Pizza Hut Crust Clone Recipe (Breadmachine)
September 30, 2008 by Jenn @ Frugal Upstate
Filed under Frugal Food, Homemade Treats, Recipes
Friday night is Pizza Night at the Frugal Upstate house! For the last 2 1/2 years more or less every week I have made homemade pizza on Friday nights.
The kids love it and look forward to it, feeling like they are getting “junk” food. Yankee Bill and I aren’t exactly complaining about it either-we both enjoy pizza.
One of the great things about homemade pizza, besides it’s very frugal cost, is that you can control what goes into it and on it. I tend to make mine a bit lighter on the cheese, which cuts the calories and fat. We typically make pepperoni and cheese, although frequently we’ll break out to broccoli (if we have fresh on hand) or tomato (with slices of fresh). I’ve even tried my hand at a version of chicken BBQ.
And let’s face it, although pizza toppings would make even a piece of cardboard palatable, there is something about a great crust that really improves the total quality of your pizza.
For the longest time I just used the pizza crust recipe that came in my breadmaker cookbook. It was a decent recipe-tasted fine and all-but wasn’t anything special. I always had the feeling that although I was saving money and being much, much healthier than ordering out pizza (or even buying frozen pizza) I was somehow sacrificing on taste.
So last year when Amy from MomAdvice started experimenting with different pizza crust recipes I watched with great interest. I’m the kind of gal that likes to learn from other peoples experiences, and Amy gave me some great ones to learn from!
She started out in her initial “Homemade Pizza” post by detailing the way her family makes pizza, along with two crust recipes and a sauce recipe. She even gave directions for freezing the dough! I have been known to make an extra crust and parbake it for 8 min or so before freezing it, but I had never thought of freezing the raw dough.
Four months later in “Pizza Dough Revisited” she tried a new pizza dough & sauce recipe from a slow cooker cookbook. That was a success – despite her aversion to dough rolling.
Fast forward another two months and in “Dinner’s in the Bag” she not only shared another new crust recipe, but a way to speed up the entire pizza making process and tips for how to turn one batch of crust into breadsticks.
You’ve got to admire that kind of perseverance. Finally she hit the jackpot, at least as far as I am concerned, with her Pizza Hut Clone recipe.
Yes, it has more ingredients than the other recipes, so it’s a tiny bit more of a hassle to put together. The taste however makes it worth it. I was in a head cold induced stupor the other day and mistakenly made my old recipe on pizza night-everyone noticed the difference and was disappointed.
So without further ado, here is the king of all pizza crust recipes.
At least as far as I’m concerned.
Pizza Hut Style Pizza Dough*
1 1/3 cups water
2 tsp sugar
1 1/4 tsp salt
2 Tbsp olive oil
2 Tbsp cornmeal
3 1/4 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp onion powder
1 1/2 tsp yeast
Add ingredients to bread machine, according to manufacturer’s settings, and run dough setting. After the machine beeps, roll out the dough.
You can roll the dough into two 9×13″ pizzas (great for kid’s lunches!) or into two medium pizzas or a large pizza and an order of breadsticks (as instructed above).
Parbake the crust with a drizzle of olive oil on it at 450 degrees for ten minutes. Remove the crust and add sauce and toppings.
If making breadsticks, add your breadsticks at this time. Place into the oven for another ten to fifteen minutes or until golden and bubbly.
Enjoy!
*Note: Reprinted with permission.
**Note: Photos by Jeff Kubina, Adam Kuban, and Javier Psilocybin respectively.
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oh thank you, thank you! I don’t have corn meal in the house, so I guess I’ll have to “splurge” at the store for that one. Never seen a recipe that puts it inside of the actual dough. I’ll have to run over to Amy’s site to see how she freezes raw dough. I freeze mine too but she probably has a better system. Thanks again!
Is it possible to convert a bread machine recipe into a regular recipe? I keep running across wonderful recipes like this one, but I lack the bread machine. Am I doomed to miss out until I break down and buy a bread machine?
Hi Jenn,
Sounds great !Thanks for sharing!
Have a great day!
Blessins’,Lib
Thanks for the link, Jenn! I really appreciate it and I am glad that your family is enjoying the recipe.
I do think this one can be converted, you would just need to proof the yeast and water together and then add the dry ingredients & oil and mix with a stand mixer(using the dough hook). I would then let the dough rise in an oiled bowl with a damp towel over it for an hour. Then you could just proceed through the steps as directed. I have not personally done this, but that is how I would approach a bread recipe.
I hope that helps and thanks again, Jenn! Congrats on making the AllTop list too!! See you soon!
