A pizza braid is very kid-friendly, easy on the wallet and extremely simple to make. My aunt and cousin first introduced me to them and I’ve been hooked ever since. The possibilities are endless of the varieties you could make (check out the Apple Dessert Braid!), but the recipe below is for a very basic hamburger and pepperoni braid. You could make your own dough, but I prefer the shortcut of using Rhodes rise and bake dough. This is one of my favorite shortcuts to make a nice loaf of bread or use in recipes like this one.
As I said, this is extremely basic. All you need is one Rhodes loaf (or however many you prefer), ground beef (if you’re baking one loaf it won’t hold any more than 1/2-3/4 lb), pepperoni, pizza sauce and your choice of cheese.
The dough takes a few hours to rise, so I take it out in the morning and place a towel over it. Once it has risen, you spray a cookie sheet and press out the dough into a large rectangle.
Yes, yes the dough in that photo has not risen fully. If you are in a time-crunch the dough doesn’t have to rise all of the way, but it is easier to work with and the finished product will be fluffier if you let it rise for a few hours.
Then you spread out the sauce, lay the meats down, followed by the cheese.
Then with a pizza cutter, start cutting about 1 inch thick strips down the whole rectangle. You want to make the strips on each side the same size and make sure you have the same amount, like the first picture. Don’t get frustrated your first time, it takes a few times to get the braiding down.
Follow the pictures above. You take the first strip and pull it down to the second strip on the other side. You then take the first strip on the other side and do the same. Keep braiding all the way down and make sure to tuck in the ends or the sauce will spill out during baking.
A few minutes before it’s done I brush with olive oil and sprinkle with oregano. I then bake at around 325 until golden brown.
There are so many versions you can make of the pizza braid: Philly cheesesteak, spinach and mushroom, Parmesan chicken- almost anything! You can even make dessert braids like apple or cinnamon roll.
I’m gonna make this for my kids birthday party’s. I’ve looked through 20 different sight trying to find the simplest one and this looks to be it. Thank you so much!
Oh, this looks so fancy! Never tried anything like this, heck never seen it before.
I will have to make this soon :D Thank you for sharing :)
Ya!! I’m glad you liked it :) The possibilities are endless. I’m betting you could even make these ahead and freeze. Thanks for posting on your blog!
Your braid was one of the very first things I pinned when I joined Pinterest forever ago. I finally got around to making it and it was immediately a huge hit. It was the perfect ration of filling to bread. Definitely a family favorite! Thank you for sharing :)
http://fantasticalsharingofrecipes.blogspot.com/2012/07/pizza-braid.html
About twenty minutes. Since everything else is cooked, all you need to bake is the bread. Some people like theirs soft and doughy- others like it brown.
I made one of these… then I realized it didn’t say for how long to bake it, till golden-brown isnt the most descriptive.
Hmmm…delicious I’d love to make that right now!!!
Mine doesn’t look that nice. But I will try again. My strips need to be fatter. Though looking forward to eating it tonight! Thanks for th idea.
Wow, looks fantastic. I wish you had showed a picture of it cut open after cooking.
This looks so yummy! And it’s really making me hungry. LOL
this reminds me alot of my mom’s pizza bread recipe only this is 10 times prettier, and better!
oh that looks so good and really easy!
Wow, this looks delicious! What a great idea!
these look good.
What a lovely item, and the photography is lovely. Great post. I’m definitely going to try it out.
My family would love this! Thank you for the great step by step directions!
I ran across this on stumbleupon and immediately had to try it out. Though I didnt have any bread dough readily available, I did have some pizza crust mix, and made a spicy cheesy chicken puff from it. It was quite possibly one of the best things I’ve made for supper ever! Thank you for the inspiration.
Wow! Great stuff! Found this on stumbleupon and tried it, used garlic butter sauce on top instead of olive oil and it gave it a nice flavor. Loved it!!!
This is one perfect recipe. An absolute FAVORITE by everyone in my family! It’s a braid of heaven if you ask me.
You mention that this is simple, but the presentation is awesome. Looks good!
Oh this looks so good. My son would absolutely LOVE this idea.
wow, that looks great. I wouldn’t mind seeing a cross-section (slice) of the finished product, too.
Gonna give this a try tonight, it looks great! :D
This is called a Stromboli pretty much.
Hi Caroline, I would have to ask someone about this. I would assume freeze it before you bake it.
If i wanted to make this a head and freeze it, do you think i should cook it first or freeze before i bake?
I would have loved to see a picture of it sliced once or twice.
so…it’s basically a giant, homemade hotpocket?
To make this recipe great, forgo the low moisture part skim mozzarella for whole milk mozzarella!
This might be a silly question, but is the ground beef cooked before used in this recipe?
