Skillet Deep Dish Pizza
Skillet Deep Dish Pizza: This pizza is loaded with toppings and cheese and cooked in a carbon steel skillet for a perfect, crispy crust.
Skillet Deep Dish Pizza
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A few times a month I get emails or questions about what equipment a new home cook should prioritize. Besides having a good knife, I put some sort of cast iron skillet really high on the list. They are economical so you don’t need to spend hundreds of dollars and you can use them for almost any cooking purpose: sautéing, frying, baking, etc.
Today, we are tackling the skillet deep dish pizza! This thing is a delicious beast! I made it from scratch with my favorite deep dish pizza dough (butter laced), but I’ll give you some tips if you want to use store-bought dough also.
Skillet Deep Dish Pizza
Equipment
Ingredients
Dough: (Add 90 minutes to prep time)
- 3 ¼ Cups (16¼ ounces) all-purpose flour
- ½ Cup yellow cornmeal
- 1 ½ Teaspoons salt
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 2 ¼ Teaspoons instant yeast
- 1 ¼ Cups warm water 10 ounces
- 7 Tablespoons unsalted butter (3 melted, 4 softened)
- 1 Teaspoon olive oil for bread
Sauce:
- 1 15 oz. can tomato sauce
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 teaspoon black pepper
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- ½ teaspoon dried parsley
- ½ teaspoon red pepper flakes
Pizza Fixings:
- ¾ lb. low-moisture mozzarella sliced
- ½ pound sweet Italian sausage
- ½ red pepper sliced thin
- ½ green pepper sliced thin
- ¼ sweet onion sliced thin
- 1 cup Asiago cheese grated
- Salt and pepper
Instructions
For dough:
- Add all dry ingredients to a bowl and mix well, then slowly add water and melted butter until the dough ball comes together. Knead this for 8-10 minutes until the dough is glossy and smooth. Alternatively, in a mixer, beat dough for 5-6 minutes with the dough hook on medium.
- Let ball of dough rise in a lightly oiled bowl for about an hour or until it doubles in size.
- Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and roll it out to roughly a 16 by 12 rectangle.
- Spread on softened butter leaving about 1/2 inch around the edges of the dough.
- Roll up the dough like a cigar. Fold dough over itself into thirds. Pinch the seams around the dough to form a ball.
- Let dough rise a second time in your fridge for 60 minutes.
For Sauce:
- Stir together ingredients in a medium bowl and set aside. Feel free to adjust flavors to your liking.
To make the pizza:
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
- Roll dough ball into about a 15 inch diameter circle.
- Add pizza dough to a 12-inch cast iron or carbon steel skillet. Work the dough up the sides and make a crust. Mush the dough into all the corners of the pan and crimp it around the edges.
- Add sliced mozzarella cheese to the bottom, followed by your marinara sauce. You can add all the sauce for a very saucy pie, or 1/2-2/3 of it if you want a less saucy pizza.
- Add small chunks of sweet Italian sausage (uncooked), sliced peppers, sliced onions, and grated Asiago cheese. Season the pizza with salt and pepper.
- Bake at 375 degrees F. for 55-60 minutes. Let cooked pizza rest for 10 minutes before slicing and serving.
Nutrition
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Cast Iron Deep Dish Pizza
The Dough
If you have the time, this pizza dough is one of my favorite dough recipes. It’s really hearty and has some nice touches like melted butter and cornmeal kneaded right into the dough.
When making pizza dough, I always recommend weighing your flour. If you use cups, you might have to adjust the amount of liquid. Usually you’ll have to add more because cups tend to over-measure the flour.
I like to knead my dough by hand in the bowl for 8-10 minutes until it’s really soft, but you can also use a stand mixer (dough hook attachment) to make quick work of it.
Once the dough is ready, let it rise for about an hour.
Now for the fun part, roll out the dough into a large rectangle and smear on a layer of softened butter. Then roll the dough up into a tight cylinder and fold it over itself. This will create lots of layers of dough which end up being light and flaky in the finished pizza. It’s one of my favorite deep dish pizza tricks.
If you want to use store-bought dough, no big deal. I would still do the butter trick with it though. If you skip it, your crust will be dense instead of light and flaky.
The Sauce
I mixed up a quick pizza sauce with tomato sauce, salt, pepper, sugar, and herbs and spices. This is a pretty flexible recipe so I recommend starting with my version, tasting it, and adjusting to your liking. Some might like more herbs or spice. Make it your own!
Finishing the Pizza
When you’re ready to make this bad boy, prep all your ingredients. Slice the peppers, onions, and cheese and get everything ready.
Roll your pizza dough out into a large 15-inch circle and press it down firmly into your skillet. A 12-inch skillet is the perfect size for this pizza.
I used a new 12 inch seasoned carbon steel skillet for my version. This thing is amazing. It’s really light for a steel skillet, but very sturdy. You can use it on the stovetop or in the oven.
I made a crimped crust out of my dough, but you could do something simpler if you want.
In traditional deep dish fashion, I added my sliced cheese (lots of it) first and then my sauce. I used pretty much all of my sauce because I like a saucy deep dish pizza. If you want it less saucy, I’d start with half of the recipe I listed.
After your cheese and sauce are on, pile on the other toppings. I like to use Italian sausage, peppers, and onions. Don’t worry about cooking the sausage ahead of time, it’ll have plenty of time to cook in the oven. Just make sure to add it in small chunks so there aren’t any large pieces.
Then add some asiago cheese to the top of the pizza. Asiago is really flavorful and gives something extra to the finished pie. Plus, who’s going to complain about more cheese?
This guy is ready for the oven!
