Anyone grill Papa Murphy's pizzas on a regular basis?

[Jim C in Denver]

The reason to rotate the pie only makes sense when you have the heat source coming primarily from one place. In classic pizza cooking, you have flames and high heat coming from the back. So you rotate to make sure all 360 degrees get evenly cooked.

Not essential, therefore on a gasser. But not harmful either, since the heat should be fairly even around all 360 degrees.

The tricky part of cooking a PM pie on a grill is getting the cardboard peeled away from the moist doungh. I find it best to cook it a little (on a pizza pan, stone or grates). That will firm up the dough enough so you can separate it from the cardboard.

The trick of all grill pizza cooking (and especially on a gasser) is cooking the top enough before the bottom gets burned. TBH, popping it under your kitchen oven broiler is the best way to do that. But that does take away from the fun of doing it all outside on the grill.

 

[JoelA]

Shoulda stopped while I was ahead. First time use of the new Weber.

Didn’t realize the tank valve has to be turned on slowly as newer regulators cut the flow way down otherwise. So I couldn’t get the burners to do much, even wide open, until I read the manual closer. My old Weber Skyline had a quick-connect tank-to-regulator connection, and the handle could be spun quickly. Then the burners are so different, many more and smaller nozzles whose flames were all blue and hard to see, where my old Skyline’s jets have easily seen larger and yellow tipped flames. The whole time I was fiddling with these issues, it began raining. Fun.

So on went the new Weber pizza stone and began heating with all 3 mains and the Sear burner on full. Meanwhile I flip the Papa’s 16” Taco Grande upside down onto an old pizza pan, remove the wrap from the exposed bottom, and promptly discover the guys here are right… you can’t remove the paper tray cuz the dough sticks tightly. Okay, plan B. Reflip onto the back of my new 16” bamboo peel and slide it paper tray and all onto the stone in a grill that had made it in the interim to, oops, over 500F. Cueing another suggestion here to heat the thing on the stone for 5 minutes to get the tray to let loose, I tried that, and it worked almost too well… the bottom was browning fast. Lowered the burners’ settings. Finagled the tray out from under the pizza, picked the pizza up on the peel, sprinkled cornmeal on the stone, and slid the pizza back on top of it. Shut off the Sear burner. Got the temp down to 400F.

I checked it a few times and turned it as recommended. Then it had browned nicely on the bottom, but didn’t quite look “done” in the middle cheese and toppings. The pizza was puffed up and unusually delicious looking otherwise, but I get comments if either the bottoms or tops aren’t done enough. So I closed the lid and turned down the burners for another 5 minutes. Wrong! Shoulda yanked it instead. Not having used a stone before, I didn’t grasp how much heat they keep kicking out on their own. When I took the pizza off, much to my chagrin the bottom was black. Aaarrrgghhh! I’d so looked forward to this adventure with all new equipment.

Of course I heard about it at the table. Some family members invented a technique for removing the burned bottom of slices. My wife added that she thought the toppings were overcooked as well. Timing is everything. And having anticipated with verve the return of the beloved seasonal Taco Grande, my family was quite disappointed in the flavor experience.

Next time I’ll either leave the paper tray on throughout or “set” the dough for only 2 minutes before tugging the tray out. And I’ll endeavor to keep the grill temp under 450F throughout. Not sure about the cornmeal, as it promptly acted like popcorn, jumped and burned when I scattered it on the hot stone, and may have contributed to the overall blackening of the pizza’s bottom. If it seems to be bottom browning faster than the toppings are cooking, I may try turning way down or off the two burners directly under the stone, and leave the grill’s far left one on full to see if that heats the air on top of the pizza enough to get it done sans a black bottom.

 

[LMichaels]

I have honestly never had nor has my wife had a lick of issue removing the cardboard under a frozen pizza. And if ANYONE would she would. And she uses a lot of frozen pizzas. Me? Very occasionally. But, I have always just slid them right off. No tricks used or anything.

 

[Bruno]

I have honestly never had nor has my wife had a lick of issue removing the cardboard under a frozen pizza. And if ANYONE would she would. And she uses a lot of frozen pizzas. Me? Very occasionally. But, I have always just slid them right off. No tricks used or anything.

These aren’t frozen, they are more or less fresh made and refrigerated.

 

[LMichaels]

These aren’t frozen, they are more or less fresh made and refrigerated.

Ahh ok. Never had one. I've seen Tom Horsman doing them (I think that brand) but never realized they're not frozen

 

[Andy Kaminski]

Papa Murphy’s pizza is good pizza for store bought.
It is better than most and sometimes better than Roundtable.
I used to buy them when they had their Tuesday $10. special for a large pie.
I’ve never had any problem separating them from their cardboard.

I prefer to make my own now.
Every now and then I will struggle separating my fresh pies when putting them to the oven or bbq.
If I have a pizza party night I sometimes prefab a bunch a bunch of pies and use parchment paper as a cheat to make things run smoother.

 

[Brian Thomas]

I cook PM pizzas on my EP320 Genesis all the time.

I first put a raised grate on top of the grates. They're easy to make. Get an el cheapo grate from Lowes or HD. Then get 4 carriage bolts at least 4" long and 2 washers and nuts for each one. Attach 1 bolt to each corner of the grate and adjust the height as needed. Total cost for this is about $30.

After putting in the grate I turn the front and rear burners to med/low and the middle burner to low. This gets the temp to about 425.

I put the pizza on the grate and cook for 10 min. After 10 min I turn the pizza 90 degrees and poke any bubbles with a fork. Cook for an additional 5 min and it's done. Comes out great every time.

The pizza does act as a heat deflector for the lid thermometer so don't freak out if the thermometer is showing a temp of just 300 or so after you put in the pizza..

Hope this helps.

 

[Andy Kaminski]

I bbq my pizza on this but have switched my cast iron to one that has no lip.