Pizza on the grill

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Janet H

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Jan 17, 2007
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After many years of making pizza in the oven, I finally screwed up my courage to try it on the grill using a pizza stone. I am never using the oven again!

I put a pizza stone in the grill and heated the grill (propane) to 450. I assembled the pizza on a cutting board with lots of cornmeal underneath and when the grill was hot, sprinkled a little more cornmeal on the pizza stone. Next I slid the Pizza onto the hot stone and closed the lid. This was the scary bit - but I managed to do it without dumping a 15 inch raw pizza on the ground or overshooting and sticking it to the back wall of the grill.

The pizza took about 15 minutes to cook and it was AWESOME!

Does anyone else cook pizza this way? Any idea what a slightly hotter grill would do? maybe 500 degrees?
 
Pizza on the grill is even more attractive than heating up the kitchen with oven baked pizza during the heat of summer. Of course some of you lucky Pacific North Westerners do not have to put up with too much summer heat.
 
Add a little bit of wood for smoke and you take the pizza up another notch.
 
I use oak for fuel and get the grill to around 600F. We slightly pre cook the crust, add the toppings and on the stone it goes. The flavor you get from using wood as fuel can't be matched except in a wood burning oven, where the floor can get around 750F and the dome around 900F. Then when it cools down to around 550F, you bake bread.

Craig
 
D'oh! Okay so it never occurred to me to put the pizza stone on the grill. The one I have is too large for my GG so I'm going hunting for a smaller one or smaller ones (individual pizzas). Thanks Janet!!!!
 
I've done that too. I usually make a really thin crust and set the grill to high, mine will get almost 700 degrees. The pizza usually cooks in around 3 minutes, but you have to watch it or it will burn quickly.
 
D'oh! Okay so it never occurred to me to put the pizza stone on the grill. The one I have is too large for my GG so I'm going hunting for a smaller one or smaller ones (individual pizzas). Thanks Janet!!!!

I don't have a pizza stone, and I make mine on the Webber 22 inch charcoal kettle grill. I make a solid bed of coals, and let them get screaming hot while I put my pizza together. To assemble the pizza, I put enough olive oil into my 12" Cast Iron pan to pool, just a little in the pan center. I press my pizza crust into the pan and place the sauce and toppings on it. Let it rise for 15 minutes and put it on the grill. Cover and let it cook with all vents completely open. The light smoke from the charcoal (sometimes I'll throw just a bit of mesquite onto the charcoal) really makes the pizza come out amazing.

I believe that it is the smoke and slight charring that makes pizza come out great from a fire heated brick oven. I can duplicate that in the Webber Kettle. Good stuff.

The moral to the story is that though a pizza stone can be a good thing, if you don't have one, don't despair. Simply break out the cast iron.

Seeeeeeya; Goodweed of the North
 
I'm in Dave's shoes, my stone is too big for my grill. I DO however, have a lovely CI pan that I'm going to try now. Thanks GW! That's a great tip and yet another forehead slap (Why didn't I think of that before?!) for me.
 
I'm in Dave's shoes, my stone is too big for my grill. I DO however, have a lovely CI pan that I'm going to try now. Thanks GW! That's a great tip and yet another forehead slap (Why didn't I think of that before?!) for me.

Our closest pizzeria (Little Caesar's) uses cast iron pans to bake their pizzas.
 
my pizza stone shattered on my grill .. but it was about 750 degrees ..
i think it said not to go over 600 ..
 
Good to know. The stone I have came from target - it was cheap, and the instructions said to keep to keep it off burners that were on, using adjacent burners to get your grill hot.. It also said, that if you HAD to place it over burners that were on to keep them on low.

I have a 4 burner grill, so I put on the two on the outside and put the stone over the two in the center which were off but after 15 mins of heating, I couldn't get the grill over 375. I turned on the burners in the center (on low-ish) and that seemed to do the trick.
 
I thought I remember Mama doing pizza on the grill. I thought she set it right on the grate, but maybe not.

Good info on the stones breaking due to high heat.
 
I thought I remember Mama doing pizza on the grill. I thought she set it right on the grate, but maybe not.

Good info on the stones breaking due to high heat.

I've done directly on the grill but you (obviously) need to use a precooked crust for that. I've found that precooked just doesn't taste the same.

Waaaay back when DC first began, we had an Admin named MJ who did a LOT of pizza on his grill and in a pizza oven outside. I'm tempted to go search out some of those old threads for tips now that Janet has brought this up.
 
Oh yeah, good point. I guess you would want a stiff crust for that or it would be a mess.
 
Hmmm I have a cast iron griddle... I bet that would work well for individual pizzas.
 
I do pizza on the grill all the time. Fresh homemade dough - roll it out - toss it right on the well-oiled grate. Partially cook one side, them flip it over. Quickly add your toppings, and finish cooking.

The whole thing only takes minutes. Best pizza I've ever had!
 
As Craig said, we precook our crusts. We actually cook both sides a little and then add toppings as it makes for a crispier crust. But, since we usually make 4, we precook 2 of them first, bring them inside and add the toppings. By the time the last 2 crusts are getting precooked by him, I've got the toppings on and the first 2 are ready to go back on the grill.
 
Okay, Janet you have inspired me.

I am making a chicken-bacon pizza on the grill for tonight's dinner. I had a bit of a practice run with some bread dough rounds about a week ago and they were a success. So I'm following your lead!
 
Pizza stones--I had one years ago...I probably broke it...I don't recall what happened to it. Anyway, I recall reading someplace that unglazed terra cotta tiles can be used. Has anyone used one of those on the grill?
 
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