Thanks for reprinting the recipe! After your last post talking about the recipe, I hopped on over to Amy’s site, but couldn’t seem to locate the recipe. You made my day!
Is this like the hand-tossed or more like their pan-style? Thanks.
Thank you so much! I needed a good dough recipe for family pizza night.
Amiyrah-You won't be disappointed. The garlic/onion and the cornmeal just add "something" to it.
Heather-Amy answered your question. That might be a good topic for a future post though
Lib, Kim & YSA-Try it, I'm telling you, you won't be disappointed.
Amy-Thanks for letting me share the recipe.
Cat-Actually, I'm not sure WHICH it is more like-I don't go to pizza hut very often
I will say that the way I roll it out the crust puffs up some (thanks to the baking soda) so I would guess it's probably more like the pan. I suppose if you actually KNEW how to toss it (which I don't) you could get it thinner like that.
Hi Jenn! Thanks for sharing! I stopped making pizza b/c I couldn’t “get it just right”. Now I’m feeling the urge to try again.
One question – do you bake it on a regular baking sheet or do you use a pizza stone? We used to have a stone (til I broke it) and I could get the dough cooked perfectly, but I seem to have trouble with a regular baking sheet. Things that make you go…Hmmm?
Have a great day!!!
Hi Jenn,
You just know I have to comment on this one. Not only is pizza my favorite food, but you remember how my dad used to make his famous pizza.
I finally talked him into sharing his crust recipe — and this IS from scratch, without a bread machine.
1 cup 2% milk.
Heat slightly in microwave with 1/2 teaspoon sorghum (can also use honey or just plain sugar) and a pinch of salt.
Add packet of yeast and 1/4 cup of flour — mix a few strokes.
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil.
Keep adding flour in 1/2 to 1 cup increments. After the first, add oregano, basil, thyme, pinch of fennel, rosemary, and a pinch of garlic.
Once you have enough flour, allow to raise in warm oven for 20 minutes.
Roll out in cornmeal.
Lightly season cookie sheet with olive oil (I like the rectangular ones — easier than circular! Also have used a stone but sheets are easiest for me).
If you have some dough that trails over the edge — I usually cut these off and make breadsticks out of them! Make sure you put extra garlic (minced is best) on these.
Raise crust another 20 minutes in oven.
Decorate to taste — for a little extra bite put a pinch of cinnamon in the sauce.
Bake for 17-19 minutes at 425 (I’m at a relatively high altitude, so your oven temp might vary).
Enjoy!
Regards,
Trond
Could you tell me which make/model of bread machine you used please? is it the Panasonic SD255 ?
Love Trond’s recipe–but isn’t his dad the one who made something like Herring Omlette to propose to his mom???
Vic-Yes, Stan did make a herring omelette when he proposed. . . and she accepted
But then again they are both of Scandinavian descent. And I can vouch from many personal experiences that his pizza is awesome. There was that one time that someone didn’t like tomatoes so he invented a green sauce. . . that was iffy.
i’m just now making this recipe(the laptop is in my kitchen right now lol) and I noticed that it just says flour, instead of bread flour. Are we supposed to use bread flour or all purpose?
I always use plain all purpose and it comes out fine. But then again I make bread w/all purpose. Use whatever you have, it should come out fine.
This is so sad, my mouth is watering and I swear I can smell pizza hut pizza right now. It is my favorite pizza and I think I will try it next week! Thanks!
i’m thinking maybe I should have used all purpose….it didn’t taste like pizza hut too much. It smelled like the bread sticks, though, so I guess I’ll just give it another go with all purpose flour.
Real pizza dough is flour water yeast and salt (and the oil from the bowl you raise it in), anything more is sacrilege…the secret is a long slow rise in the refridgerator (24 hours at least) the flavor comes from the long fermenting yeast, also if you think your crust is flavorless your not using enough salt in the dough, a pinch is not nearly enough, 1 tsp per 2 cups flour is minimum, more if you like it “salty”
Thanks for the great recipe! I have tried a lot of pizza dough recipes and this one take the cake! I even forgot to add the baking soda and it was still delicious! It turned out more like a hand tossed pizza. Can’t wait to try it next time with the baking soda! Ha LOL!
Anon-thank you for the classic pizza recipe.
Stephanie-glad your family enjoyed this! Mine gets upset now if I make anything else.
Gotta try this one
I need to get some flour but i do have pepperoni and mozzerella handy 
I have to go with Anonymous,
I let my dough raise for at least 24 hours! If I plan well enough I’ll go for 48 hours raising in the fridge.