Whole Wheat Sourdough Pizza Dough

This incredibly easy Whole Wheat Sourdough Pizza Dough takes minutes to make and easily ferments for hours in the fridge making it a gut friendly meal for the entire family.

Pizza night is always a blast in our home. The kitchen is smothered in flour, counter to flour, toppings are flying in the air, and I always seem to find raw sourdough pizza dough under my toddlers learning tower (I always make extra for him to play with!) It’s always an utter mess that I never mind cleaning, especially after a full belly of fermented pizza.

This whole wheat sourdough pizza dough takes minutes to prepare and hours to sit and wait patiently, while beautifully fermenting, in your fridge. I love to prep the dough first thing in the morning so that it’s fermented and ready to bake for dinner.

“Everything but the Kitchen Sink”

I love this phrase. It gets me in the “zone” when I need to get creative in the kitchen and find whatever ingredients will work for the meal I’m prepping. That’s why I LOVE pizza night. There really doesn’t have to be a plan besides prepping the dough. I find that we have all sorts of toppings that work for pizza; leftover pizza, bacon from yesterday’s breakfast, olives, herbs, and what they hay, let’s throw in a fried egg since we have a lot those from our backyard chickens!

Prepping this pizza dough always calls for inviting a few friends over, too. This dough makes roughly 4 small to medium size pizzas or 2 large pizzas. Perfect to share with a neighbors and hungry toddlers!

How to make Whole Wheat Sourdough Pizza Dough

Tools you may need

• 1 large bowl for the dough
• Clean surface for shaping the dough
• Pizza peel to transfer dough into oven, flat baking sheet, or large cast iron skillet
• Pizza cutter or sharp knife
• Plastic wrap, silicone lid, or damp tea towel

Ingredients you’ll need

• 100g (1/2 cup) sourdough levain or sourdough discard
• 10g (2 tsp) sea salt
• 30g (2 Tbsp) olive oil
• 100g (3/4 cup) whole wheat flour
• 400g (2 1/2 cup) all-purpose flour
• 350g (1 1/3 cup + 2 Tbsp) warm water
• Toppings of your preference, like mozzarella, gorgonzola, or parmesan cheese, pizza sauce, olive oil, or pesto for sauces, etc. Make it fun!

Step by step instructions

Combine sourdough levain or discard, sea salt, olive oil, whole wheat flour, all-purpose flour, and warm water in a large bowl. Mix and knead the ingredients with either your hand, large spatula, or standing mixer with a dough hook until the dough becomes smooth and elastic.

Place kneaded dough back in bowl, cover with either plastic wrap, silicone lid, or damp tea towel and place in fridge to ferment for 4-24 hours.

What if I let my Whole Wheat Sourdough Pizza Dough ferment in the fridge longer than 24 hours?

You can absolutely let the dough ferment longer, just be sure that there isn’t a crust forming on the top of the dough. You can avoid this by covering the bowl with either plastic wrap or a silicone lid to keep the moisture inside the bowl.

After fermenting in the fridge, and about an hour before you’re ready to bake, take the dough out of the fridge and let it come to room temperature. This usually takes anywhere from 30 minutes to 1 hour.

On a clean, floured surface, use a dough scraper or sharp knife to cut the dough into your preferred size. This recipe will make 2 large pizzas or about 4 small to medium pizzas. I like to cut the dough into quarters so that we have 4 different pizza options for dinner!

Shape the dough by pulling on one side and folding into the middle and pressing in. Grab another side of the dough, pull out, and press into the middle. Do this until you have a rough ball. Turn the dough over so that the seam side is down. Using the outer edge of both hands, shape the dough in a circular motion until the top of dough becomes somewhat smooth and holds its shape.

Dust the top of the pizza dough with flour and cover dough until they’ve reached room temp.

Preheat oven to 500 degrees.

Once the dough has reached room temp, with floured hands, press into the middle of the dough and gently work your way towards the outer edges of the dough in a circular motion. You want to gently push and stretch the dough so that it stretches and expands.

Immediately top dough with a light layer of pizza sauce, oil, pesto (whatever you like) and preferred toppings.

Bake at 500 degrees for 20-25 minutes or until crust is lightly browned.

Making pizza in the Ooni Oven

We recently bought a pizza oven, eeek! To us, It looks like spaceship that can make some really great bakes. It’s called an Ooni and we LOVE IT.

The oven we have isn’t sold anymore, but the Karu 16 is most like what we purchased.

It took some tinkering to learn the oven. You have the option to cook with wood fire or propane. Both are a blast. Setting up the wood fired element takes a bit more time, simply because you have to start a separate fire then pour the hot, flaming coals into the coal basket. The taste of wood fired pizza is incomparable and delicious.

Setting up the propane element is easy. Hook up the propane hose to the Ooni attachment, turn the gas on with a knob, and your oven is heating in seconds.

Steps for baking pizza in the Ooni with the propane attachment

1. Turn gas on HIGH and heat Ooni oven to 725 degrees (yes! 725!) It’s best if you have the Infrared Thermometer (here’s one on Amazon just like Ooni’s) With the thermometer, check the temperature of the pizza stones for a more accurate result.
2. When the pizza stones reach 725 degrees, turn down the flame to LOW and throw your pizza in.
3. Cook pizza, rotating the pizza one-quarter every 30 seconds, until the crust is golden brown. Depending on the size of your pizza, it will cook anywhere from 2-4 minutes. It’s very quick~
4. Turn the gas back to HIGH until the pizza stones reach 725 degrees again.
5. Repeat this with each pizza you cook.

Immediately enjoy your Whole Wheat Sourdough Pizza!