This is awesome, my sister and I are currently making a ham and tomato one! :)
This looks delicious! It might be a great idea for a dinner for when I’m back at college and want to have friends over for dinner!
what’s the bread for ?
I’m putting the ingredients for this on my shopping list!
I have never made a pizza braid, but they look fantastic. Simple, easy to put together and the taste looks great.
However, if you have the time, I encourage you to make your own dough…
albert grande
Pizza Therapy
I love Hy-Vee too! Yes, the midwest is a great place to live!
Hy-Vee, I miss you (I saw the hy-vee brand cheese in your pic)! I used to be the store dietitian at the Faribault, MN store. My husband and I moved back to NH…and I MISS the Midwest terribly! Only spent a year out there, but what a wonderful part of the US. This recipe looks great! Can’t wait to try it!!
You need to get in my belly now!!!
I know that this is an older post, but just like the previous commenter, I found this on StumbleUpon as well.
I made it for dinner tonight with a homemade garlic dough and it was SUPERB!! My friends all loved it and I’ve already shared a link here with a few more friends. Thanks for the handy recipe! :)
simply,
ME
This is what’s for dinner tonight! I found it through stumbleupon.com. Super excited to try it!
Wow, this pizza roll looks awesome! Wish I had it made for dinner!
You bake it at 375 for 25-30 mins..:) Been making this for years, except I use my bread maker for the dough..:)
pizza is the best food in nature :)
HOLLY WOW that looks SOOOOOO GOOD!! I have to try this
Hi,
I might have missed it, but I didn’t see how long you cook it for? I want to try this veggie style for my husband who can’t eat red meat. Can you let me know the temp and time for the cooking. Thanks! :O)
Wow, this looks very good!
Great, I’m glad!! You should experiment with different ingredients!
I made this for my family tonight and it was HUGE hit! I think my (picky!) eleven-year-old had fourths. He kept saying, “This is really good, mom. We should have this more often.” Thanks so much!
Plans to make a meatball sub version of this is in the works. Thanks for sharing!
I’m surprised someone hasn’t already asked this, well, either that or I completely missed something in the post, which is known to happen. How long does this cook? Are you baking per directions on baking the bread dough? Looks delish, I’d love to try it, but I’ll admit to either over or under cooking almost everything I try to make without solid directions. I’m hideous, I know. =)
Yum! I’m craving that right now!
Let me know if you do! I would be interested to make it!
I’m putting the ingredients for this on my shopping list
Oh, now that looks so good! I’m going to have to figure out how to make a gluten free version of it.
Another good idea is to do smaller pizza braids but not to fill them, instead sprinkle on top of them with cinnamon, sugar, and brown sugar and butter. This gooey desert pretzels are a great finish to any dinner!
WOW. This looks wonderful. I love pizza and calzones and this looks like the best of both!
Ya, Rhodes is delicious isn’t it? Braiding it is a fun new twist.
Genius! I always buy this bread dough to use as pizza dough. So I think the next time around I’ll just make a braid out of it.
Very mouth watering, and that braid made it more delicious looking. This made me crave for pizza.
Hi Howard, I’m glad this recipe served as creative inspiration for you :) I bet the pie-crusts would have a whole different taste, more flaky and dense, but delicious! I always love to try to figure out how to use leftovers. Good thinkin!
Hi Bob, Yes this is very similar to a stromboli. A lot of people like the “braided look,” it looks a little fancier than a stromboli!
Isn’t this basically just a stromboli with sauce on the inside and slits in the top?
Okay so when are you going to come and make this for me? LOL
I didn’t have the bread dough, so I used the pre-made pie crusts that my wife keeps in the freezer. The only downside was that it is a but less sturdy than the bread dough. So, it broke a little. But it was still very good. What a left-over user! I had some shredded cheeses, some meatloaf, pizza sauce and a bit of onion and green peppers. Yummy!
Will mention this post for national deep dish pizza day, it’s close enough. http://www.examiner.com/frugal-family-in-des-moines/julia-mcguire
Wow, I see dinner tonight. Thanks, this is a keeper!
Excuse me, but that looks greedy-good. I hate to do “real” braids, but I’d be glad to braid one of these…. And feed it to my Food Trap, of course.
The family will loves these. Thanks~!
OMG! Yum :)
Wow, that is too cool! I have never seen anything like it :)
I haven’t ever heard of that, sounds healthy though :)
Oh this looks amazing! A veggie pizza braid would be yummy too :) I would love to try this using a new flour we tried called Kamut Khorasan Wheat! Have you ever tried it? I love it because it is a whole wheat but has the taste and texture of a soft white. Good stuff Emily, thanks!
Thanks Laura. I was just thinking a veggie braid would be delish- squash, zucchini, onions… yum!
Ooh…once again a great recipe! I’m thinking of making a veggie pizza braid for dinner tonight. Thanks for sharing, Emily!