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The Best New York Style Pizza Dough and 14 Tips for Success!!

I’ve been making a lot of this NY style pizza dough recipe …. The obsession started a while back, and I’ve finally found a recipe that I love the best! After years of experiments (and I mean years!), I am now using this recipe based on recommendations from the many fine pizza makers at www.pizzamaking.com and the late great Dough Doctor, Tom Lehmann.

best New York Style pizza dough recipe

Making Pizza Dough at Home

Making NY style pizza dough is definitely somewhat of an art form. There are so many variables that can be changed aside from the ingredients alone. For example, these variables include:

  • oven temperature
  • temperature of the water used to make the dough
  • proofing methods (room temp vs cold rise)
  • order of adding the ingredients (yes, this makes a big difference!)
  • mixing time
  • use of autolyse
  • use of poolish (I don’t do this or the one before, although I have in the past)

And then of course, the toppings which can be simple or as complex as you’d like. But don’t worry too much about all of this – my method is easy and straightforward. Plus, you will make better dough than 99% of the pizza chains out there. You will not want take out anymore!

best new york pizza dough recipe cheese

My Favorite Pizza Dough: The Big Secret (How You Proof the Dough)

My all-time favorite dough is NY style dough, which really is classic pizza dough that is stretched out into a thin crust pizza. This type of pizza dough contains water, flour, salt, instant yeast, and olive oil (and sugar especially when baking in a home oven, to help browning).

After it is mixed, it is proofed (left to rise/ferment) in the refrigerator for a minimum of 24 hours and up to 72 hours (it can also be frozen) – this is the big secret.  I’ve used the dough up to 5 or 6 days afterwards, so you can essentially prepare dough for the week.

This recipe produces a crisp yet foldable crust that is tender, light, and flavorful and will make enough for four 14-inch pizzas. You can easily double or half the recipe to make 2 or 8 pizzas.

slices of ny style pizza

Fourteen Tips for Success

Tip 1: Choosing the flour

Use high-quality flour – I like to use King Arthur’s all purpose or bread flour; higher protein (ie, bread) flours work best. However, I prefer all-purpose flour because I like a lighter, airy crust.

Tip 2: Adding the yeast

Do not add instant dry yeast (IDY) directly to cold or cool water – you may shock the yeast (add the IDY to your flour instead) (please note that IDY differs from active dry yeast, which must be activated by adding it to water).

Tip 3: How much yeast?

Use only enough yeast to “get the job done” – yeast eats the sugar in your flour to produce its leavening effects – I find that if you use too much, your dough will be tasteless (this is just my opinion); however, it is a fact, that too much yeast can make your dough taste bad. Most recipes out there, some of them in well known, published books contain too much yeast!

Tip 4: Cold ferment that pizza dough!

Always use your refrigerator.  The best NY style doughs “ferment” or “cure” in the refrigerator for at least 24 hours and up to 48 72 hours. This is called a “cold rise” (vs warm rise on your kitchen counter).

The refrigerator is used to retard (or slow) the dough’s fermentation, allowing that distinctive flavor to come through (ever wonder why some pizza crust tastes different than others, despite the fact that they are both made from just about the same exact ingredients? – this is a big reason why!)

When your dough rises too quickly, the flavor will not develop optimally. Slow rise = MUCH better flavor.

Tip 5: Weigh those ingredients!

Use a scale to weigh the flour instead of using a measuring cup – it is much more accurate and will yield superior results. I’ll admit, I resisted doing this for a loooong time. Just do it. You’ll be glad you did and your dough will be more consistent and much improved.

Tip 6: Add oil last

Mix the oil in as the last step, after the flour has all been incorporated. This is important to allow the flour to hydrate properly.

Tip 7: Flour your dough balls

Before tossing or opening your dough balls, flour them *very* well on each side (if you are a beginner) to ensure they do not stick to your counter or pizza peel. I sometimes use a bit more flour after I begin spreading them.

