Grilled Pizzas Common Process
Notes
All of the pizzas have common ingredients and a common process for cooking. They differ in what you put on top. A helpful hint is: Don’t go crazy with toppings. The tendency is to put too much on one pizza. The best results come with 1 or 2 toppings (3 at the most).
*I like the flavor of fresh mozzarella but prefer the performance of the low moisture one. The problem with fresh mozzarella is the moisture. If you use fresh mozzarella without a few precautions, you will wind up with a soggy pizza. When I use fresh, I cut or shred it then let it dry out on a paper towel in the refrigerator for an hour or so.
Ingredients
- 1 pizza dough ball
- ¼ cup olive oil
- 1½ tablespoons minced garlic
- 1 cup yellow corn meal
- 1-2 cups low moisture mozzarella cheese*
- Kosher salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Preheat your gas grill to as hot as you can get it.
- Roll out pizza dough until it is 3/8 of an inch thick. Though I have tried to hand stretch it and throw it the way they do at the pizza places in NY, I get the best results by starting by hand, stretching and pulling the dough to get it roughly shaped then finishing it with a rolling pin (or wine bottle).
- Cover your pizza peel (a.k.a. paddle) with a thin layer of corn meal. Place rolled out pizza dough on top.
- Place the raw dough on the grill, close the cover and let it cook for a few minutes. When the dough bubbles, check the bottom for doneness. You want it to be slightly charred. Slight char/grill marks are good. Burnt is bad.
- Take the half-cooked dough off the grill with your peel. Flip the dough so it is uncooked-side down. Spoon on a layer of olive oil and minced garlic, brushing it out to thinly coat the cooked side.
- Prepare each pizza with toppings of your choice (i.e. Margherita, Sausage and Mushroom, etc).
- Return pizza to the grill. Cook the bottom until it has good grill/char marks. Take it off the grill and place on a baking tin. (I usually make 3 or 4 pizzas on the grill an hour or so in advance and set them aside to cool.)
- As the guests begin to arrive, preheat the oven with a pizza stone to 450°.
- Finish the pizza in the oven to get them a crispy well done, 5-10 minutes.