My grandma Josephine (Josie as I like to call her) was a phenomenal cook and a master at getting dinner on the table every night for 5 hungry kids (four boys!). And her sheet pan pizza recipe was a memory-maker. Josie spread scratch pizza dough in an enormous handmade steel deep dish pan and topped it with a savory sauce, layers of cheese and some of my papap’s homemade Italian sausage.

Pizza doesn’t get any better than that.

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What is sheet pan pizza?

Some might think it’s Detroit-style pizza (even though it’s really not). In the case of my grandma’s sheet pan pizza, it is more likely that it was Sicilian-inspired because my family is from the “heel of the boot” region in Italy known as Reggio Calabria. That’s the region that is still mainland Italy before you cross to Sicily. 

If you’ve been wanting to make a pan pizza at home and are looking for a classic recipe that works every time, my friend, you’ve come to the right place.

Recommended pizza dough for sheet pan pizza

The recipe includes a thick bread-like pizza dough…almost like a bakery crust pizza dough. You can even butter the bottom of the pan like Chicago fav Lou Malnati’s butter crust. Dreamy.

It makes the perfect amount for a big sheet pan crust with just the right amount of thickness and cooks perfectly in the middle. 

I don’t know anyone who likes a soggy, undercooked pizza crust.

Don’t skip these ingredients

Let’s talk pizza crust, sauce and topping ingredients. Caveat: there are no hard and fast rules about what goes on this slab pizza recipe. Feel free to experiment. 

• Active or instant dry yeast – Please don’t use quick rising or fast yeast. You’ll use one whole package of  yeast or 2 ¼ teaspoons. [add a tip for storing yeast down below]
• Olive oil – Josie’s recipe calls for at least ¼ cup of olive oil in the dough. This gives such good flavor.
• All-purpose flour – I use all-purpose flour because I still want some lightness in the crust.
• The sauce is a quick semi-homemade pizza sauce.

Sheet pan pizza crust proofing technique

For this sheet pan pizza recipe, we are going to double-proof the dough with a thin layer of the sauce on top. Adding some of the uncooked pizza sauce right on top of the dough marries the sauce and crust together in a most magical way.

1. After the dough has risen in the bowl, you’re going to spread it out into an oiled sheet pan, gently coercing the crust to pan’s edges (see the photo above).
2. Spread a thin layer of the sauce mixture on the uncooked pizza dough.
3. The pizza dough and sauce will hang out together for about 45 minutes or so. The dough will get nice and comfy and rise again in the pan.

Step-by-step instructions

Pizza topping suggestions

• Spicy soppressata, caramelized onions and the cheese trio blend described above
• Italian sausage and black olives
• Meat lover’s with sausage, pepperoni, pancetta, and Italian beef
• Frozen chopped spinach mixed with a little ricotta, garlic and parmesan by the tablespoonful (another Lou’s inspiration!)

Helpful tips

Weather – The weather does affect how pizza dough rises.

• I usually place my dough in an oiled bowl large enough for the dough to do it’s thing
• Next, I cover the bowl with a piece of plastic wrap that’s been sprayed with a little cooking spray.
• And then I cover that whole thing with a clean dish towel and place it on the lowest rack of a cold oven. I do this in hot and cold weather to keep the humidity out and also create some warmth when it’s colder outside.

Size of sheet pan – While you won’t have a pan that is literally the size of your entire oven, a half sheet pan (approximately 12 ½”  x 17”) works beautifully for this recipe. You want it to be rectangular or it wouldn’t be sheet pan pizza now, would it? It would be deep dish pizza or if you use a cast iron skillet, you want my Cast Iron Skillet Pizza recipe instead (sooo good too!).

Pan pizza dough tips