Easy Sourdough Pizza Crust Recipe and Guide for Oven Baking

Learn how to make easy sourdough pizza and bake it in your home oven!

This is the easiest way to make sourdough pizza with a thick, fluffy focaccia style crust.

You can even use this method with the dough for your go-to sourdough basic country loaf recipe.

If you are looking for my VIP sourdough pizza recipe for Italian style pizza that works best for outdoor pizza ovens, you can get my full guide here.

Important differences between sourdough pizza and traditional pizza

​Maybe like you, I LOVE pizza. I’ve been making homemade pizza since I was a newlywed once upon a time.

Back then, I used recipes that used commercial yeast like instant or active dry. Or a really fast “crazy dough” recipe I found once.

But ever since childhood, this favorite food always left me in pain with digestive discomfort or heartburn.

Using a sourdough starter and the sourdough long fermentation process, creates a dough that is more digestible and has incredible flavor development.

​Aside from having a superior flavor and being easier to digest than the traditional version made with commercial yeast, it is also a much stickier dough which can be frustrating IF you don’t know how to work with it.

Sourdough pizza dough must be properly fermented during bulk fermentation. The dough will be tacky but shouldn’t be too sticky. Pay attention to the signs.

Also, it needs proper handling. The easiest way to make sourdough pizza with it’s different texture is the oil method I’m using in this recipe. It’s great for beginners!

For other styles of pizza like my VIP sourdough pizza recipe which is an Italian or neapolitan-style pizza, that requires a few more steps and a coating of flour at different stages instead of oil.

7 Tips for Successful Sourdough Pizza Making

1. Bread flour creates a better dough than all-purpose. It has a better final texture and will be less sticky after bulk fermentation. Type 00 flour is the best for pizza dough, but is sometimes hard to find.
2. Bulk fermentation is a key stage. Don’t rush it and don’t overdo it, especially in summer time. With the time range, check the dough in the first half in hot summer weather, in cold winter weather, plan for your dough to take almost the full range of time.
3. Plan your timeline. See this post on time planning for a special occasion.
4. A HOT oven is key! And a proper surface to bake the pizza from the bottom crust up, will create a better final texture and avoid underbaked centers.
5. Use a baking steel for best home oven results.
6. While you can preheat your oven and bake right after the preshape process, the longer dough rest period will allow your dough to stretch more easily and create a more airy crust.
7. The way you top your pizza will determine the type of crust you end up with. Lighter weight toppings create an airy crust, heavier weight toppings will create more of a dip in the center, put less toppings on the outside crust for lots of crust for dipping in olive oil or balsamic, or spread the toppings as close to the edge as possible for less untopped crust.

For more tips for outdoor pizza ovens and Italian style pizza, check out my guide with my VIP recipe and need-to-know tips!

How to Make Easy Sourdough Pizza

The process of making this sourdough milk bread recipe has the following steps: Ingredients, Starter preparation, Making the dough, Bulk fermentation, Dividing, Preshaping, Proofing/Dough Rest, Oven Prep, Final Shaping, Baking.

Ingredients needed for Sourdough Pizza Dough Recipe

Here are the ingredients you will need to make two large focaccia style pizzas:

Flour Choice and Impact on Pizza Texture

​In this recipe I use some whole wheat flour for the fiber and flavor. It creates a more chewy texture.

​You can use all white flour (500 grams total) for a more fluffy, airy texture.

Dough made with all white flour will rise higher and will have more air inside. The crust will have a more crisp texture as well.

Sourdough Starter Preparation

You will need a healthy, established sourdough starter for making this recipe. If you need to buy one or make one, here are my resources to get started!

Mix the amounts called for in the starter until there’s no dry flour left.

Cover and let this fed starter sit at room temperature for 6 to 12 hours to ferment. The time range depends on the temperature of your ingredients (use room temp or slightly warm water–about 70 degrees F to help this go faster) and your room temperature. Expect the shorter end of the range for summer and the longer end of the range for winter.

The starter will double in volume and have large bubbles.

Make sure to check out this post if you are new to sourdough starters: What is a sourdough starter?

I recommend doing this process the night before so you can begin mixing the dough the next day.

You’ll notice that you will make more than the amount needed. I do this just to ensure that new sourdough bakers have a remainder left to carry on for future batches.

Making the easy sourdough pizza dough

Once your starter is active, you will mix your dough in two stages: first mix with autolyse and final mix with salt added.

In a large bowl, combine 355g water, all the flour (500g combined), and the 100g of active sourdough starter. Mix until no dry flour is left. Then let it rest for autolyse for 20 to 60 minutes. Cover with a towel or plastic wrap if you plan to leave it for longer than 20 minutes or live in an arid climate.

The autolyse begins the development of the gluten to form connections that create a strong, elastic dough.

