Joe Milczewski
TVWBB Fan
Thanks to everyone on this forum for giving me some ideas on how to turn out a quality pizza from my Performer. Special thanks to Jim McKelvey for a great post I found in the forums.
My goal continues to be to turn out a quality, Neapolitan style pie from the Performer. My standards are these: I want good char on the crust, I want some leopard spots on the bottom of the crust and I want the heat in the kettle to be such that I am able to cook a pie in 2 minutes or less.
Long story short, I'm not there yet. But I feel like I am making progress.
My first effort last night was the "Ring of Fire" technique. I poured a full chimney of unlit KBB in a ring around the grill, and then a full chimney of lit on top of that. Interspersed in the ring I had some applewood chunks. I then set up a pizza stone on top of two bricks placed on top of the grill. I had the bricks sitting on their longer edges in an effort to get the dough as close to the dome as possible. I waited 45 minutes after pouring in the lit coals before beginning to cook.
The result was good but not great. The total cook time was about 7 minutes. There was some charring on the crust on the side where there is a hot spot on the grill. But the cook time was way too long and it clearly did not cook from the top down.
For the second try, I tried to stoke the fire by adding more chunks of wood. I let them burn a while to try to get past the heaviest smoke, and then tried again. The temp of the grill was clearly hotter, but not hot enough. The cook time came down to about 6 minutes, but the smoke flavor was a little too pronounced. I didn't take any pics of this effort.
For a third try, I scraped all my hot coals to one side of the grill into a pile that reached almost to the grate itself. I kept the pizza stone on bricks, but turned the bricks on their flatter sides. I also moved the stone as far from the fire as possible. This worked much better. Cook time came down to between 5-6 minutes. I did have to turn the pie once mid-way through. This was a marinara pizza I did using this method, and also a pic of the set up.
I had enough dough for one more try, so I stoked the coals on the one side of the grill as much as possible, and added several wood chunks to really get it hot. This required lifting one of the flaps on the grill grate so that the coals and flame reached up to the level of the pizza. This made sense to me, as in brick oven the fire is on the cooking floor. The result was the best of all. Good char on the top, and a little spotting on the bottom. Best of all, the crust developed a bit of a true cornichon and had great texture. Cook time was a bit under 5 minutes, with a turn mid-way through.
These are my conclusions, and changes for next time:
1. It wasn't until my last cook that I felt like stone temps were approaching what I needed for some leoparding on the bottom. I can only conclude that I need to let the stone heat up for MUCH longer. To conserve fuel, I may pre-heat my stone for an hour or so in the oven and then bring it down to the hot grill.
2. Bringing the heat source up closer to the pizza is important to try help the heat flow back down to the top of the pie. This obviously increases the risk of burning a few, but what the hell.
3. The dome of the kettle is imperfect for redirecting heat back toward the grill. My suspicion is that the ceramic coating and the dome shape helps it RETAIN heat but not REFLECT it. This isn't a criticism of the Weber. I know it wasn't built for the purpose of cooking pizza. Next time I may try foiling the dome to see if that will bounce some of the heat downward.
Anyway, I look forward to trying again next week. The wife doesn't like the idea of a masonry project consuming our summer to build a brick oven in the backyard so I'm trying to improvise. Any suggestions would be helpful.
Happy weekend everybody!
My goal continues to be to turn out a quality, Neapolitan style pie from the Performer. My standards are these: I want good char on the crust, I want some leopard spots on the bottom of the crust and I want the heat in the kettle to be such that I am able to cook a pie in 2 minutes or less.
Long story short, I'm not there yet. But I feel like I am making progress.
My first effort last night was the "Ring of Fire" technique. I poured a full chimney of unlit KBB in a ring around the grill, and then a full chimney of lit on top of that. Interspersed in the ring I had some applewood chunks. I then set up a pizza stone on top of two bricks placed on top of the grill. I had the bricks sitting on their longer edges in an effort to get the dough as close to the dome as possible. I waited 45 minutes after pouring in the lit coals before beginning to cook.
The result was good but not great. The total cook time was about 7 minutes. There was some charring on the crust on the side where there is a hot spot on the grill. But the cook time was way too long and it clearly did not cook from the top down.
For the second try, I tried to stoke the fire by adding more chunks of wood. I let them burn a while to try to get past the heaviest smoke, and then tried again. The temp of the grill was clearly hotter, but not hot enough. The cook time came down to about 6 minutes, but the smoke flavor was a little too pronounced. I didn't take any pics of this effort.
For a third try, I scraped all my hot coals to one side of the grill into a pile that reached almost to the grate itself. I kept the pizza stone on bricks, but turned the bricks on their flatter sides. I also moved the stone as far from the fire as possible. This worked much better. Cook time came down to between 5-6 minutes. I did have to turn the pie once mid-way through. This was a marinara pizza I did using this method, and also a pic of the set up.
I had enough dough for one more try, so I stoked the coals on the one side of the grill as much as possible, and added several wood chunks to really get it hot. This required lifting one of the flaps on the grill grate so that the coals and flame reached up to the level of the pizza. This made sense to me, as in brick oven the fire is on the cooking floor. The result was the best of all. Good char on the top, and a little spotting on the bottom. Best of all, the crust developed a bit of a true cornichon and had great texture. Cook time was a bit under 5 minutes, with a turn mid-way through.
These are my conclusions, and changes for next time:
1. It wasn't until my last cook that I felt like stone temps were approaching what I needed for some leoparding on the bottom. I can only conclude that I need to let the stone heat up for MUCH longer. To conserve fuel, I may pre-heat my stone for an hour or so in the oven and then bring it down to the hot grill.
2. Bringing the heat source up closer to the pizza is important to try help the heat flow back down to the top of the pie. This obviously increases the risk of burning a few, but what the hell.
3. The dome of the kettle is imperfect for redirecting heat back toward the grill. My suspicion is that the ceramic coating and the dome shape helps it RETAIN heat but not REFLECT it. This isn't a criticism of the Weber. I know it wasn't built for the purpose of cooking pizza. Next time I may try foiling the dome to see if that will bounce some of the heat downward.
Anyway, I look forward to trying again next week. The wife doesn't like the idea of a masonry project consuming our summer to build a brick oven in the backyard so I'm trying to improvise. Any suggestions would be helpful.
Happy weekend everybody!
