Our budget doesn’t allow for as much eating out or takeout as I would like. My family loves pizza, and I love an easy meal after a busy day of work and parenting. We’ve tried a bunch of different pizza recipes, but none were quite right. My husband, a self-proclaimed food critic whose mother owned a restaurant, always had a complaint. The crust was too crumbly, not flavorful enough, not enough air bubbles and structure, etc. Finally, we found the perfect recipe, the perfect flour, the perfect temperature, the perfect sauce and cheese. Now we needed to be able to make it quickly too. Here’s how we make the best homemade frozen pizza for a quick and money-saving meal.
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How much money could you save by making homemade frozen pizzas?
Homemade vs store-bought frozen pizza
A Tombstone frozen pepperoni pizza at my local grocery store costs $4.82. Of course, a Tombstone pizza is smaller than a large pizza, and wouldn’t be enough to feed my pizza-loving family. We’d need at least 2 pizzas costing a total of $9.64 before tax. And, we usually add some extra cheese, because it just doesn’t have as much cheese as we like.
When we make a pepperoni pizza at home, it costs us about $3.50. That includes generous portions of 2 kinds of cheese, and lots of pepperoni. And it takes delicious, because everything is fresh! Usually one homemade pizza is large enough for a meal. But even if we were extra hungry and made 2 pizzas, we’d still only spend $7.
Homemade vs takeout or delivery pizza
Our favorite local family-owned pizza joint charges $17.25 before tax for a pepperoni pizza. Add on a delivery fee or tip and the price of that pizza is even higher. Our homemade pizza costs half that, and it is delicious! Takeout pizza may be cooled off until you get it to your house, but homemade pizza is always hot and fresh.
The benefits really add up when you start to consider pizzas with more toppings. A chicken bacon ranch pizza is $25.99, and a meat lovers pizza is $26.75. It is not very difficult or expensive for us to add those meats to our homemade pizzas. I like to cook up a batch of finely chopped chicken or bacon and then freeze it in portions for pizzas or quesadillas. When we have meatballs or sausage, I take a few leftover pieces, slice them up, and freeze them too. When we’re ready to make a pizza, I pull out these frozen meats and I’m ready to top my pizza right away.
Other benefits of homemade pizza
Quick meals
Homemade freezer pizza takes some time to prepare ahead. However, once your crusts are prepared and frozen, it’s quick to add sauce, toppings and cheese and bakes in 10 minutes or less! That’s a great way to serve a homemade meal on a busy workday.
Serving company
Friends or family stop in and you’re wondering what to make? Pizza! The homemade frozen pizzas can be customized to meet your guests tastes and dietary needs, and they don’t much effort. You’ll be able to enjoy your time with your guests, and everyone will be well-fed.
Just the right size
Ever find yourself wondering how much is the right amount of pizza to order? In my family, we love to have leftover pizza, but of course it is best when baked fresh. With homemade pizza, you can make whatever size or amount suits your family. You can freeze a large round crust, or small rectangular crusts for individual pizzas. I love to have individual frozen pizza crusts on hand to my husband, who’s always extra hungry when he gets home after a soccer game. He can heat up one or two individual pizzas instead of making a full-size pizza for himself.
Quality ingredients without paying for every topping
When you are making your own pizza, you know the ingredients are fresh. You know it will meet the dietary needs or taste preferences of each member of your family. Does one person need dairy-free cheese? No problem, you can make it yourself and know there will be no cross-contamination. Everybody wants a different topping, have a pizza making party and let each person customize their own pizza. And if you like, you can make yourself a meat lovers pizza without paying a fortune!
No wasteful packaging
No plastic will be used on packaging as with a store-bought frozen pizza.
The Best Pizza Crust
After a lot of trials, our favorite pizza crust recipe by a long shot is Roberta’s Pizza Dough. I have made some minor adaptations so that it is easier to make for our household. I prefer to use ingredients I have on hand, and 00 flour hasn’t yet become a staple in my pantry. I also have found that the time needed to rise is a bit different for me. So let’s take a closer look.
All Trumps Hi Gluten Flour
I like to have All Trumps Hi Gluten Flour on hand to use when I’m baking breads, and I’ve found it gives a great texture and structure to our pizza crusts. If you took a look at the Roberta’s Pizza Dough recipe, you’ll see it uses 00 flour and all-purpose flour. Rather than using both all-purpose flour and 00 flour, I just use only All Trumps Hi Gluten Flour. It’s easier, and since I don’t use 00 flour for other things, I don’t think it’s worth the extra space in our pantry. Between our flours and gluten-free flours for baking for family members, I already have 4+ different kinds of flour in my pantry at all times. If you do want to use 00 flour, you can easily find it here on Amazon.
