My first pizza on the EGG.

JustSmokeIt

This is my first pizza bake on my new EGG.

(I had set the gaskets with 6 previous bbq/grill sessions at 350 F and below including a 5 hr cook with a 14 lb pit ham on Easter Sunday.)

After reading through many forum posts and watching countless videos, I decided to take the best parts of several and put them together to come up with a workable technique. 

What I came up with:

1) Setup - legs up on the plate, then cooking grid, and the pizza stone on top of the cooking grid.
2) Temperature - 500 F.
3) Preheat stone to 500 F verified with IR Laser.
4) Add apple wood chunks immediately prior to adding pizza.
5) Cook time was 12 minutes.

The setup was to get decent air around the stone and the dome.. The temp was chosen to keep both parts of the pizza cooking together so that the crust didn't burn before the toppings had time to properly cook and melt the cheese.

Too many posts and videos were nightmares with burnt pie dough and and under cooked toppings and vice versa, or easier explained as unevenly cooked pizzas due to setup and temp combinations.

This pie had a nice crisp crust not too crunchy and evenly cooked toppings. 

Overall a surprising success.

Any comments and/or suggestions are fully welcome.




The pie is ready for the EGG. When I asked my wife what flavor, she replied "kitchen sink variety". 
Homemade dough made in a bread machine. Covered with Canadian bacon, pepperoni, diced Easter ham (cooked on the EGG), lightly browned Italian sweet sausage, caramelized onions, and 2 or 3 different cheeses.


plate, grid, and stone setup.


the black at the bottom of this photo is shadow not burnt char

DieselkW

Looks like a winner - was it as good as it looks?

I wouldn't change a thing.

johnmitchell

Fantastic..... Congrats.. Looks great. Only suggestion is make another one..

JustSmokeIt

DieselkW said:

Looks like a winner - was it as good as it looks?

I wouldn't change a thing.

The Mrs seemed to enjoy it. She went back for more.

JohnnyTarheel

Great looking pie...

bgebrent

Looks pretty great to me brother!!

Focker

Good first run, looks a lot better than my first off the egg.  Pizza preference is subjective, but a little more time,  or better yet heat, to slightly brown the crust and cheese wouldn't hurt.  Dough can pick up the slightest smoke, leave the wood out next time.  Again, all personal preference.

Try bumping temp up to 550 next rip, and/or bake a little longer.  You can keep an eye on it through the dome hole.  Most of the fun is dialing things in.  Keep after it.

XC242

Bravo !

YukonRon

Best Pizzas ever come from the egg. Beautiful cook!

LKNEgg

Great first pizza!   Nice work!  You should give lessons! 

NPHuskerFL

Nice first Za

jarc

Great looking pie.

JustSmokeIt

Focker said:

Good first run, looks a lot better than my first off the egg.  Pizza preference is subjective, but a little more time,  or better yet heat, to slightly brown the crust and cheese wouldn't hurt.  Dough can pick up the slightest smoke, leave the wood out next time.  Again, all personal preference.

Try bumping temp up to 550 next rip, and/or bake a little longer.  You can keep an eye on it through the dome hole.  Most of the fun is dialing things in.  Keep after it.

A little more time and heat I'd have had burnt crust. I prefer my pie crust crisp and brown. My teeth are too old for chewing burnt brick. 

I won't even comment on peeping down the dome hole. hehehe

Smoke was barely noticeable as compared to some i've done on my offset smoker. 

TY for comments.

bhedges1987

That looks like a good pie.  I really need to do one sometime.  Great Job!

Focker

IMHO, pie looks a little anemic on the top end is all.   A common issue on the BGE.  But hey, if you felt like you crushed it first pitch, all is good.  

StillH2OEgger

That looks great, especially for a first attempt. If you can get the pizza higher in the dome you might have better luck browning the cheese a little bit without burning the crust.

JustSmokeIt

StillH2OEgger said:

That looks great, especially for a first attempt. If you can get the pizza higher in the dome you might have better luck browning the cheese a little bit without burning the crust.

