This delicious 4 Cheese Pizza is made with an easy homemade garlic butter crust and loads of melted cheese. Add some chicken for a gourmet white chicken pizza you will love.
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With shredded mozzarella cheese, shredded white cheddar cheese, feta cheese crumbles, and grated Parmesan cheese added to butter and garlic-coated crust and a little fresh tomato, the taste is terrific. Adding chicken is the final touch to make this one great pizza.
You could call this Pizza Quattro Formaggi, which means "four cheese pizza" in Italian and is a classic Italian dish. The cheese is usually melted. Varieties can vary some but usually include mozzarella and commonly combined with gorgonzola, Parmigiano Reggiano, and goat cheese. It may be made with or without tomato sauce—rossa (red) or bianca (white).
Check out these other pizza recipes, like How to Make Pizza Dough and Cook Homemade Pizza, French Bread Pizza, Biscuit Pizza, Crock Pot Pizza Casserole, and Low-Carb Tortilla Pizza, which includes a variation of this recipe.
🧀Ingredients
- Pizza Dough—all-purpose flour, salt, sugar, yeast
- Garlic butter for crust—butter, garlic powder
- Cheese—mozzarella, white cheddar, feta, and Parmesan, but use what you like.
- Highly recommend—Roma tomato, precooked chicken (like rotisserie chicken)
- Suggested topping—green pepper, red onion, cooked crumbled bacon
👨🍳How to Make 4-Cheese Pizza
- Mix crust ingredients completely, form into a ball, cover, and let rise until double in size.—about 30-40 minutes.
- Spread the dough on a well-oiled 12-inch pizza pan or ¼ sheet baking tray.
- Combine melted butter and garlic powder—brush on the made-out dough.
- Top with cheeses and other toppings of choice.
- Bake in a preheated oven for 20 to 25 minutes.
This is a summary of the steps and ingredients. See the recipe card or the step-by-step photo instructions below for full instructions.
✔️Tips and Options
The dough
- The dough, after mixing, should be soft and a little fluffy. It will be a little sticky. Add a bit more water or flour to adjust if needed.
- The dough can be made ahead and refrigerated or frozen. See How to Make Pizza Dough for details.
- This pizza uses a standard-thickness crust but makes more or less pizza dough to adjust the thickness of the crust.
- I recommend AP (all-purpose) flour or bread fluid. You can substitute up to 50% whole wheat, but this recipe calls for a white crust. The whole wheat will usually need more fluid and a touch of honey.
- Non-wheat flour is probably not a good substitute in this recipe. Gluten-free baking is a whole other thing and not just some substituting.
Sauce and Toppings.
- I like using thin slices of Roma tomatoes for a little more Italian tomato-like taste.
- The chicken, which is optional, can be any cooked chicken you happen to have. Perfect use for leftover rotisserie chicken.
- The main feature of this recipe is the combination of cheeses, and I suggest following my suggestions. But Gorgonzola cheese, Fontina cheese, Romano cheese, goat cheese, and Provolone cheese are also good choices.
- Ricotta is used mainly in New York Style White, which is a different recipe.
↕️How to make this smaller "for two" or "family size" recipe
This is a very easy recipe to cut in half or double. As written, this makes a 12-inch medium-sized pizza—about eight slices and will fit on an eighth-size sheet pan. A half recipe makes an 8-9 inch small pizza, and a double recipe makes a large 16-inch pizza that works on a quarter sheet pan, also.
- Use the recipe card and adjust the number of servings to half or double.
- Use the amount of ingredients in the ingredient list, not the instructions—those do not adjust.
- Cook for the same amount of time.
❓FAQs
In addition to the variety of cheeses mentioned above, you can add almost anything you like. Add a tomato-base pizza sauce, use other spices, or sprinkle with fresh basil. Add some mushrooms, black olives, or caramelized onions. And I have been known to add some cooked Italian sausage or pepperoni.