Rise Time
I like to always allow my dough to rise in my oven. As soon as I start to prepare to make the dough, I turn on my oven light. By the time my dough is made, kneaded, rests the 15 minutes, and kneaded again, the oven is slightly warm. With the oven light on the whole time, my dough stays at the right temperature for rising. Keeping the dough in the oven also keeps it safe from busy toddlers! I don’t know if it’s a difference in the temperature of my oven and oven light, or if it’s due to the different flour, but my dough usually doubles in size in 2 to 2 1/2 hours. That’s faster than what’s listed in the original recipe, which makes it even more convenient when my day doesn’t go as planned.
Baking
The Roberta’s Pizza Dough Recipe as shown in the New York Times Cooking doesn’t include baking instructions. I feel the best way to bake a pizza is with high heat. We bake ours at 500 degrees Fahrenheit, nearly as high as our oven will go. At this temperature, it doesn’t take long for cheese to brown. If we want a crispier crust, we will par-bake the crust, remove it from the oven and add sauce, cheese, and toppings, and then return it to the oven.
I always bake the pizza on my silicone baking mats to save time cleaning up later. There’s nothing I hate more than trying to scrub burnt cheese off my pans, but with a silicone baking mat, any cheese that falls off the pizza is easy to clean. If you already have silicone baking mats, make sure that they are safe to temperatures of 500 degrees Fahrenheit. For a round pizza pan, this pizza baking mat is also rated for 500 degrees Fahrenheit.
The Best Pizza Sauce
While you could certainly use any sauce for your pizza, I do have a recipe that is our favorite pizza sauce. We don’t go very heavy on the sauce, so a batch is usually enough for a few pizza nights.
This sauce recipe is easy to make. Simply combine tomato paste, tomato sauce, basil, oregano, garlic powder, marjoram, salt, sugar, and olive oil. Simmer over low heat for 10 minutes, and you’re ready for pizza-making!
Use what you need, then freeze the rest in portions for future pizza nights.
The Best Pizza Cheese
You could certainly use an cheese or mixture of cheese that your family enjoys. Our favorite combination is muenster cheese and mozzarella cheese.
How to make a Homemade Frozen Pizza
What’s your favorite type of pizza?
If you are looking for more ideas, check out my other Money-Saving Recipes!
The Best Homemade Frozen Pizza
Ingredients
Pizza Dough
- 2 1/4 cup Hi gluten flour
- 1 tsp salt
- 3/4 tsp yeast
- 3/4 cup warm water
- 1 tsp olive oil
Pizza Sauce
- 6 oz tomato sauce
- 6 oz tomato paste
- 1 Tbsp basil
- 1 Tbsp oregano
- 1/2 Tbsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp marjoram
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp sugar
- 1 oz olive oil
Cheese
- shredded mozzarella cheese
- shredded muenster cheese
Instructions
Pizza Sauce
- In a small saucepan, combine all sauce ingredients
- Simmer over low heat for 10 minutes
Pizza Dough
- Stir together warm water, yeast, and olive oil
- Add in dry ingredients
- Knead 3 minutes, then let dough rest for 15 minutes
- Knead again for 3 minutes. Then place dough in floured bowl and cover with greased plastic wrap
- Let rise 3-4 hours at room temperature, or 8-24 hours in the fridge
- If dough is refrigerated, remove from fridge 30 minutes before you're ready to use it. Shape dough into rounds or squares, large pizzas or individual-sized crusts.
- Top your pizza crust and bake at 500 degrees Fahrenheit for 6-10 minutes.
- For an extra crispy crust, place the crust in the oven and par-bake before adding sauce, cheese and toppings.
To Make a Homemade Frozen Pizza
- Make the pizza dough, following all instructions including the rising time
- Shape large or individual pizza crusts
- Par-bake the crust at 500 degrees Fahrenheit, for 3-4 minutes, until crust is set yet still pale in color
- If the crust is bubbled and you want it to be flat, press it with another baking sheet as it cools
- Allow crust to fully cool, then wrap in plastic wrap and freezer bag. Freeze crust until you are ready to use.
- After the crust is frozen, you could add sauce, cheese and toppings and return to freezer, so your pizza is completely ready. Or, add toppings only when you are ready to bake the pizza. This way, you can customize the pizza and toppings for whoever is eating with you that day.
- When you are ready to make the pizza, preheat the oven to 500 degrees and remove the pizza from the freezer
- Add sauce, cheese and toppings if you have not already done so.
- Bake pizza for 6-10 minutes
