BBQ Pizza (non WFO)

[adm]

Last Saturday, the Weber Charcoal Pizza Oven that I ordered a while back got delivered. It's a replacement for the lid of a Weber 57cm kettle BBQ with a pizza stone built into it and ducting for hot air, plus a lower lid with an opening at the front that channels the hot air from the charcoal across the top of the pizza and out the front. It's actually a pretty clever design and is well made like most Weber products.

I wasn't expecting it, so wasn't prepared to be cooking pizza, but the results came out like this....



This was the 2nd pizza I made - I was low on Mozzarella, but had some olives and salami and knocked up a quick tomato sauce. Could have done with a little longer, but was very tasty anyway. My skills at thrwoing pizza bases are still unformed - so it's a bit misshapen and too thick for my preference.



Here's the underside of the base - looking pretty OK. My dough recipe was just using bread flour and only quickly proven, but it seems to have puffed up OK.

I ordered a 25Kg bag of Caputo Pizzeria flour, which was delivered yesterday, so I will practice a bit more over the weekend if the weather permits, but all in all it seems like a neat little gizmo and looks like it kicks out enough heat to make decent pizza.

It's not a 90 second pizza cook though - more like 3 minutes, but should suffice until I build my Pompeii oven....

[cannyfradock]

ADM

.....just skipping through the "20 most recent posts" to see if I can add a few comments on any new questions and.....saw your pics.

How dare you post a pic of a luscious looking pizza ....not baked in a wood-fired oven!!. Not quite sure how you managed it, but the base of your pizza resembles the closest thing I've seen to a wood-fired oven pizza......anybody can pay through the nose for special pizza toppings, but often less is more and it's the crust that's makes a good Neopolitan Pizza.

Please hurry up and build that wood-fired oven......

Terry

[rivergirl]

Fab pizza ! Can you post a picture of the oven?

[adm]

Here you go:



Here's the external view. You can see how much lower the pizza oven lid is than the standard Weber lid. It's hinged at the back and stays up when you lift it with a little cam type arrangement. It comes with a couple of little aluminium heat shields for the plastic grill handles which is a nice thought. You can see one on the front handle.



With the lid up. Here you can see the vents at the back which channel the hot air up from the coals and over the top of the pizza.



And finally with the pizza stone removed. This is the bit that surprised me. I thought the stone would sit directly over the coals, but there's a chamber underneath it with some vents...

I got a 25Kg bag of Caputo 00 Pizerria flour sitting in the litchen now so will experiment over the weekend!

[rivergirl]

Very swish!!!

[adm]

Here's a bit of this evening's output.

This gizmo is working well - and the Caputo flour made a lot of difference. It's beautiful to work with and makes a lovely base. Much easier to throw pizza with than than standard strong flour which seem too "elasticky" to me. The Caputo spreads well and doesn't rip so much....



I seem to finally be getting the hang of throwing pizzas. This one was with wild boar salami, pepperdew peppers and buffalo mozz. Lovely.

[faz]

MMMMM nice looking pizza. Nice looking bit of kit too

[adm]

A few more pizzas made it off the Weber this evening. I used the recent Dan Lepard dough recipe from the Guardian (50/50 water/beer, olive oil) with Caputo 00 pizzeria flour.

To be honest, I didn't really like the dough all that much - it kept springing back too much, but was also easy to rip holes in. On the plus side, it puffed up well at the crust boundary. A bit too "doughy" for me though - I like thinner and crispier personally. I think back to the Jeff Verasano recipe next time.

Still. The kids loved it and crowned me King of Pizza.


This one is anchovy and black pudding. Pretty "out there" but it worked really well. I think an egg in the middle next time.


And the obligatory crust shot.

The Weber pizza oven gets bloody hot. I have a contact grill thermometer that runs out at 650C and it's pegged at the stop after about 30 mins. Must buy an infra red thermo to see how hot it does get.

[turkey]

I must say that looks a swish bit of kit, I love my oven but for the odd 1 or 2 pizzas I can see that being really useful.

black pudding on a pizza sounds really good, an egg never hurts on a pizza if you ask me

[cannyfradock]

adm

I'm still thinking about banning you for posting "Pizza Porn" on a wood-fired oven forum when using a Weber grill.....only joking!!

Great results...and love your top tip on the use of Caputo flour....

and the Caputo flour made a lot of difference. It's beautiful to work with and makes a lovely base. Much easier to throw pizza with than than standard strong flour which seem too "elasticky" to me. The Caputo spreads well and doesn't rip so much....


Terry

[adm]

:-) Thanks Terry,

I only bought the Weber pizza oven as I was lusting after wood fired oven pizza (and all kinds of other goodies), but knew that I was a year away from having a WFO! I figured it might be a good interim measure - and it certainly is!

Today, I am busy cutting down a massive bay tree that is right where I want to put the slab for my WFO base - so I am at least making a little progress! I am a realist though, and I know that given my work schedule and other commitments, if I get the WFO built by next summer I will have done well....

Still - at least I will have halfway decent pizza while I build it, and by the time I am complete my recipes and technique should be pretty good!

[rivergirl]

I am lighting up the hot smoker tomorrow so I am going to follow your lead and have a bash. Maybe flatbreads.

[turkey]

May 19, 2013 13:34:28 GMT adm said:

Today, I am busy cutting down a massive bay tree that is right where I want to put the slab for my WFO base - so I am at least making a little progress! I am a realist though, and I know that given my work schedule and other commitments, if I get the WFO built by next summer I will have done well....

It took me 2 years to build and hand on heart I cannot say I had a lot of other commitments really, just lazyness or lack of preparation so when dry weekends did come round I was not able to make any progress.

In truth you can build most parts quite quick so if you plan well and have the ability to store materials then it should not be so hard to fit in round other jobs and responsibilities.

[adm]

True.

I do travel a lot - I am pretty much out of the country 3 weeks out of 4 right now.

Luckily, I do have the space to store materials, so I am busy planning and getting ready to buy in a whole load of stuff - including 100 square metres of sandstone paving that will need to be laid at the same time as building an outdoor kitchen.... I hope to get the area levelled, the paving and the WFO slab laid over the school summer holiday period, then hopefully the blockwork for the base. After that I can probably do the dome in bits and pieces at my leisure...