Tip 8: Keeping those rims a bit puffy

Take care not to “degas” the rim of your pizza as you are spreading your dough! Do NOT ever use a rolling pin! There are many different methods to spread/open your dough ball. I hope to add a few pictures someday of this process.

Tip 9: Baking pizza in a home oven

Ensure that your oven is preheated for a sufficient amount of time (about 1 hour) and bake the pizza within 6 to 8 inches of the top of your oven (ie, your broiler) so that the tops browns sufficiently in conjunction with the bottom of the pizza.

Do not place the stone near the bottom of your oven. I made this mistake for too many years.

After your stone has been preheated sufficiently, the heat from the stone will cook the pizza from the bottom and you can switch the broiler on if you find you need more browning on the top (I now use the broiler to bake my pizzas…more on this sometime in the future).

If you find that your cheese is browning well before your rim attains sufficient color, use partially frozen cheese (ie, place shredded cheese in the freezer while the oven is heating up) and cold sauce or you can drizzle just a bit of olive oil on top of cheese.

Tip 10: Use a pizza stone or steel

Use a pizza stone if you have one. The stone with draw moisture out of the dough and produce a beautifully crisp crust. I use a pizza steel because my stones kept breaking.

Tip 11: Use just the right amount of sauce

Do not use too much pizza sauce – it will make your pizza soggy

Tip 12: Find the right kind of cheese

Do not use low fat cheese to top your pizza or pre-shredded cheese (the former will not melt sufficiently and the latter contains additives that prevent the cheese from sticking together and therefore does not melt very well). The best is low-moisture, whole milk mozzarella.

If you must use pre-shredded cheese, I’ve found that adding the sauce on top of the cheese helps with the melting. Also, do not use too much cheese; apply it sparingly so that you can achieve that mottled NY pizza appearance.

Tip 13: Flour your pizza peel

Use semolina or flour on the bottom of your pizza peel to prevent the pizza dough from sticking but be careful not to overdo it because it will burn.

Tip 14: Learn to launch that pizza

Give the pizza peel a few very small quick jerks to make sure the pizza will easily slide off your pizza peel before attempting to transfer pizza to the oven, and more importantly, rub flour into the peel before placing the dough on top.

Essential Equipment

Please note that as an Amazon affiliate, we earn a small commission if you purchase a product at no additional cost to you.


I adore my baking steel; it’s transformed my home pizzas into restaurant-quality and better. You will love this! A kitchen scale streamlines measurement with remarkable accuracy, while a pizza peel is essential for smoothly sliding pizzas into the oven. And proofing boxes provide an optimal storage for pizza dough fermentation, enhancing flavor, texture, and elasticity.

Baking steel

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Kitchen scale

$55.49
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Pizza peel

$28.98
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Proofing

$45.99 ($23.00 / Count)
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Please visit our SHOP page for more recommended tools and equipment to make restaurant-style NY-style pizza at home!

How to Stretch the Pizza Dough

A nice video (from The GoodFellas Pizza School of NY), showing how to stretch the dough:

YouTube video

How to Freeze Homemade Pizza Dough

  • After mixing dough and dividing into balls, place dough in refrigerator for at least 24 hours.
  • Place dough balls on baking sheet lined with plastic wrap or parchment paper, cover loosely with plastic wrap and freeze until firm (~ 2 to 3 hours or up to overnight).
  • Wrap frozen dough balls individually in plastic and store in zipper-lock bags for up to 4 weeks.
  • When ready to bake, transfer unwrapped dough into the refrigerator for 12 to 24 hours before making pizza.
  • Bring dough to room temperature for 20 to 60 minutes before baking (less time for hot kitchen/summer and more time for cool kitchen)

Pizza Dough Calculator

Need more dough? Less dough? Try out our new Pizza Dough Calculator to calculate the weights to get it just right!

Have More Questions?

Please See My NY Pizza FAQ

If you tried this recipe, please leave a 🌟 star rating and let me know how it went in the 📝 comments below! SUBSCRIBE for more recipes.

