The 2-Step Cooking Method For Crispy Bar-Style Pizza Crust

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Once you make pizza at home, you may never go back to overpaying for delivery. Homemade pizza is easy and fun, and there are some foolproof tips for making the best homemade dough. For a bar pie, even using store-bought dough is fine. That's because that perfectly crispy, slightly chewy crust is all about the way you cook the dough.

A classic bar-style pizza is a thin-crust version that's crispy on the bottom, but still has a slightly chewy texture when you bite into it. The first part of the process is partially cooking the pizza on a well-oiled, round pan. The dough goes on the pan, then you add the toppings and bake it. As it heats, that oil gently crisps the dough — but the process doesn't stop there. Once the dough is just firm enough to be shifted, gently slide it off the baking sheet and onto a preheated pizza stone (the stone should already be in the oven and extra-hot). Since pizza stones retain heat so well, the bottom of the crust cooks in minutes, rendering an extra-crispy outer layer but stopping just short of crisping the dough all the way through. Suddenly, you have perfect bar-style pizza.

For the method to work properly, you have to have the right tools. Start with a good-quality sheet pan — you don't want the hot oven to warp the pan when it makes contact, or else your pizza could shift and cook unevenly. Look for a pan with rolled edges made from heavier metal. Next, grab a pizza stone (and learn how to use one). Old Stone is a good option, for example, or you can choose from one of the best pizza stones based on customer reviews. Make sure the stone preheats alongside the oven, otherwise the pizza doesn't cook properly and there's a good chance the ceramic stone cracks due to thermal shock.

Finally, cook the dough at the right temperature. Pizza dough needs a scorching hot oven for the best results — don't be afraid to crank the oven up to around 500 degrees Fahrenheit. If your oven goes up to 550, by all means, cook it at that temperature instead. The extra heat causes the exterior to cook quickly, but it leaves the interior with that slightly chewy texture you're looking for.