Grilled Pepperoni Pizza

[CDN]

Alright NY friends, I know you guys love your pies! So let me know if this southern boy is doing it right!

Pizza is one of those foods that is kind of a staple of sorts. You can have it for tailgate and football parties, birthday parties, it's even great sitting around the pool relaxing in the summertime. We make our own pizzas on the Weber Kettle with lump charcoal and a chunk of oak for that wood fired flavor. I'm telling you, it could put the name brand pizza joints out of business!

Here's what you need:

Pizza dough, handmade or premade from the grocery store

Pizza sauce, homemade or your favorite store bought

1 or 2 packs of Pizza cheese

Sliced pepperoni

1 package of breakfast sausage

Mushrooms

1 medium onion, (I prefer Vidalia, but I live in Georgia where you can get them. A sweet onion would do fine)

Lump or briquette charcoal

1 small wood chunk such as oak, hickory or pecan

3 bricks (optional)

Pizza stone

Pizza peel

The first thing to consider here is your dough. My wife makes a great homemade pizza dough, and I'll have to get her to spill the beans and post her recipe on here. She makes the dough and freezes it so we will have it when we need it. But we have found that for a couple of more dollars than making your own, the local grocery stores around here offer frozen doughs that are excellent. So check your local grocer and see if they offer anything, in the meantime, I'll try to get her to tell me her recipe! Now on to the rest of the pizza cook. Start off by browning the sausage in a pan. While it is going, go ahead and get the grill going. We use a Weber Kettle, but you could use whatever you have or what you like, you just may have to adjust my method to suit your needs. The key is you are going to heat your pizza stone to 500 degrees, so build your fire with that in mind. For my Weber Kettle, that will require one full chimney of charcoal, plus a few pieces dumped unlit into the grill. I usually use lump charcoal, but briquettes would work just fine. Once the charcoal gets going good, dump it in the middle of the grill and let it continue to burn until it is fully lit and all pieces are burning. Then spread it around the edges of the grill body, so as to create a "bowl" of heat with no charcoal in the middle.

Next, place your chunk of wood or wood chips on the fire so they can start burning down. I like to use oak, but hickory or pecan will do nicely as well. You don't want to use much, just one chunk to give it a hint of wood flavor. The combination of the coals and the wood chunk will do this without overpowering the flavor of the pizza, but you want to let the wood burn down so that it doesn't smoke too heavy. Place your 3 bricks on the cooking grate in a position so that your pizza stone will sit on top of them. This step is optional, but through trial and error we have found that this method creates a "barrier" between the stone and the direct heat of the coals, and will lead to less burned crusts! Place the pizza stone on the bricks and put an oven thermometer on the stone to monitor the temp. Remember we want to get to 500 degrees ideally.

Place the lid of your grill so that it is resting on the handle, but leaving a gap to allow oxygen and let the charcoal and wood continue to burn, creating a rising heat for your stone. Back inside, when your sausage has browned, remove it from the heat and strain it to remove the grease. Slice the mushrooms into 1/4 inch thick slices and slice the onions into slivers, and place in the leftover grease in the sausage pan. Lightly saute the mushrooms and onions, but don't let them get completely done. Now you are ready to put your pizza together while you are waiting for the stone to come up to temp. Cover your pizza peel with corn meal, as this will give a "marble effect", allowing the pizza to slide off easily onto the stone.

Next, Shape the dough into the proper shape, being careful not to overwork it. Use your hands to stretch it and shape it, being careful not to get it too thin. This process takes practice, but you will learn how to get it to your liking, as folks like different thickness of pizza crust. Also be mindful of the size of your stone, don't make your crust bigger than the diameter of the stone! In fact it is best if you make it just slightly smaller, to prevent exposed crust from burning. Spoon out about 2 tablespoons of pizza sauce and use the bottom of the spoon to spread it around the dough. Then pile on the cheese, followed by the sausage, pepperoni, onions and mushrooms, then what the heck, maybe a little more cheese! We're ready for the grill!

Once the stone has reached 500 degrees, remove the thermometer and carefully slide the pizza off of the peel onto the stone. You want to get the pizza on the stone so that no edge is hanging off the stone to prevent burning. Close the lid and let it go for about 7-8 minutes, then check it and use the peel to rotate it 180 degrees, to prevent hotspots on the bottom of the crust. It is impossible to get the charcoal exactly uniform around the bottom edge of the grill, so you may have one particular area or side that is hotter than the other. Close the lid back up and let it cook for another 7-8 minutes, or until the crust has puffed up and started to brown around the edges, the cheese has melted, and the mushrooms and onions look to have softened up.

Using the peel, carefully slide the pizza off of the stone, take it in, slice and enjoy! You can use this method to create any type of pizza you like, the possibilities are endless!

[Littlesunray]

oh I had to see this while I am hungry lol I am not eating lunch yet maybe in a while but we are all going to a gun raffle later on then I will get some food to eat there lol

[Littlesunray]

also we have one of the cooking round stones and I love ours best thing I ever got for pizza's lol

[Fletch]

Hmmm I have been doing grilled pizzas for years never tried the pizza stone. Will have to attempt.