extra 1/2 cup of fresh-milled flour to this dough; don’t add any more than you milled.  At this point, pause the bread machine and close the lid.  If you’re using the KBS, it will automatically restart in 15 minutes.  

Once the bread machine restarts, watch the dough ball and make sure it comes together in a nice sticky ball.  It doesn’t have to be perfectly smooth like bread dough and can actually be a touch on the wet side; this makes really good pizza dough this way!

Allow the bread machine to finish its cycle.  Most raw dough cycles will be 15-18 minutes, but probably less.

Step 4: Cold Rise the Dough

Once the kneading is complete, transfer the dough to a large greased bowl.  Toss the dough bowl in the oil to make sure the top of the dough is covered.  Cover the bowl with a lid or plastic wrap tightly and place in the refrigerator.  Allow the dough to rise up to 3 days, but I do 24 hours.  This slow cold ferment will give your dough amazing flavor and texture!

Step 5: Bake

About 2 hours before you want to bake the pizza, remove the dough from the refrigerator  and allow to start to come to room temperature.  It doesn’t have to be completely warm and most times I honestly forget to do this and just slap it on the pan cold.  Works just fine.

Spread the dough out on your oiled pizza pan.  I use my hands but you could also use a rolling pin.  I have a very large cast iron pizza pan, so one batch of this dough makes one medium crust.  I could split it and make 2 very thin large pizza crusts pretty easily.  It’s all on your preference.  If you’re using a cast iron skillet and your pans are about 12″, you will have enough dough to make 4 crusts pretty easily. If you’re super fancy, use a pizza peel and transfer it to a pizza stone in your oven… I am not talented enough for this ;D

Add pizza sauce and your favorite toppings and bake in a 425 degree F preheated oven for about 22-25 minutes, or til the crust is perfectly brown and the cheese is bubbly and browned, too.

​Cut and serve with homemade garlic butter!