📖 Recipe

photo of a NY style pizza with slice missing

The Best New York Style Pizza Dough

The best, authentic NY pizza dough recipe for making pizza dough at home. This is the best thin crust pizza ever! You will never want take out again!
4.90 from 660 votes
Author: Marie
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 6 minutes
Resting time 1 day
Total Time 1 day 21 minutes
Course Main Course
Cuisine American, Italian
Servings 32 slices
Calories 91 kcal

Equipment

  • pizza stone or pizza steel for baking
  • Standing mixer optional or hand knead
  • kitchen scale highly recommended instead of volume measures

Ingredients
 

Original Recipe for Four 14-Inch Pizzas; want to make more or less? Use the pizza dough calculator

  • 6.5 cups (796 g) all purpose flour or bread flour (weighing is most accurate!)
  • 2 1/4 cups (493 g) water barely cold water (17.4 oz per 2 1/4 cups)
  • 1 teaspoon (3.5 g) instant dry yeast
  • 2.5 teaspoons (15.6 g) salt
  • 2 teaspoons (7.8 g) sugar
  • 1 tablespoon (11.8 g) olive oil

1 Pound of Dough (~454 grams) (use the pizza dough calculator to make more or less dough)

  • 2 1/4 cups (274.5 g) all purpose flour or bread flour
  • 3/4 cup (170.2 g) water
  • 1/2 teaspoon instant dry yeast
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 3/4 teaspoon sugar
  • 1 teaspoon olive oil

Instructions
 

Mixing the Dough

  • Place water in mixing bowl.
  • In a separate bowl, mix salt and yeast (and sugar if using) into flour
  • Combine flour/salt/yeast mixture into water and mix until all the flour has been incorporated.
  • After flour has been totally incorporated, add oil and knead for about 4 to 5 minutes (see note)
  • Test final dough temperature, which should ideally be between high 70s to low 80s (optional)

Dividing and Rising

  • Divide dough into 4 equal pieces (using a digital scale if possible; each ball should weigh 11.5 oz [~326 grams]), shape into a ball, and place in greased, sealed quart-sized container or oiled/greased freezer bag and refrigerate overnight or up to 72 hours (After much experimenting, I have concluded that I like 3 days best but day 2 is good too).

Assembly and Baking

  • The following day, remove your dough balls within 1 hour or less of baking and allow the dough to come to room temperature. (the dough will tend to blister more if the dough has not been allowed to come to room temperature however, I often bake coldish dough without problems, just some bubbling)
  • In the meantime, place your pizza stone in oven and preheat at 550 degrees (depending on thickness of your stone and your oven’s power) for at least 1 hour
  • Open each dough ball using care not to degas, transfer to a pre-floured pizza peel (or on parchment paper), and top with your favorite sauce, cheese, or other toppings.
  • Transfer pizza from peel to oven or slide parchment paper onto preheated pizza pan/stone and bake for 4 to 6 minutes each until browned on top and cheese has melted but not burned.
  • Enjoy!

Notes

Weighing Ingredients 
  • Use of weight based measurements is highly recommended instead of US Customary. You will need a kitchen scale. 
  • METRIC amounts DO NOT correspond exactly to the US Customary amounts because, for example, 796 grams equals 6.4 cups (and most can’t measure 0.4 cups or 0.22 cups). Recipe was based on grams.  
TO MAKE MORE OR LESS DOUGH
KNEADING
  • If you want to use the dough the next day, knead a little more (slow speed for about 8 to 10 minutes)
  • If you have time to let the dough rest for 3 days, knead for 4 to 5 minutes, low speed or hand knead.
TO FREEZE THE DOUGH:
  • After mixing dough and dividing into balls, place dough in refrigerator for at least 24 hours.
  • Then, place on baking sheet lined with plastic wrap or parchment paper, cover loosely with plastic wrap and freeze until firm (~ 2 to 3 hours or up to overnight).
  • Wrap frozen dough balls individually in plastic and store in zipper-lock bags to store for up to 4 weeks (longer may work, but results might vary).
  • Before using, transfer unwrapped dough into the refrigerator for 12 to 24 hours before making pizza.
  • Bring dough to room temperature for 20 to 60 minutes before baking (less time for hot kitchen/summer and more time for cool kitchen). 
BAKER’S PERCENTAGES:
  • calculate your own using baker’s percentages: 62% hydration, 0.4% yeast, 2% salt, 1.5% oil, and 1% sugar or use my new pizza dough calculator. 
Have more questions? See our pizza dough FAQ
Nutrition is estimated for one slice of pizza without any toppings. 