Bake this beauty at 375 degrees F. for 55-60 minutes. It’s a thick pizza so it needs a lot of time to bake through. Keep an eye on it to make sure it’s cooking evenly, but it’s pretty hard to over-cook it.
Resting Time
When this sucker comes out of the oven, it’ll be bubbling hot and will be a big mess if you cut into it right away. Sort of like how you would treat a steak, it helps to let this pizza rest for 10 minutes before slicing into it.
Also, let me introduce you to my new favorite cast iron skillet accessory: The Magnetic Trivet!
Cast iron skillets get really hot and retain heat forever (a good thing). If you made the mistake of putting this skillet on your table or counter directly, chances are it would ruin the surface. This trivet is so awesome because when you put your skillet on it, it sticks to the skillet! That way you can move your skillet around and know that it always has protection!
Just remember to take it off before you cook again with your skillet!
The only thing that’s left now is to slice up this skillet deep dish pizza into large pieces and serve it up to hungry family and friends!
WOW! That looks Amazing! I like the idea of incorporating cornmeal into the butter laced dough. I can’t wait to give this a try! Thank You for sharing!
Hey Daren, yep! It’s one of my favorite homemade doughs for sure. Give it a shot if you’re looking for a good deep dish recipe. ;)
With the new line of Lodge being so light, is there any negative when it comes to maintaining even heat? Light is nice, but I would think that loses the inherent benefit of heavy iron (?)
Hey Matt, from the Lodge team directly:
“Our seasoned steel products are made from 100% carbon steel, and are formed by spinning and stamping which allows them to be lighter and thinner. Although seasoned steel will heat up and cool down faster than seasoned cast iron, the level of heat that the pan can handle and the amount of heat that it can conduct are the same as that of a cast iron pan. This still makes cooking with seasoned steel an awesome option when it comes to searing steaks, or cooking other things that require a high temperature.”
Wow this looks amazing. I think I will try this in my Dutch oven during our next camping trip. Thank you for the inspiration
WOW! Did you really make this camping? I know this comment is old lol but i love the idea of making a pizza camping. Any tips would be appreciated.
I see another lodge in my future! I have 2 cold handle fry pans. I will have to try the pizza recipe.
What a beautiful and tasty looking pizza. The pan has been ordered (was looking for a new Lodge pan) and this is Friday’s nights dinner.
Thanks for an awesome recipe, can’t wait to make it.
Lori
I made this recipe for tonight’s dinner. I was skeptical about the corn meal in the crust. I have to admit the crust was the best part. Thanks for the delicious dinner!
Mama-Mia ! Just gotta try this pie–I think I’ll add some pepperoni, mushrooms and black olives but will cut down on the amount so as to not overload the pan—-Mangia ! !
“Holy Mother of Pizza” ! ! —- The Pie came out great ! I used store bought dough because I was in a hurry to try this but next time I’am gonna use the cornmeal dough. My Lodge cast iron frying pan was a little to big for the store bought crust I used so the dough was a little thin. The flavor was outstanding and so easy ! !
Thanks for this recipe! I was looking for a cast iron pizza recipe, since that’s the pan I have – 12 inches. I was running short on time, so I used store-bought dough (TJ’s). I also used their sauce. I used a mix of cornmeal and flour to work the dough, and I did the butter thing. The crust turned out great! I used 8oz shredded mozzarella, then I added a layer of pepperoni that I had pre-cooked in order to minimize grease. On top of that, 4 oz quattro formaggi, and 4 oz ricotta, then back to the recipe, except I only had 10 oz of store bought sauce. I got nervous and took it out at 50 minutes, and that was just a tiny bit too soon. I shoulda listened!
Great dough recipe! My friend just gave me a bunch of spinach from her garden, and I thought a sausage, spinach, and cheese pie would be good. Also made a regular sized pepperoni pie, plus two mini plain cheese and sauce ones in my 6″ pans for the kiddies (made two batches of dough). Thanks for not having scary ads pop up on your page!
WHoa! Very mis-leading. Total Time is NOT 1 hour 30 minutes. Up front you need to state 2 + hours preptime just for the pizza dough THEN you have an hour baking time for the pizza. It’ s a good thing I made a soup to accompany dinner, which while now the appetizer. This is a 3 hour job.
Hey Susan! Sorry about that… yea… the recipe time assumes you have the dough already made. Sorry if that wasn’t clear. I’ll make a note in the recipe! Cheers!
Does the cast iron make the bottom of the pizza crispy too ?
Mine always turns out. Brown on the bottom but not crispy.
Thank you for your time
Mine has always gotten nice and crispy on the bottom. If it’s getting soggy on the bottom your fillings might have too much water? Just a thought. good luck!
GREAT! I actually heat some pepperoni or sausage in the pan and use the grease to coat the pan (apply with a brush).
will this be good if I use just a plain cast iron skillet
Absolutely. Just make sure it’s deep enough to hold all the goods. Good luck!
Do you cut the pizza in the pan? I worry about scratching the seasoning on my skillet.
Is it ok to make the dough ahead of time and leave it in the fridge for a day or two (instead of the usual 60 minutes or so)?
No problem at all Ben. I frequently make dough ahead of time and just store it in the fridge. Let it come to room temp though before baking. Good luck!
Great recipe. My wife and I have made it twice. It’s super easy and the sauce is easy to customize to your liking. Delicious.
Hey there, just wanted to know if you can guide me through how you crimped your pizza crust please
Chicago pizza I have had has tomato on top and it’s great any thoughts
I think you meant to say that you like to use Italian sausage, not sauce, along with the peppers and onions. You already added the sauce in the previous step. It looks and sounds delicious, will try to make one in my Lodge 12″ cast iron skillet. Thank you for sharing your recipe, the crust sounds interesting!
Doh! Nice catch. :) Thanks!