Grilled Pizza

 Anyone who knows me well has heard me RAVE about grilled pizza.  It is absolutely amazing.   I happened upon this method of cooking pizza a couple of years ago and we have been hooked on it ever since.  I mean how can anything but magic happen when a barbeque grill and Italian food collide?  Lots of people have been intrigued with this idea so today I thought I would share the process step by step. 

What you'll need:

 -A grill.  Duh.

-Clean grill grate. Don't want the dough to stick!  You can also spray it with a little cooking spray

- Dough- from scratch, packaged mix, canned- whatever your little heart desires

- Sauce 

- Toppings

- Olive oil

- Grill tongs and Spatula 

- Rimless baking sheet 

Mmm.  Can you smell that rosemary?

 First, you will want to prepare your dough and prep the toppings you will want to put on your pizza.  I like to make my dough from scratch because it makes me feel more Martha Stewart-ish and I also like to add a little rosemary and basil to my dough (you should totally try that if you've never had rosemary pizza crust). Mix and form your dough according to instructions.  Divide your dough into four even portions.  Why divide the dough?  Because working with four small circles of dough on the grill is sooo much easier than one large one.  It also allows for you to do different toppings combinations and if you are having guests over everyone can customize their own personal pizza.  Yay!  

 Next you will prepare a rimless (you will see later why it needs to be rimless) baking sheet  to form your pizza crusts on.  Lube that baby up with lots of olive oil so it's super slick. 

 Work the dough sections into circle-ish shapes on top of the oiled baking sheet.  They don't have to be perfect and trust me, even if they are they won't stay that way for long.  The crusts should be about 1/4 of an inch thick.  Use a pastry brush to apply more olive oil to the tops of the crusts.  Now its time to do a test.  Pick up the pan and tilt it to one side.  When you do this the crusts should begin to slide on the pan.  If they don't remove the crusts and add more olive oil to the sheet til they do.

You are now ready to head out to the grill. 

We have a charcoal grill.  I prefer the flavor of a charcoal grill over that of a gas grill but a gas grill can also be used.  You will want to pre-heat your gas grill to medium heat.  Charcoal grills are a bit trickier.  You will want enough coals to cover the entire bottom of the grill in a singe layer.  You'll want the coals to be moderately hot with no visible flame.   The coals are moderately hot when you can hold your hand about for inches above them for no more than 3 seconds.  If you are using a charcoal grill you will probably want to start the coals before you begin making your dough since it takes around 30 min or so for a charcoal grill to reach the desired temperature.

 Hold baking sheet above the grill and slide the crusts, one at a time, onto the grill.  If you are having trouble you can use grill tongs or spatula to help ease them off the sheet.  I know what you are thinking...that dough is going to fall right through the grate.  Don't worry.  If the grill is at the right temperature the dough begins to firm up instantly.  If any edge does start to slip through just use tongs or spatula to pull it back from its fiery death. 

After just a minute or so the crust will begin to bubble and puff up.  It's time to remove them from the grill.  Slide your spatula under the crust flip them so you place them grilled side up on your baking sheet.  They should easily come off the grate.  If not give them just a few more moments on the grill. 

 A couple of these got a little too done but you get the idea.  You want that side of the crust to be just firm enough to remove it from the grill.  Now you can take your crusts and add sauce and toppings to the already grilled side.  With grilled pizza the crust is really the star here so you don't want to over do it with sauce and toppings- less is more. 

Obviously I feel no need to impress with made from scratch sauce. 

 I prefer to use a mix of pesto and tomato sauce.  Something about the nutty, basily goodness of the pesto just pairs wonderfully with the smokey flavor of the pizza.  I also love tomato sauce and the two play so nicely together.

 Like I said before, go light on the toppings.  This is often hard for me because I just love, love, LOVE pizza toppings.  This night we opted for grilled chicken, bacon, red onion, mushroom, black olives, goat cheese and threw a little parmesan on a couple of them.  I've also had grilled pizza with just a few vegetables and it was  amazing.  That's what I love about pizza....so versatile! I do suggest that if you are using any raw veggies like tomato slices or onions that you give them a quick saute just to remove some firmness because they won't be on the grill for all that long.  Once your pizzas are topped to your liking take them back out to the grill to cook the bottom side of the crust. 

See whats happening here?  Pure. Magic. 

This time you will want to leave the pizza on for a little bit longer around 4 minutes or so. You want the bottom of the crust to turn a light shade of brown and be nice and firm.  I constantly check the bottom by lifting the pizza with a spatula to make sure it doesn't burn.  Once the crusts reach the desired color remove them from the grill. 

Don't they look dreamy?  Swoon.

  At this point if your cheese didn't melt enough you can pop it under the broiler in your oven.  Your pizza is finished!  Cut those suckers up and relish in the deliciousness of grilled pizza.