Nutrition

Serving: 1SliceCalories: 91kcalCarbohydrates: 18gProtein: 3gFat: 1gSaturated Fat: 0.1gPolyunsaturated Fat: 0.1gMonounsaturated Fat: 0.4gSodium: 183mgPotassium: 29mgFiber: 1gSugar: 0.3gVitamin A: 0.5IUVitamin C: 0.001mgCalcium: 4mgIron: 1mg
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Try these other pizzas and this NY pizza sauce: 
Buffalo style (one of my absolute favorites)
White with prosciutto
White with spinach and feta
Pizza sauce 

1,823 Comments

  1. 5 stars
    Hi Marie,

    Thanks for the recipe, you mention mixing the yeast with the salt, doesn’t the salt kill the yeast, and it should be added later after mixing flour with water and yeast?

    1. Good question! if you mix the yeast with the flour and salt, it won’t cause a problem. I believe it’s more of a problem if you would dissolve the yeast in the water (if you were to hydrate it) and then add salt directly without flour. You could hold back the salt until after the flour is added but I’ve found that the dough is too extensible. If you are having problems with the dough not stretching nicely that is an option to try though

  2. Hi, im a lil bit confuse with the quantity of dry yeast, the recipe says 2 ¼ cups, this is not to much or you mean teaspoon. I will appreciate your reply, thanks.

  3. 4 stars
    Just wondering. I just made the dough yesterday morning and made pizza today. I make homemade pizza all the time but buy the dough (in a bag) previously frozen from the bakery. And it is great. I thought I would make it from scratch just to see if it was worth the effort. The dough I made yesterday was thin, crispy bottom but did not have the outside crust (edge) that I hoped for. I am guessing it lacked the rise. Your description says you prefer waiting 3 days after many tries, Why? What difference are you seeing for the wait? Many other recipe’s call for much more yeast then 1 tsp for over 6 cups flour. Is that a misprint? Should I try the recipe again and increase the yeast? I liked your recipe because I always make 4 pizza’s and yours made 4.

    1. Hi Jean – sorry to hear things didn’t turn out well. No, it’s not a misprint. I use only 1 teaspoon of yeast for 4 pizzas (12 to 14 inch, depending on how thin you want to take them). the issue could have been a few things – are you certain that the yeast is fresh and active? Also, what kind of flour did you use? Was it a good choice to make pizza dough with? Those are probably my first 2 questions. Also, it is possible you put too much salt, which would overpower the yeast or if you added salt directly to yeast it would also cause a problem. It’s really simple to make dough. Only a few minutes of mixing and dividing. If you’d like to discuss, send me an email via the contact page and we can troubleshoot together.

      1. Hello, the recipe says 2 1/4 cup of dry yeast, Is not a lot? You mean teaspoon? Hopefully you can help me thx 🙂

      2. You might be confusing the water measurement with the yeast measurement? Yes, 2 1/4 cups of yeast is a lot! and this recipe only calls for 1 teaspoon.

  4. 5 stars
    Hi Marie,
    I can’t thank you enough for sharing this awesome recipe. IMHO it’s perfect. We went thorough a spell experimenting with homemade pizza and did pretty well, but after dozens of attempts it was obvious that the dough was the reason our pies were falling short of our expectations so we just gave up. I truly believe that the dough can make or break the pizza. After a few years I got the bug again to have another go at it. I found this site and decided to give it a try. My wife, son and I are now making pizza’s again on a regular basis and we all agree this dough is every bit as good, maybe better than some of our favorite NY style pizza joints. Thank you very much!!!

