Making your own pizza is a wonderful thing. You can choose what goes on it; and you can make your own dough so that you can be sure it’s made of the best ingredients possible.
But, if you are not used to making your own pizza dough then you might make some mistakes initially. How to fix undercooked pizza dough may be one of the questions you find yourself asking, so let’s look at the solutions!
Why Is My Pizza Dough Not Cooked In The Middle?
Home made pizza is the best, isn’t it? You can put exactly what you want on it, and know exactly what has gone into making it.
However, there can be some tricky elements to making your own pizza, and the dough it generally the biggest problem!
- Too much sauce on your pizza dough can cause the base to remain undercooked in the middle. You can either reduce the sauce, or try precooking your dough.
- If you like a big pile of toppings on your pizza (and let’s face it, who doesn’t like a loaded pizza?) then this can also change the consistency of your pizza base
- If the temperature of the oven is too low, this can also affect your pizza cooking perfection.
- It is best to use a high temperature, with the pizza on the middle shelf, to avoid it over or under cooking.
- Pizza is not meant to be slow cooked; it fares best on a fairly high heat for a relatively short time.
- If your pizza pops out and is underwhelming, try popping it back in on a higher temperature with the pizza lower down. This can improve the cooking of the pizza and ensure it is fully cooked.
How Do You Fix Undercooked Dough?
If your oven has a history of delivering well cooked tops but soggy bottoms, you may wish to change how you cook pizza:
- Using a pizza stone will help the bottom of the pizza as well as the top, as the heat will be spread around the pizza evenly.
- Do you place your pizza on the top shelf? This is what most of us do, but because heat rises this means that the top will be more cooked than the bottom.
- Try placing the pizza lower down, and increasing the oven heat. You may need to cook your pizza for a couple of minutes longer, but it will be worth it for the perfect pizza!
- Cooking your pizza on a baking tray is similar to using a pizza stone, in that it will transfer heat to the bottom of the pizza.
- A pizza steel is a newish invention that mimics the behaviour of both a pizza stone and a thick baking tray, and will help the dough to be well cooked.
- If you are using a shop bough pizza, let it sit at room temperature for a few minutes before you cook it. This will ensure that moisture is not released during cooking.
- With a home made pizza, do not let the ingredients sit too long on the base before you cook. Too much moisture can seep into the dough, making it harder to cook.
- You can brush the dough with olive oil if it has to sit with the sauce on it; this creates a barrier between the dough and the wet ingredients.
These pizza experts have a good few tips on how you can fix your undercooked pizza dough.
Can You Recook An Undercooked Pizza?
So the oven timer has pinged, the table is set, your stomach is rumbling – but then you get your pizza out to find that it is undercooked!
Popping it straight back into the oven for another 10 minutes is the simplest, easiest fix for this problem.
If, however, you have undercooked a pizza and turned off the oven and let everything cool, you may have more of a problem.
If you have a vegetarian pizza, you don’t have to worry too much about cooking it over and over.
However, if your pizza is a meaty one then you may need to take more care. Undercooked meat can cause serious health problems, so ensure that you cook your pepperoni until it is piping hot!
Reheating a pizza with meat on it can be problematic, so if you can’t finish it all in one go then at least make sure you eat the leftovers within a day, and if you reheat it then make sure it is thoroughly cooked.
This video shows you a few different ways to re cook, or reheat, your undercooked pizza:
Is It Safe To Eat Undercooked Pizza Dough?
Although eating undercooked pizza dough generally won’t kill you, it can cause you some issues.
There is not much in dough that can cause you any harm – flour, yeast and water, and maybe a bit of oil – but under cooking it can still cause you issues.
Raw pizza dough is not very palatable, that’s the main issue. Pizza is meant to be firm on the base, delicious and oozing with flavour on the top!
An undercooked base will not only not taste great, but it will actually not hold up the topping very well, ruining your pizza experience.
If your pizza dough is undercooked, chances are there are things that you can do to fix it:
- Increase the cooking time. Your home made pizza dough will likely need more cooking time than a pizza you bought from a shop, so simply cook it for longer.
- Cook it at higher temperatures. Pizza is meant to be cooked relatively quickly, but if your dough is home made then it might take longer.
- Reduce the toppings. Everyone loves a loaded pizza – but no one loves a soggy bottom! If your pizza is not cooked all the way through your excessive toppings may be the culprit.
Fixing undercooked pizza dough is a relatively easy one; it’s generally just as case of adjusting your cooking times or your topping choices.
Now you know, you can save your Friday night feast instead of having to throw it away! Looking for more tips? Here is our guide to cooking pizza rolls properly.