After the autolyse rest time has passed, add the salt and reserved 10-20 grams of water on top of the salt to begin dissolving it.

Massage the salt into the dough until it is completely incorporated.

Transfer to an oiled bowl or 4-qt size cambro lined with about a teaspoon of olive oil. Cover and with plastic wrap or a lid and let it sit at room temperature in a warm place for the bulk fermentation.

Notes:

• The olive oil is optional. It helps the dough release more cleanly after the fermentation.
• The active starter is combined most easily before the autolyse rest period, but can be added afterwards with the salt. Delaying adding the starter creates better overall dough development.

​Can I use a stand mixer?

In short, yes, but here are some important instructions for using a stand mixer with sourdough.

First, use a dough hook attachment. The paddle is too aggressive for bread or pizza dough and will create overoxidation. Which means poor color, poor consistency, and a weak dough.

Second, do not overmix! Don’t walk away while the dough is mixing and mix it on the lowest two speeds. You only want to mix until all the flour has absorbed the water.

​Third, use a dough scraper. The dough scraper helps to get the bits of dry flour that usually hide in the bottom of the stand mixer bowl into the dough.

Finally, add the salt by hand. I highly recommend adding the salt by hand to get a feel for the dough and make sure the salt gets evenly distributed. It’s at this point you can evaluate by feel if the dough feels too dry, which may happen with volume measurements that aren’t as precise as weight measurements.

Bulk Fermentation for easy sourdough pizza dough

The dough needs to ferment for 3 to 6 hours after the salt is added. This is also known as the first rise.

The time range depends on the room temperature. Summer is a favorite season for pizza for many people for this reason.

During the first two hours of the bulk fermentation process, do 1-4 stretch and folds at 30-minute intervals which start after the salt is added.

You can also do a long cold bulk fermentation for 24 to 48 hours. But be sure to bring the pizza dough back to room temperature before dividing for best results.

For clarity on when bulk fermentation is done, see this post.

Dividing the Sourdough Pizza Dough

Once the dough has fermented, place the bulk on an unfloured surface.

Use a bench knife or dough scraper to divide the dough in halves.

Preshape the Pizza Dough

Cut two large squares of parchment paper. Especially a higher quality brand like If You Care Parchment paper that holds up to high heat.

Drizzle about a tablespoon of olive oil or avocado oil onto each sheet. Spread the oil around with your hands so that the paper is covered and your palms and fingertips are covered.

Use the bench knife or dough scraper to pick up a piece of dough and place it into the center of the sheet. Repeat with the other piece of dough.

​With your fingertips, gently dimple and spread the dough with gentle movements to avoid pressing the built up gas out of the dough.

Make sure the dough is well covered with the oil from your hands and let it rest at room temperature uncovered. The coating of oil will keep it from drying out, drizzle on more if needed.

If you are taking this dough to a friend’s house or want to make sure it is safe from small hands or pets, I love these dough proofing boxes:

Can I bake my pizza right away?

I have topped my pizza and baked right after this gentle shaping process for great results.

​However, if you allow the dough to rest at room temperature, more air will build up in the dough as it continues fermenting (proofing period) and it will become more elastic in order to spread a bit more for a final shaping before topping and baking.

Dough Rest/Proofing

Home oven pizza baking tools

A wood fired oven can cook a pizza in 30 seconds to 3 minutes with an ambient temperature of 700 to 1,000 degrees F. Whereas your home oven can only reach a maximum of 500 to 555 degrees F. So there are some tools that can give you pizza results similar to an authentic pizzeria!

• Ceramic baking or pizza stone or baking steel. The baking steel creates a higher surface heat than the stone, but is usually a bigger investment.
• Digital infrared laser thermometer
• Pizza Peel
• Rocking Pizza Cutter for cutting perfect slices without your toppings getting knocked off

Baking Easy Sourdough Pizza in the Home Oven

The key to cooking pizza in any oven is a high ambient temperature (the air in the oven) and a high surface heat so that the pizza can cook from the bottom and from the top down simultaneously.

In order to create a high surface heat in your home oven, you need to use a material that will absorb and retain heat like a ceramic baking or pizza stone or baking steel.

​Other alternatives are using a cast iron large griddle or an insulated baking sheet, but they won’t perform as well as the stone or steel.

Place the baking steel or stone in the oven to preheat along with the oven for 30-60 minutes.

Use a digital laser thermometer to check the temperature of the surface. Once its at least 450 degrees F, its ready to bake your pizza!

A pizza peel is helpful for removing hot pizza from the oven. For the home oven, you can use one like this: metal pizza peel with foldable handle. For an outdoor pizza oven, long handled peels are used.

Tip: trim the edges of the piece of parchment paper before moving your pizza to the oven to avoid the paper singing or burning.