Thanks for the input bud. I almost used fire bricks to make an elevated grid, but decided to keep it simple for the fist test. One of my next projects is to build a removable, adjustable (height), pivoting rack elevated above the main grid. 

JustSmokeIt

johnmitchell said:

Fantastic..... Congrats.. Looks great. Only suggestion is make another one..

TY bud.......I see many more in the future.

JustSmokeIt

LKNEgg said:

Great first pizza!   Nice work!  You should give lessons! 

lol........ I can screw up a good cook just as easy as anyone. Guess I got lucky with this one...

StillH2OEgger

As someone whose pizzas often take a variety of non-uniform shapes, yours looks perfect. You said it's your first on the egg, but do you have other pizza making experience? Other than practice, any recommendations for how you get such a nice circular shape?

Stormbringer

JustSmokeIt said:

StillH2OEgger said:

That looks great, especially for a first attempt. If you can get the pizza higher in the dome you might have better luck browning the cheese a little bit without burning the crust.

Thanks for the input bud. I almost used fire bricks to make an elevated grid, but decided to keep it simple for the fist test. One of my next projects is to build a removable, adjustable (height), pivoting rack elevated above the main grid. 

I used firebricks to solve that problem, worked well. Also agree with a comment above, try hotter next time just to see how it goes. I cook at 400C/750F for 7-8 minutes, with cornmeal sprinkled on the pizza stone this gives the crust a real crunch to it.

@StillH2OEgger - one of the tricks for a circular shape is make the dough well in advance and let the gluten relax. I make mine 24 hours in advance (method in this forum discussion). Rolling or tossing it will then give a reasonable shape as the elasticity in the gluten will be minimal.

To get it spot on, you can roll it out a little larger than you want and then use a circular template and cut around the edge with a pizza wheel. Again, doing this after the gluten has been allowed to relax helps keep the uniform shape without distorting.

Using a good quality wooden peel with cornmeal on it, or a Superpeel, is also important as it prevents pizzas getting out of shape when transferring from a floured worktop to pizza stone.

Jcl5150

Looks good!  I was wondering why you added apple chunks though, as I thought the idea behind chunks was to add a smoky flavor.  You didn't get any smoke in your dough?

THEBuckeye

30 minutes or less! 

bluebird66

Looks like you did good!

JustSmokeIt

Jcl5150 said:

Looks good!  I was wondering why you added apple chunks though, as I thought the idea behind chunks was to add a smoky flavor.  You didn't get any smoke in your dough?

There was a slight smokey apple wood flavor in the crust. Not very strong but definitely noticeable over the lump charcoal.

JustSmokeIt

Stormbringer said:

JustSmokeIt said:

StillH2OEgger said:

That looks great, especially for a first attempt. If you can get the pizza higher in the dome you might have better luck browning the cheese a little bit without burning the crust.

Thanks for the input bud. I almost used fire bricks to make an elevated grid, but decided to keep it simple for the fist test. One of my next projects is to build a removable, adjustable (height), pivoting rack elevated above the main grid. 

I used firebricks to solve that problem, worked well. Also agree with a comment above, try hotter next time just to see how it goes. I cook at 400C/750F for 7-8 minutes, with cornmeal sprinkled on the pizza stone this gives the crust a real crunch to it.

@StillH2OEgger - one of the tricks for a circular shape is make the dough well in advance and let the gluten relax. I make mine 24 hours in advance (method in this forum discussion). Rolling or tossing it will then give a reasonable shape as the elasticity in the gluten will be minimal.

To get it spot on, you can roll it out a little larger than you want and then use a circular template and cut around the edge with a pizza wheel. Again, doing this after the gluten has been allowed to relax helps keep the uniform shape without distorting.

Using a good quality wooden peel with cornmeal on it, or a Superpeel, is also important as it prevents pizzas getting out of shape when transferring from a floured worktop to pizza stone.

Thanks for the suggestions Stormbringer and StillH2OEgger.  As I do more pizza pies I'll be experimenting more with quality tips from the forum to refine my techniques. My career background as a research technician (retired) seems to have followed me home in many of the things I do; especially Grilling and BBQ (now I can add baking). Good notes are vital....

