Thin Crispy Pizza Crust

First things first. Get your oven pre-heated with your pizza stone inside to 425 degrees (F). You want the hot oven and surface to quickly heat and stop the dough from rising or bubbling when it hits the heat. You’ll press your dough onto parchment and then slide the parchment on to the stone for easy handling.

1 teaspoon active dry yeast
1/4 teaspoon white sugar
3/4 cup lukewarm water
2 cups all-purpose flour, divided
1/2 teaspoon salt
oil for brushing onto dough

Instructions

Combine warm water with sugar and swirl or stir to dissolve the sugar. Add yeast and allow about 8-10 minutes for the yeast to bloom (shown below).

2. In a stand mixer or mixing bowl, mix 1 3/4 cups of the flour with the salt. Reserve 1/4 cup of the flour for adding in later if necessary.

3. Add the yeast solution to the flour and salt and mix until the dough comes together.

4. Roll the dough out onto a floured surface and knead until the dough is smooth, adding the remaining 1/4 cup of flour if necessary. Cover dough ball with plastic wrap and a towel and allow it to rest for at least ten minutes. It may rise a bit, and that is fine.

5. Divide into two or three dough balls, and one at a time:

shape your ball into a thin disk by turning, lightly pulling, and finally pushing along parchment
brush dough with oil
slide crust onto pizza stone and bake for about 5 minutes until you see a little bit of browning
remove crust from oven, repeat with all crusts

6. Your crusts are now partially baked and it is time for toppings! Add your toppings and place into oven for another 8-10 minutes, watching for cheese to melt to the center. Adjust times if your crust is burning, as ovens may vary.

The key elements to this method are the yeast to flour ratio, the hot oven and pizza stone, the oil (to prevent the sauce from seeping into the crust and making it soggy), and pre-baking the crust also to prevent a soggy merge with sauce.