Finding new recipes is so much easier than it was for our moms and grandmas. Instead of flipping through endless pages from stacks of cookbooks, we now have the internet as an endless recipe library. Need to make the perfect cake for celebration? Desperate for a quick yet tasty chicken recipe? All you have to do is search and thousands of recipes await you.
And then there are the recipes that make the rounds online because they’re so clever, like the two-ingredient dough recipe.
Two-ingredient dough truly lives up to its name. The recipe uses fat-free Greek yogurt and self-rising flour. That’s it.
This dough’s popularity owes to its simple perfection: the two ingredients are easy to find, and it’s easy to make. But it’s gotten a boost in popularity thanks to the WW community (formerly Weight Watchers). WW lists fat-free Greek yogurt as a zero-point food, which makes this dough a great substitute for normal dough. The yogurt also adds more protein to the dough, which people who count macros or follow a high-protein diet appreciate.
How To Make Two-Ingredient Dough
Most recipes for two-ingredient dough use a basic formula of one part fat-free Greek yogurt to one part self-rising flour. To make a single serving of dough, you would use 1/4 cup each of both ingredients. If you want to make more servings, based on whatever recipe you’re using the dough for, just increase your ingredients accordingly.
I’ve made this dough numerous times and I have a few tips to help if you’ve never done it before.
Add the yogurt to the mixing bowl first, then the flour. For some reason, I find the ingredients combine better when I add the dry ingredient into the wet. If I’m making 2-4 servings of dough (1 cup of each ingredient), I simply use a bowl and a fork to mix it up. If it’s much more than that, I put the ingredients in my mixer and use a hook to combine them.
The dough is going to look rough and feel very sticky. When making the dough by hand, be prepared for a shaggy, rough dough that feels sticky. You’re going to wonder what you did wrong. Don’t panic.
The magic happens when you knead it. Dump that messy mixture on your countertop (which should have some self-rising flour dusted on it) and get those hands kneading. After about 5 minutes, it comes together to look more like a dough. You may need to add a little more flour as you knead to make it less sticky.
Once you have the base dough made, what can you do with it? Here are two options for you to try.
How To Make Two-Ingredient Dough Pizza
It doesn’t get better than a simple pizza crust recipe. This is the recipe I put together after a number of trials.
- Make your pizza dough based on how many people you’re serving. I like making individual pizzas, and I use 1/4 cup yogurt and 1/4 cup flour per pizza. You can also make one larger batch of dough and then divide it by serving.
- After I make the dough and knead it, I let it rest in the fridge before getting it ready to bake. Just put the dough back in a lightly sprayed bowl with some cling wrap on top.
- While the dough rests, turn your oven on to preheat to 450F to 500F. You want the oven very hot to let the crust cook quickly and get crisp. A pizza stone helps, but I started out just using a pizza pan or sheet pan.
- Let the oven get to temperature and stay there for at least 20 minutes. Then, shape your dough on your sheet pan or pizza peel. You want it thin so it doesn’t stay doughy in the middle. I like to prick the dough with a fork to make sure it doesn’t puff up too much.
- Add your toppings (sauce, pepperoni, cheese, veggies, etc.) and place the prepared pizza on the top rack for 7-9 minutes. Keep an eye on the pizza, though. Every oven is different.
- Take the pizza out of the oven when ready, slice and enjoy!
How To Make Two-Ingredient Dough Bagels
I love bagels, but they can be a challenge to make at home. But when I found a two-ingredient bagel recipe from WW, it looked relatively simple, so I gave it a shot. (Note: you will need one lightly beaten egg white to brush on the dough after it gets shaped into a bagel, so technically, this calls for three ingredients.)
The WW recipe changes the one-to-one flour-to-yogurt ratio, bumping up the flour quantity. For four bagels, the recipe calls for 1 1/2 cups of self-rising flour and 1 cup of fat-free Greek yogurt.
The dough looked a little drier than I was used to because of the extra flour. Fortunately, it still came together.
Like the pizza crust, you’ll cut the dough into four quarters to make the bagels. Roll each section into a “snake.” Because the dough was a little dry, this takes a little extra work.
Once rolled out, I rounded the snakes into a bagel shape, pinched the ends together, brushed each bagel with beaten egg white and added some everything bagel seasoning to give it extra flavor. Then I popped them into the oven.
WW’s bagel recipe calls for baking them at 375F for 25-30 minutes on a parchment-lined baking sheet, then cooling them on a wire rack.
Mine didn’t have the classic bagel holes, but a little experimenting with shaping should fix that. They tasted great and had a good texture. I can’t wait to make these again!
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