No-knead, all crunch: a simple, astonishing pan pizza anyone can master with The Lazy Way to Pizza…

I have a problem, and that problem involves you. You just aren’t aware of it.
 
And really, why should you be?
 
We all live our lives on a need-to-know basis. Until your life involves making pizza with me, you and I do not have much of an overlap in the Venn diagram.
 
Anyway, here’s my problem: When I write a book, I want the book to be a) entertaining and b) useful.
 
If I can solve that problem, and my book keeps you along for the ride, you’re more likely to find what I’ve done to be useful and exciting.
 
Useful because you made a pizza.
 
Exciting because it’s a pizza you want to make again and again and again.​

 
Last week, I made you a promise.
 
So, here’s what’s about to happen. We’re going to:
 
- Talk about how this exciting new pizza is a rockstar;
 
- Look at what this cookbook really is;
 
- Discuss the benefits of my (perhaps misguided) reader-focused philosophy; and
 
- Link to the sale price. In case you’re still interested. You might not be. I can have that effect on people.
 
If you have no patience or are too lazy to read that far (and let’s be real—it’s in the title of the book: The Lazy Way to Pizza: How to Make the Best Pizza Possible With the Least Amount of Work), here’s the link to the 99-cent ebook on Amazon. (The sale price is good until Saturday, 06/27/26.)
 
And if you don’t already know, the Amazon ebook reader app is free for your phone or tablet (I use both), and you can also open the book on your computer by going directly to your Amazon account.
 
 
Why is this pizza rockstar?
 
The simplest answer is this: It makes you a rockstar. It’s that easy and that enjoyable.

The ease! The crunch! The cheesy, crusty, juicy tomato punch! The joy of olive oil and oregano together again! It has so much going on that your tongue will dance a tarantella.
​
I’ve encouraged some of my more experienced pizza peeps to make this recipe, and there are two clear responses: 1) Tastes great! and 2) No cleanup!
 
I asked Kevin Godbee of Pizza Is My Life if he’d like to write the foreword to this book. He went from being hesitant, to reading the book, to making the pizza, and ultimately adding a whole new style of pizza to his repertoire.
 
 
And guess what he liked about this pizza besides the taste? 
 
“This method leaves remarkably little mess behind.”
 
I developed this book for people I know who don’t want to deal with the tools and skills and time required to make traditional, artisan-style pizza.
 
The unexpected byproduct of this book is that the people who DO want and have the tools, skills and time required to make traditional artisan-style pizza love this pizza, too.
 
 
This is a pan pizza. Do not be afraid.
 
For a lot of people, the whole idea of pan pizza smacks of cafeteria food.
 
That’s probably because the school cafeteria used to make thick, soggy pizzas in those giant sheet pans.
 
This pizza is not that pizza. That flabby, wet pizza of yore is nothing like this slim, sexy pizza of New England Greek heritage.
 
Yes, this pizza is inspired by the New England-style Greek pizza of my post-college days in Boston.
 
This style of pizza is all over New England. And when it’s good, it’s great.
 
 
This pizza is made with a no-knead dough, which is remarkably simple.
 
It requires about 5 minutes of active prep. That’s the time you spend combining the water, flour, salt and yeast and making sure they’re fully incorporated.
 
After that, the dough just sits.
 
Ideally, after a 20-hour room-temp ferment, it’s cold fermented for 72 hours.
 
But if you wish, you can make the dough today and use it tomorrow. You’ll still be amazed at how great it tastes.
 
(I did that repeatedly while testing recipes for this book. It holds up really well as a young dough. My standard pizza dough needs at least 48 hours to mature before I let it out in polite company.)
 
 
This pizza also eats like a meal.
 
It’s substantial, with satisfying quantities of cheese and sauce on top of a crust that has a crunchy, olive-oil fried bottom.
 
Not only is this pizza a flavor bomb, but it’s an appetite engagement monster.
 
You go in hungry and leave happy.
 
 
It’s the best simple pizza I’ve ever had in my life.
 
The master recipe is formulated for a round pan of 8 inches times four, 12 inches times two, or 16 inches times one.
 
And when I tell you that two adults can eat an 8-inch version of this pizza and be satisfied, I’m dead serious. My wife and I have done it repeatedly.
 
Of course, when there’s a bigger pizza, we will answer the call to tame its wildness.
 
Still, there will be leftovers. We’re not animals. As far as you know.
 
 
As for this book, it shows you exactly one thing: How to make this pizza.
 
I believe there’s a serious problem with most pizza cookbooks.
 
