People associate Chicago with deep dish pizza, which is fine, for special occassions…it’s fine. But it’s the thin crust pizza that is the true Chicago-style pizza, with its cracker crust and fennel-heavy sausage, always “party cut” into squares.
Chicago-Style Thin Crust Pizza

Inspired by Garvey and his Pizza Factory recreation

Three 14-15" pizzas

baking pizza dinner

Ingredients

Dough

  • 468 g all-purpose flour
  • 234 g water
  • 1 scant tsp kosher salt
  • 1 heaping tsp sugar
  • 38 g vegetable oil
  • 3/4 tsp instant yeast

Sauce

Cheese

  • low-moisture, whole-milk mozzarella
  • sharp cheddar
  • parmesan reggiano or pecorino romano

Day 1 - Dough

In a bowl, mix flour, salt, sugar, and instant yeast. Add water and oil and stir with spatula until difficult, then switch to hands. It’s a dry dough, so the goal is to hydrate all of the flour and break up any oil clumps. This takes a minute or so, until the dough comes together into a shaggy ball. Cover with plastic wrap and move to fridge.

Day 2 - Divide and Ball

Get 3 greased containers ready for dough balls. Punch down dough and divide into 3 ~250g pieces. Shape into tight balls, pinching the bottom to seal. Place into containers seam side down, and move to fridge for another 2-3 days.

Day 4 - Prep and Roll

  1. Pizza Prep (-90 min) => set oven to 500°F, with stones/steels in place. Remove dough containers from fridge. Shred cheese and prepare sauce and toppings. Get out rolling pin, rolling mat (ideal), peel, and flour. Cut 3 15" parchment paper sheets to the width of the pizza peel, mine are in the 14"-15" range.
  2. Roll => dust rolling mat or counter and top of dough ball with flour. Put container upside-down and tap on counter to release dough ball. Pat the dough out into a ~10" circle with your hands, adding more flour if needed. Then switch to rolling pins, rolling to an even 16" circle, adding more flour if needed. Use fingertips to smoosh the edges, this makes them cracker-y instead of bread-y. Move dough to parchment paper, and repeat for the other two dough balls.
  3. Dock ==> dock each dough with a docker or fork tines, to prevent bubbles and a messy bake due to ingredients sliding around.

Don’t worry about the doughs drying out, that’s not a bad thing with this style. They will keep for ~30-60 minutes before dressing.

Day 4 - Dress and Bake

  1. Dress => pour 3/4 to 1 cup sauce into middle and spread almost to edges, with a spoon or clean hands. Toppings under cheese, except for pepperoni, is my rule. Add relatively-light layer of cheese. You should be able to see the sauce throughout. Repeat for 2nd pizza. I dress the third when the first two are almost done.
  2. Bake (~12 min) => Drop oven to 450°F. Launch parchment+pizza with peel, centering on the stones/steels. Bake for 5 minutes. Use peel and oven glove (or careful hand) to rotate pizzas 180° and remove parchment. Bake for 5 minutes. Peek at the bottoms. If the bottoms are done but the tops are not, turn on broiler. Bake for another 1-2 minutes, keeping a close eye, until tops are done. This style is cooked well-done; there’ll be browning on the cheese, dark brown edges are OK.
  3. Finish => move pizzas to cooling racks, and top with grated parm/pecorino and oregano. Let cool for at least 5 minutes. The sauce is molten in the middle, and the cheese may look a litle soupy if you went heavy on sauce and toppings…it will congeal a bit as it cools, don’t worry. Move to cutting board, do a “party cut” grid-style cut, and serve hot.