  5. Dear Dear Marie,
    If there is a ‘pizza mafia’ that protects the secrets of the best pizza, then your life is in danger.
    I have made pizza comercially with a pizza oven and at home with a stone for thirty some years now. I have tried numerous high gluten flours and every yeast out there and never came close to what your method produces.
    I grew up in Queens and lived on Long Island and have been exposed to every ‘best’ pizza in New York. To a non New Yorker, almost every New York pizza is terrific but to a Native there, the arguments over who makes the best are endless. The differences are many but oh so subtle and slight. Most agree on the dough and crust being extremely critical.
    The one major proceedure overlooked by almost everyone is the refridgerator rise. That is the secret even the most seasoned pizza makers dont always get. I didnt until I followed your insistence.
    A pizza maker friend whos family had a top ten pizza joint on L.I. gave me your low yeast recipe twenty five years back and while I understood why they needed to refigerate 200 lbs of dough daily, it just never clicked in my head just how important that single step is.
    Here in florida everyone blames crappy pizza on the water. This is not the case in myhouse. I have well water rivaling anything in NY so that ingredient was not suspect in my efforts.
    So far I have only waited 36 hrs and in the comments above I noticed only complaints from various novice errors.
    I cant thank you enough. Cold rise compared to room temp rise simply could beany further apart in end result.
    Thank You a million dear Marie!!!
    XOXO

    1. Awe:) comments like yours keep me going on this blog. I too know the feeling of living outside of the east coast and missing the pizza. So glad you can recreate it in Florida! Enjoy!

  6. 5 stars
    Excellent !! Followed the recipe with the exception that I only had active dry yeast . This will be my go to pizza crust recipe from now on . Thank you for the recipe and all the hints which really helped .

  7. 5 stars
    FINALLY! This is it! In my quest for pizza perfection I have tried just about every recipe out there. This is by far, without a doubt, the best recipe I have ever tried. My search for perfection has ended on a high note. This pizza is not only crispy and delicious, it’s absolutely easy to make! It has a wonderful blend at flavor and crispness, and yet it is still foldable. Just remember, for best results cook it HOT (minimum 550) and fast. I cooked one at 550 in the oven on a pizza stone and the second at 700 on a pizza stone in my grill. Both turned out great but has very similar flavor profiles. Thank you for this wonderful recipe! I will share it with every one of my pizza enthusiast friends!

  8. 5 stars
    Love this recipe! It is absolutely perfect. I don’t often rate recipes, but it’s so good it definitely deserves the time to review. Thank you so much for posting. I hate to admit my husband and I end up eating this pizza about 5 times a week since I found it 🙂

  9. I assume that your recipe could be easily adapted to make panzerotto, but are there any quirks to making the transition that you are aware of?

    1. Hi Paul – Panzerotto is something I saw here and there in South Jersey but it’s not offered by many places locally so I can’t really say. Is it like a “deep fried calzone”? I would say no adaptions needed – calzone can be made from this pizza dough and then deep frying is no problem. I’ve deep fried this dough when left over (but not as a panzerotto) and then topped it with powdered sugar – so, panzerotto should work fine. That said, I don’t think you’d have to go to the trouble of using a 3-day slow rise if you are going to fry it, because the flavor would probably be lost – now if I’m mistaken and you are looking to make a calzone or stromboli then I’d say go for it.

  10. 5 stars
    Found this site and happy i did. Great video too. I am super stoked to try this as live in Florida and we don’t have great pizza around my neck of the woods.

  11. 5 stars
    First I wanted to say that this is such an awesome recipe. I have landed on it as my favorite. It has varied for me so much, but with weighing ingredients and enough kneading it has yielded “the best pizza ever” for my family, according to my son.