They throw you into the deep end of the pool and walk away.
 
Without explaining a whole lot, they confront you with a bunch of pizza styles, lay out an array of topping combinations, and leave you to figure it all out for yourself.
 
You’re given a kind of à la carte menu of pizza and told to make your choices without context.
 
I recently read one “celebrity” pizza cookbook that had me utterly confused by chapter two—and I’ve been making pizza for over 20 years.
 
(IMPORTANT NOTE: Peter Reinhart’s cookbooks, especially American Pie (my personal favorite), do not do this. He’s my personal favorite bread & pizza geek, and his books are constructed with conscience, purpose and intent.)
 
 
The Lazy Way to Pizza is the book I wish I’d had 30 years ago when I was a kid trying to make pizza.
 
In my late teens and 20s, I fumbled through incomplete directions and bad recipes compounded by ignorant choices, ultimately making pizzas unworthy of the name.
 
The pizza inside The Lazy Way to Pizza is the antidote to such culinary mayhem.
 
It’s practically foolproof.
 
It’s a pizza maker’s manual for the casual cook who doesn’t want a hobby, just a pizza.
 
If you’re relatively smart, and willing to follow directions, it takes minimal skill to produce a mind-bending pizza using this book.
 
That pizza costs you less than most takeout options, and tastes better as well.
 
 
Why do I engage in this madness?
 
Because I harbor the illusion that it might be entertaining and useful. I’m well aware of the pizza failures I’ve had, and I want to spare you the disappointment.
 
It takes a lot of time to make a lousy pizza.
 
Why not take a little more time to make a great one?
 
Without a special oven.
 
With no special hardware.
 
 
This all started as a kind of mission.
 
Free The Pizza began as an effort to spare my friends the frustration and disappointment of buying a tiny, cruel oven that would just end up in the garage covered in dust.
 
If they actually succeeded in making a pizza in it, the result was probably less than advertised.
 
I used to have a 1,200-pound, restaurant-grade wood-fired oven inside my house, which was a different kind of frustration.
 
It allowed me to make some amazing pizza.
 
But you don’t heat up a half-ton oven for just one pizza by yourself. With a three-hour burn time before it’s ready to cook, that oven is an inefficient way to make just one pizza.
 
 
Owning that oven made me seriously reevaluate the potential for the home oven.
 
Fast forward to today, and I have written over 250 blog posts, two pizza cookbooks, a short pizza documentary that’s in the final stages of post-production, and my website is a top search result for what to do with (yes) leftover pizza dough.
 
I’m practically famous!
 
I enjoy telling stories about pizza people. The history of pizza is intriguing.
 
 
But I most enjoy demystifying the process for people.
 
When I can help them realize the thrill of making great pizza in their home oven, my work is done.
 
(Yet I keep doing it. Because there’s always more pizza to be made.)
 
The Lazy Way to Pizza is just one more extension of that enjoyment.
 
The bonus feature for me is that experienced pizza people are enjoying The Lazy Way as much as the newbies.
 
 
Anyway, the ebook is just 99 cents at Amazon right now.
 
If you missed my missive last week, it makes a persuasive case for why ebook cookbooks are a killer format.
 
For one, they’re often cheap (as am I).
 
For two, they’re a great way to decide if you want to spend the money for the print edition.
 
And for three, they’re a killer tool as a companion to the print book. They are 100% searchable, while the print edition is not.
 
 
And you can carry your entire ebook library with you wherever you go.
 
I have 2,000 books on my phone and my iPad—including all of my cookbooks.
 
My wife and I have this thing where we travel the country cooking for people.
 
You never know which cookbook you’re going to wish you had when.
 
I travel with over 200 cookbooks, 47 of which have “pizza” in the title.
 
Yes, it’s a sickness.
 
 
By the way, do you want to write a review of The Lazy Way to Pizza?
 
I'm looking for a dozen readers who will buy the 99-cent Kindle book and write a review in the next week. 

I’m not allowed to incentivize review writers. It goes against the terms of service for the god that is Amazon.
 
But I can send you the same thing I send everyone else who asks: an autographed copy of the official print-book cover card!
 
It’s a full-color, postcard-size rendering of the book cover with a message from me on the back.
 
Regardless of whether you want to write a review, if you buy the Kindle edition, just contact me here and let me know.
 
Tell me your mailing address, whether you wrote a review or not, and who to sign the cover card to.
 
Free the pizza, my friend— the lazy way! 

​Click here for the 99-cent Kindle edition of The Lazy Way to Pizza