The pizza bakes in the hot oven for 3 to 8 minutes. The toppings should be cooked and cheese melted. The crust should be baked with golden brown spots on the top of the crust and on the bottom of the crust.

Place pizza on a top rack (if your pizza steel or stone is not already on the top rack) and turn on high broil. Broil 1-2 minutes to get the top done to your satisfaction.

See the image above to get an idea of what an ideal bake looks like. If you have a rigid bottom crust on your slice of pizza, that’s a great bake!

Cool and Serve your Sourdough Pizza

Once your pizza is out of the oven, add any finishing touches, if needed, like fresh basil leaves to wilt into the hot toppings, fried sage leaves, drizzle of olive oil or pesto.

​Let the pizza cool for about 5 minutes for the toppings to set before cutting.

I love using a rocking pizza cutter to get crisp cuts and to avoid topping loss with a pizza wheel.

How do I make more pizza?

This recipe creates 2 large pizza which can feed 4 to 6 people.

To make a larger batch, refer to this post for how to scale up the dough for making a bigger batch like double or triple!

You will need a kitchen scale for the easiest way to make more pizza.

Switch up Your Pizza!

There are many ways to do something unique with this easy sourdough pizza method.

From limitless combinations of ingredients to creating something new, here are some ideas:

• Make this into an incredible Sourdough Focaccia by topping with olive oil after dimpling and coarse or flaked sea salt. Add rosemary, lemon zest, halved grape tomatoes, or olives for a fun focaccia to serve.
• Create a savory flatbread. Add salsa, cooked taco meat, and shredded monterey jack cheese for a taco night themed bread or barbeque sauce, mozzarella, shredded barbeque chicken, and red onions for a barbeque style bread.

Savor and Share

Enjoy your family pizza nights with this incredible and easy sourdough pizza recipe!

Share this recipe with another sourdough baking friend who loves pizza!

After you try it, send me a note, leave a review comment, or tag me on facebook or instagram @livingbreadbaker

I love seeing how people connect with people they love through bread.

More easy sourdough recipes

• How to make Sourdough Bread step by step
• How to Make No Knead Sourdough, The Easy Way
• The Best Soft Flour Sourdough Tortillas Use Active Starter

If you are looking for the easiest way to jump into sourdough or you are feeling run ragged by sourdough and need an easier way to make sourdough breads each week, my Once-a-Week No Knead Sourdough method was made to simplify sourdough baking for new bakers and busy bakers.

Make a big batch of no knead sourdough each week. Keep it in the fridge and pull portions throughout the week to make pizza, bread, rolls, english muffins, and more! See all the details and samples here: Once-a-Week No Knead Sourdough Course

Sourdough and Nutrition

I turned to sourdough baking in 2014 after some health issues led me to a nutrition therapy practitioner who introduced me to traditional food preparation methods and Sally Fallon’s book Nourishing Traditions. I experienced first-hand the difference of eating sourdough after a period of gut-healing support.

Sourdough methods combine long fermentation and the power of enzyme reactions from the good bacteria in the sourdough starter culture.

Gluten proteins, especially in the United States where we have cultivated super wheat hybrids, are like long chain links. Many of our digestive systems cannot break these apart properly so some people display reactions like gas, bloating, skin issues, etc.

The good bacteria (lactic acid bacteria) act like scissors cutting apart and weakening those protein “chain” links so our bodies can more easily digest the final product.

If you are ready to learn more about sourdough, my free quick start guide is a great resource and if you are truly ready to stop researching and START making sourdough, my Intro to Sourdough online course will give you the foundation you need to feel confident and have success!

Note: This website is not meant for health or nutrition advice. Please consult a nutrition therapy practictioner to discuss your individual health and diet needs. My experience and anecdotal observations are not meant to treat or diagnose anyone else

Need more sourdough help?

A competent guide is the big difference from floundering in sourdough with information overwhelm to having confidence and ease in your sourdough baking.

If you are just getting started in sourdough, I’d love to support you with my books or online courses.

Beginner-Friendly Video Courses

My Intro. to Sourdough online course is comprehensive with video tutorials for each stage of the process to help new or aspiring sourdough home bakers gain a solid foundation for sourdough, the traditional way, to learn all the basics, language, techniques, and the process from start to finish to make sourdough bread. My teaching is straight forward and makes the whole process seem simple. I have helped launch hundreds of eager sourdough bakers onto their own inspiring sourdough journeys.

I also have a Once-a-Week No Knead Sourdough online course, which is my strategy for busy weeks to have sourdough on hand ready to make into country bread, sandwich loaves, English muffins, pizza, bagels, and more! This course is great for absolute sourdough beginners to just get familiarity with sourdough or for veteran sourdough bakers who need to simplify their baking schedule.

Free Resources

If you are just starting on your sourdough journey, you can get my free Quick Start Sourdough Guide to begin learning some of the key terms and concepts in sourdough. Learn the difference between the sourdough stages of active sourdough starter and sourdough discard as well as how to care for a starter.