Store leftover pizza sealed in an airtight container, like a Ziplock bag. Refrigerate for 3 days or freeze for 3 months.
Leftover pizza is best reheated in a medium oven on a preheated pizza stone. You can reheat it in a microwave, giving a soggy crust or a skillet, which is good for the crust but not the best for the cheese.
This recipe is listed in these categories. See them for more similar recipes.
Step-by-Step Photo Instructions
In a large mixing bowl, add 1 cup warm water, ½ pack of rapid or quick yeast, ½ teaspoon sugar, ½ teaspoon salt, and 1 ½ teaspoons olive oil.
Add 2 ¼ cups flour and mix. Add more flour if it is too sticky, but you are making a light dough, not a heavy brick. Add more water if needed.
Cover, place in a warm place, and let rise until double in size—about 30-40 minutes.
While the dough is rising, prep any toppings. Precooked rotisserie chicken, green bell pepper, red onion, and Roma tomato are recommended.
Preheat oven to 375° convection or 400° in a conventional oven. Spread the dough on a well-oiled medium 12-inch pizza pan. Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in a microwave, mix with 1 teaspoon of garlic powder, and spread thinly over the dough.
Top with cheeses and other toppings of choice.
Bake in an oven for 20 to 25 minutes.
📖 Recipe
4 Cheese Pizza
Ingredients
Dough
- 2 ¼ cups all purpose flour
- 1 cups water - warm
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon sugar
- ½ pack rapid or quick yeast
Toppings
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- ¼ cup Parmesan cheese - grated
- ⅓ cup feta
- ⅓ cup white cheddar - shredded
- ⅓ cup mozzarella - shredded
Optional toppings
- 1 Roma tomato - sliced ⅛ inch
- 1 cup cooked chicken - optional
- ¼ red onion - medium thinly sliced
- ½ green pepper - diced
- 2 strips bacon - Cooked crumbled
Instructions
- In a large mixing bowl, add 1 cup warm water, ½ pack of rapid or quick yeast, ½ teaspoon sugar, ½ teaspoon salt, and 1 ½ teaspoons olive oil.
- Add 2 ¼ cups flour and mix. Add more flour if it is too sticky, but you are making a light dough, not a heavy brick. Add more water if needed. Cover, place in a warm place, and let rise until double in size—about 30-40 minutes.
- While the dough is rising, prep any toppings. Precooked rotisserie chicken, green bell pepper, red onion, and Roma tomato are recommended.
- Preheat oven to 375° convection or 400° in a conventional oven. Spread the dough on a well-oiled medium 12-inch pizza pan. Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in a microwave, mix with 1 teaspoon of garlic powder, and spread thinly over the dough.
- Top with cheeses and other toppings of choice.
- Bake in an oven for 20 to 25 minutes.
Your Own Private Notes
Recipe Notes
Pro Tips:
- This is for a standard thickness 12-inch crust.
- Changing the size of the pizza and pan sizes are discussed in the post.
- The dough needs to be a bit light, so it will be a little sticky.
- The chicken is pre-cooked leftovers from wherever you want it—usually rotisserie chicken.
- I don't recommend changing the cheeses much. It is the feature of this recipe but options are in the recipe post.
To adjust the recipe size:
You may adjust the number of servings in this recipe card under servings. This does the math for the ingredients for you. BUT it does NOT adjust the text of the instructions. So you need to do that yourself.
Nutrition Estimate
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Originally Published: September 7, 2011. Updated with expanded options, refreshed photos, and a table of contents to help navigation.
Chris
Dude, that looks wicked good! Alexis and I enjoy white pizza as our favorite but use alfredo based sauce. The 4 cheeses that you use bring a lot of taste to the pizza and I'll be giving this a try soon. Bookmarked this post.
Mumsfilibaba
Mmm. Can I have a slice? :P
Barefeet In The Kitchen
This looks delicious. I'd love a slice of this for lunch.
Inspired by eRecipeCards
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