Pizza on the Grill

Want something fun to cook on your grill this Memorial Day weekend? If you haven't tried grilling pizza yet, forgive me, but what are you waiting for? The texture you get from the dough cooking on the grill is incredible! Light, crispy and crunchy!

Start with good quality dough, either homemade or storebought. Let it come to room temperature before you even attempt to roll it out. I like to cut my dough ball in half, it's much easier to manage on the grill.

Make sure your grill is super clean and all that former BBQ sauce has been burned off and scraped clean. Get the grill nice and hot, coasting on medium high. Your dough is going to cook up so fast, so don't walk away, it can burn!

Fresh, lighter ingredients work best for grilled pizza, have everything ready to go because things go really fast! For this pizza I used veggies that I grilled the day before, eggplant, zucchini, red and yellow peppers with fresh mozzarella for my cheese, all on top of a light tomato sauce base.

In the past I've made many margherita pizza's, you can't go wrong with that, or just melt your favorite cheese on the dough and when its done add some prosciutto and arugula, actually that's one of my absolute favorites!

Think caramelized onions, pancetta with blue cheese, feta or goat, cherry tomatoes tossed with fresh basil and olive oil spread all over creamy bubbly cheese. Another favorite of mine is shrimp with pesto, I could just ramble on and on for an hour about all the good combinations you can make! Chicken is good too, alright, alright I'll stop!

No matter how hard I try my pizza never comes out round, I roll it out round but when I plop it on the grill it morphs into another shape, who cares, it's all about the taste!

And believe me it tastes phenomenal! Pour yourself some wine or grab a beer, ice tea or lemonade and enjoy casual dining at it's finest!

Here's what you do:

Heat your clean grill up to a medium high heat, I like to oil my grill grates a little too.** While the grill is heating up, roll your room temperature dough out and brush the top with olive oil** Place dough, oiled side down on grill, don't move it, it will start to bubble up and cook, use tongs and check the bottom side it should look crispy with nice grill marks, once cooked it will be easy to flip** Pull it off, lower your heat and add all your toppings on the cooked side.** Place pizza back on the grill and when the cheese is all melted and bubbly and the underside is cooked it's done.

Happy Grilling!