Jun

Grilled Pizza: Basic How To

Grilled Pizzas with goat cheese, caramelized onions and mushrooms, roasted peppers and Parmesan cheese.

I use my grill at least once a week in good weather, and I have pizza at least once a week in ANY weather — so why have I never put the two together? I think I suffered from an irrational fear: FOPFTTG — or Fear Of Pizza Falling Through The Grates. Losing a hot dog in a grill is sad, but losing a pizza would be a tragedy.

Like many fears, this fear is irrational, although strangely shared by many. As a Girl Scout leader and camper, I have enjoyed making pie-iron pizzas (I will cover those in a future post) but I always avoided the grill method. Too risky.

But cheered on by many other food bloggers who have successfully grilled pizza on a grill, and lived to post about it, I decided it was time. Last weekend we grilled 4 pizzas and they were delicious and beautiful — and fun to make. And I am happy to report that none of the pizzas fell through the grates.

This recipe is for the basics of grilling a pizza, overcoming the initial nervousness, and prepping and cooking. I made 2 kinds of pizzas: goat cheese with veggies (roasted peppers and caramelized onions and mushrooms), and mozzarella cheese with chicken pesto sausage.

With this method of grilling pizzas, you will grill one side of the crust first, flip it over onto a cookie sheet, top it, and then put it back on the grill to cook the bottom of the crust, melt the cheese and heat the toppings.

Olive oil - just carry this around at every step. It’s like oxygen for pizza.
Flour or corn meal - 1/2 cup or so; for making sure the dough doesn’t get stuck to your work surfaces. The secret is to use enough to avoid sticking but not too much to interfere with the taste or texture of the dough.
Crust - either make your own or use prepared crust. Because of my FCFTG I didn’t want to make the emotional investment in preparing a crust from scratch (I’m also a little afraid of yeast, but that’s another post) so I bought 2 bags of dough from Trader Joe’s - one plain and one herbed. In Chicago, and hopefully other large cities, you can buy dough from local Italian delis. You can also use pre-made crust, like Boboli crusts. Estimate 1 12-inch crust (or standard bag of dough) serves 1-2 people (2 adults with a salad, or 1 big hungry guy like my son).

To prepare the dough - I opted to make 2 smaller pizzas from one bag of dough, because I thought it would be easier to handle (it was), and because this gives you the option of creating different kinds of pizzas separately. Simply separate the dough in half. This is especially good if you are having a pizza party. Make one pizza crust for each guest and let them prepare the rest as they want.
To roll out the dough, use a clean surface with flour or corn meal. Throw the ball of dough down like you are mad at it (this was fun for me), and then flatten it out with your hands. Lift it up to make sure it’s not getting stuck and sprinkle more flour/corn meal as needed.
Flatten it out as thick or thin as you want. Let your inner pizza maker out; it really comes naturally. Humming along with Dean Martin’s version of “That’s Amore” helps a lot.
Add a bit of olive oil (1/2 tsp. for a half of a crust) and spread it over the crust. You can use a rolling pin but it’s not necessary; using your hands is easier. ..
Flip the crust over once, spread it out a bit, and spread the same amount of olive oil on this side. You should be really enjoying this now, and considering a new career as a pizza maker. Continue to flatten and shape the dough as needed. Perfect circles are nice but other shapes are fine (just call them “rustic”). Some people like squares.
When you are satisfied with the thickness and shape of the dough, place your completed crust on a cookie sheet.

Sauce - I used simple marinara sauce; again, make your own or used a prepared sauce. You can also use a white sauce, or any kind of sauce as a base for the cheese (I’m thinking pest would be awesome) and toppings. Estimate is 1/4 - 1/2 cup of sauce per pizza.

Cheese - I used crumbled goat cheese on 2 pizzas and shredded mozzerralla on the others. Estimate about 1 cup of cheese per pizza. Yeah, I kinda like cheese.

Toppings - Keep it simple; no more than 3 ingredients is recommended. You can use standards like pepperoni, sausage (cooked), veggies (raw or cooked, depends on what you like) or just keep it plain with no toppings. I will cover some different toppings in future posts (I am already planning on a Maragrita pizza with fresh basil from my garden and slices of mozzarella).

Cookie Sheets without edges - Use these to hold the pizzas before and after grilling.
Cutting Board - (optional) - for slicing when the pizzas are completely one (you could cut on the cookie sheet but I hate that sound and it’s not so good for your knife.)
Spatula/Flipper - use the largest you have to check the crust and to remove the pizza from the grill.
Tongs - use the largest you have to work with the spatula in removing the crust from the grill.
Grill - Use either a gas or charcoal grill. I use charcoal. Prepare coals as usual; spread out as much as you can so that most of your grill is medium-high heat.
Prep table - more than any other grilling, you really need a prep table beside your grill for making pizzas.
Helper - Although grilling pizzas is really easy, it’s good to have a helper in case things heat up (and I mean really heat up) quickly.

Prepare the crusts and toppings before you start the coals.
Start the coals and bring all of your materials (crusts on cookie sheets, sauce, olive oil, cheeses, toppings, spatula/flipper, tongs) to the prep table.
When the coals are ready and spread out, remove the crusts from the cookie sheets. Hopefully they won’t stick. If they are, try the spatula (add olive oil if things get really sticky). I just lifted the crust up with my hands while Paul held the cookie sheet over the grill. Our crusts were fairly thin and we were worried they would stretch out too much in transit — they were fine.
Once the crust is on the grill, it will take about 4 minutes to cook. Avoid the temptation to check after 1 minute, but a 3 minute check is OK.
Check all sides of the crust and adjust it if 1 side is more cooked than the other. This will be the top of the crust and should be cooked as light as possible.
When done, put the crust on the cookie sheet with the uncooked side down. You will be topping the cooked side. Some people flip the crust directly on to the grill, which requires quick — and I mean reallyquick - adding of sauce, cheese and toppings. I might do this after I get a few of these under my apron, but for now, I’ll take the slow and easy route.
Add toppings: Sauce is first; go lightly. Then add cheese and any additional toppings.
Put the pizza back on the grill and cover it. It will need to cook about 5- 8 minutes, depending on your grill and the coals.
Keep an eye on it. You want the crust to be a nice medium to dark brown and the cheese melted. Move it around if one side is cooking more than the other.
When done, remove the pizza from the grill, using the spatula and possibly the tongs. Place it on the cookie sheet or cutting board.
Let it cool for 30 seconds, then slice and enjoy.