    My question is, have you ever played around with using a sourdough starter in place of yeast? I love the dough as is, I just found the wonderful world of sourdough and wondered what I’d get if I combined the two.

    1. Hello! I have not used sourdough starter but I do think it would be very good! I’m not certain about how long it would “keep” in the refrigerator since sourdough is so much more acidic from what I remember. I believe the standard substitution is 20 to 25% of the flour volume with active sourdough or starter. If you Google “Jeff Verasano” he has detailed instructions on how to make dough with sourdough. I used to make his recipe all the time and it’s great but I wanted something easier that was still good. Good luck!

      1. 5 stars
        Thanks! I will check his site out. I really love this recipe though, making it today to have pizza on Friday!!

  12. 5 stars
    Hi Marie,

    Thank you so much for sharing this fantastic recipe! New York pizza is my favorite style of pizza and I’m so happy that I can make it at home whenever I want now. I tried baking the pizza before on a perforated pizza pan and it came out great. I recently got a pizza stone and tried baking the pizza on it last night. I found that I had a lot of trouble transferring the pizza onto the hot stone while keeping the pizza’s shape (and toppings!) Do you have any tips on this part of the process? Could I prepare the pizza on parchment paper and then transfer the pizza along with the paper directly onto the stone and cook it just like that? Will parchment paper burn or stick to the pizza at 550 degrees? One last question: if I were to make 2 pizza instead of 4 with this recipe, what pizza diameter should I aim for to get the best thickness of dough?

    Thank you!

    Cheryl

    1. Hi Cheryl – yes, you can use parchment paper – absolutely. It will help you transfer the dough easily. As you continue, practice using a pizza peel if you’d like to – just make sure it is floured well. If you make 2 pizzas instead of 4, you can still do the 14 inch for a pretty thin pizza or 12 inches to be more like “chain store” thin if you know what I mean. It depends what you are used to and how much dough you leave around the rim.

  13. 5 stars
    First off, thank you for this recipe and being so dedicated to this site!
    I’ve been making dough (the wrong way) for too long. I’ve always used my bread machine’s dough setting to make pizza dough and it always comes out on the thick side, which is ok for Chicago style or if I’m grilling it but never thin and foldable. When I try to make a thin crust, all I do is make holes.
    Until I came across your recipe… This is a game changer for me. The dough was perfect. I took your advice and weighed out everything. I watched the video you posted on stretching dough and followed that without making holes in the dough. The dough was so easy to work with! Your recipe is as straight forward as anything I’ve seen. I’m still in shock right now on how easy and good this recipe is. I plan on trying out your sauce recipe too!

  14. Hello Marie: I’ve just read your recipe and the comments others have made and I’m very much looking forward to making my first dough.
    I was wondering about the oven…In the past, I’ve used unglazed quarry tiles to line two racks (top and bottom) forming a kind of “stone oven” inside my oven. It proved pretty effective and I was just wondering if you or others have used this kind of oven set up. Would love to hear your take on this.

    1. Hi Harry – I’ve always wanted to try using the tiles but have never been able to find unglazed ones. After breaking too many pizza stones, I finally just bought a pizza steel and I love it! I would like to try your method using 2 steel plates – thanks for sharing your tip!

      1. Marie; FYI…You should be able to buy the tiles at Home Depot, Lowes, etc. in the flooring department.
        They are approx. 8 X 8 inch tiles.
        I’v used them for bread making for years.

  15. 5 stars
    This is absolutely one of the best pizza dough recipes and tip sets I’ve used. I have a lot of success with it. I use honey instead of sugar and that’s it, and it doesn’t affect the consistency, etc. Really, really great post, thanks for all of the clear, specific tips and instructions. And like you say, measuring the ingredients by weight is so worth it if you want to have consistent results. I love this also because it makes so many! I can pop them in the freezer and they defrost quickly so it’s easier if we decide one night we want to have pizza late in the day. I have what I think it the smallest size KitchenAid stand mixer and it just fits this recipe.

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