Perfect for new or experienced bakers, I have a full Sourdough Time Planning Workbook with 8 templates ready to fill in and a baking journal. The 8 templates include 4 different ways to make classic sourdough country breads, 3 time planning worksheets for enriched sourdough bread depending on serving time target, and a blank template. The baking journal goes over baker’s percentages and how to take notes on your sourdough bakes.

Living Bread Baker posts mentioned

When is sourdough bulk fermentation finished?

When is sourdough finished proofing?

What does a 100% Hydration Sourdough Starter mean?

What is a sourdough starter?

Shop this post

Food scale

Baking steel

Ceramic baking or pizza stone

Digital infrared laser thermometer

Pizza Peel

Rocking Pizza Cutter

Parchment baking sheets

FREE Sourdough Quick Start Guide

Sourdough Time Planning Workbook

My Intro. to Sourdough online course

My sourdough starter

Breadtopia live starter

Cultures for Health starter

Sourdough Time Planning Workbook & Baking Journal

This post contains affiliate links. Read my policy here.

Print Recipe

Easy Sourdough Pizza (focaccia style)

Servings: 2 large pizzas

Author: Jenny Prior

Ingredients

• 400 g bread flour 2 2/3 cups
• 100 g whole wheat flour 2/3 cup
• 355 g water plus an additional 10-20g water 1 1/2 cups then 1-2 tsp.
• 100 g active starter 1 cup
• 10 g salt 1 1/2 tsp.

Instructions

• Mix together flours and water to begin a process bakers call “autolyse”. Starter can be mixed in at this stage or added after autolyse. Adding starter at the beginning allows it to incorporate more easily and jumpstart fermentation, delaying the addition of starter until after autolyse helps better gluten and dough development to take place.
• Autolyse 20-60 minutes.
• Add salt and some of the additional water to dissolve salt and help incorporate into dough. (Add starter if you have not added it yet)
• Cover bowl and let dough ferment 3-6 hours at room temperature or 24-48 hours in the fridge. Do 2-4 stretches and folds during the first 2 hours of fermentation.
• Remove dough from bowl to a smooth, clean, unfloured surface.
• Cut square sheets of parchment, drizzle with avocado oil, rub oil all over sheets and on hands. Use dough scraper to cut sections of dough from the fermented sourdough. Place on oiled parchment. Like playing a piano, use fingertips to gently dimple into the dough with slight spreading of fingertips to shape the dough. Do not pull, tear, roll, or stretch the dough by force as this will make air escape and result in a denser crust. If dough resists, allow it to rest a few minutes before shaping again. Shape until about ½ inch thick.
• Optional, but recommended, let your oiled preshaped pizza dough rest for 30 minutes to 3 hours. After optional rest, do a final shaping of the crust by oiling fingertips and gently dimply and spreading dough. Be careful not to tear or press out air at this point.
• Top pizza as desired. Transfer pizza with parchment underneath onto the hot baking steel or stone.
• Preheat oven with a baking steel or baking stone (a cookie sheet can work in a pinch) inside to 550 degrees F.
• Bake 3-8 minutes, until toppings are cooked and crust is beginning to turn golden brown. Turn on broil for 1-2 minutes until baked to your level of doneness (lightly golden, or more dark crust with singed pepperonis). Check the bottom of the crust for doneness as well. Remove with a pizza peel.
• Cool 5 minutes before cutting.

Notes

Note: this recipe is identical to the sourdough country bread until the end of the fermentation stage.

7 Tips for Successful Sourdough Pizza Making

1. Bread flour creates a better dough than all-purpose. It has a better final texture and will be less sticky after bulk fermentation. Type 00 flour is the best for pizza dough, but is sometimes hard to find.
2. Bulk fermentation is a key stage. Don't rush it and don't overdo it, especially in summer time. With the time range, check the dough in the first half in hot summer weather, in cold winter weather, plan for your dough to take almost the full range of time.
3. Plan your timeline. See this post on time planning for a special occasion.
4. A HOT oven is key! And a proper surface to bake the pizza from the bottom crust up, will create a better final texture and avoid underbaked centers.
5. Use a baking steel for best home oven results.
6. While you can preheat your oven and bake right after the preshape process, the longer dough rest period will allow your dough to stretch more easily and create a more airy crust.
7. The way you top your pizza will determine the type of crust you end up with. Lighter weight toppings create an airy crust, heavier weight toppings will create more of a dip in the center, put less toppings on the outside crust for lots of crust for dipping in olive oil or balsamic, or spread the toppings as close to the edge as possible for less untopped crust.

For more tips for outdoor pizza ovens and Italian style pizza, check out my guide with my VIP recipe and need-to-know tips!

See the full recipe for more tips!