30-Hour Cold Fermentation Pizza Dough
Plan Tonight · Bake Tomorrow · Taste the Difference
Ingredients
- 447 g bread flour 70%
- 192 g all-purpose flour 30%
- 428 g water — cool or room temp around 70°F
- 3 g instant or active dry yeast
- 2 tsp sugar
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 13 g salt added last, not with the flour
Instructions
1. Activate the yeast (if using active).
- Dissolve the yeast and sugar in a small portion of warm water and let it sit for 5 minutes until foamy. You can skip this if using instant and mix the yeast directly into the flour- with a long ferment, it will activate on its own. But there's something reassuring about seeing it bloom.
2. Mix the dry ingredients, without the salt.
- Whisk the two flours together in a large bowl. Hold the salt — it goes in after the first knead, giving the yeast and gluten a head start before the dough tightens.
3. Bring the wet and dry together.
- Add the yeast mixture (or dry yeast directly), the remaining water, and the olive oil to the flour. Mix in a stand mixer or with your hands until a shaggy, rough dough forms.
4. Knead until smooth, before the salt goes in.
- Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead by hand for 8–10 minutes, or use a stand mixer on medium for 6–7 minutes, until the dough is smooth, elastic, and tacky but not sticky. It should pull back slightly when you stretch it.
5. Add the salt, and knead it in.
- Sprinkle the salt evenly across the surface of the kneaded dough and work it in for another 2–3 minutes until fully incorporated. The dough will tighten slightly; that's the gluten responding to the salt.
6. Divide and ball
- Turn it onto a lightly floured surface and divide it into two portions (about 560g each) for 2 large 16-18 inch pizzas. Shape each one into a tight, smooth ball by pulling the surface taut and pinching the seam closed at the bottom. Place the dough balls on a lightly oiled sheet tray or in individual covered containers.
7. Short bulk fermentation: let it breathe before the cold.
- Cover with plastic wrap or a lid, and let it rest at room temperature for about 30–minutes. This brief window at room temperature gives the yeast a warm start before the refrigerator slows everything down.
8. Cold fermentation: the work happens while you sleep.
- Transfer the dough balls to the refrigerator and leave it for a minimum of 30 hours, ideally 2-3 days. The dough will rise slowly in the cold while flavor compounds develop. Organic acids, complex sugars, and extensibility make the dough stretch like a dream. You don't have to do anything. The refrigerator is doing the work. Go live your life.The dough will keep in the refrigerator for up to a week, though 48–72 hours is the sweet spot for flavor and structure. After Cold Fermentation pull the dough from the refrigerator. It will be cold, firm, and have a faint tang when you smell it; that's exactly what you're after.
9. Final proof
- Leave them at room temperature for 2–3 hours before baking. Cold dough is tight and uncooperative; this rest period is what transforms it from a refrigerator brick back into something willing and stretchy. It will puff lightly and relax visibly. Don't skip or shorten this step.Use these 2–3 hours to prep every topping, set up your pizza station, preheat the oven with your stone or steel inside to 500–550°F, and pull out every tool you'll need for baking. When the dough is ready, you should be completely ready too.
10. Stretch, top, and bake
- Take a dough ball and press it gently from the center outward with your fingertips, coaxing it toward a 18-inch round. Let gravity do the work, pick it up, drape it over your knuckles, and let it stretch under its own weight. If it springs back, set it down for two minutes and try again. Don't force it. Top with sauce, cheese, and whatever you love. Slide it onto the preheated stone or steel. Bake for 6–8 minutes until the crust is deeply golden with dark spots and the cheese is bubbling and beginning to brown at the edges.While the first pizza bakes, stretch and top the next.