Two major factors led to the 500 temp rather than higher. 1. It was my first pizza on the EGG. 2. crust thickness (went for thick). 3. was to make sure the partially cooked cased sausage had time to finish cooking without turning the pie dough into charcoal. 4. my hope to get both crust (crispy) and toppings done at the same time.

As far as adding smoking wood, I got a little flavor from it but I think most came directly from the BGE Lump.

Overall we were pleased with the first attempt. and look forward to bumping up the technique as ideas come in and my confidence builds to bake a few more Pizza Pies.

Again thanks for the ideas and suggestions.

 

JustSmokeIt

Focker said:

IMHO, pie looks a little anemic on the top end is all.   A common issue on the BGE.  But hey, if you felt like you crushed it first pitch, all is good.  

Once again I appreciate your comment.

I'm assuming your use of anemic is referring to the cheese color over the crust color. I mostly agree with that assessment.

The crust was adequately browned and crispy (for a 1st attempt), and would have approached brick hardness. The toppings below the cheese would have been overcooked. My humble opinion.

As far as saying I "Crushed It On the First Pitch"  I never said that. I merely stated it was a "surprising success".

Translation: we were pleased by the results of our 1st attempt and it was pleasantly palatable.

Finally, and I say this with all due respect: I value everyone's opinion. I will also respectfully request that in the future you refrain from rewriting/rewording my comments which has the effect of transforming your opinion into an argumentative statement.

As I gain experience using my EGG and develop techniques and good notes through experimentation, ideas, and suggestions better results are bound to follow going forward.

Again I appreciate your comments and try to remind myself daily....



Thanks again have a good day.

NonaScott

I haven't tried one yet but I hope my first comes out just like yours. I'm with you in that I don't care for charred crust(crispy yes,charred no) nor burnt cheese. I like the cheese to be gooey and stringy. Looks great to me.

Stormbringer

My first one was also lower, at 275C (527F), because that's what I used to do in a conventional oven. So totally agree that's a good place for your first one, and move up from there. My next was at 325C (617F) and the third, what you saw in the other post, was 400C (752F). As I progressed through the temperatures, cook time lowered however time to get the stone up to temp of course increased.

My next pizza is going to be an experiment ... get the egg up to 350C, get the stone heated up and then slow down the heat so that the stone releases heat energy more quickly as the ambient temperature drops. I'll cook the pizza when the egg drops to around 220C. This may result in an ultra crispy thin crust and the top not being cooked (or "anaemic") but we'll see what happens.

JustSmokeIt

Stormbringer said:

My next pizza is going to be an experiment ... get the egg up to 350C, get the stone heated up and then slow down the heat so that the stone releases heat energy more quickly as the ambient temperature drops. I'll cook the pizza when the egg drops to around 220C. This may result in an ultra crispy thin crust and the top not being cooked (or "anaemic") but we'll see what happens.

Sounds good.
It makes me curious, if adding a protective ring around the crust would yield a benefit.

The reason I ask
I used to build aluminum foil rings with .125 - .25 inches air gap around the pizza and .25- .5 inches above the edge to help protect the crust from burning/charring. It worked well on round pies i did using oven baking sheets (I got from an unnamed pizza joint in town) which I then placed on an aluminum pizza pan on my offset charcoal smoker. After burning the bottoms of a few I found that this setup produced better results indirect at lower temp 300-350 for 30 - 40 minutes as compared to direct over hotter coals.

Admittedly the result was by far highly inferior to what the EGG is capable of producing, but much better than an oven pizza.

Any way it's one of the ideas I have for future experimentation. 

Any thoughts on it?

Stormbringer

If I understand the setup correctly, the rings were to protect the edge of the crust by absorbing the heat energy before it hit the rim of the pizza? If so, I think it will work on the egg.

However, I don't see why you would need to do that, your pizza looked fine and the ones I have cooked at high temperature have not experienced burning (except when I put too much cornmeal on one bit of the stone and it self combusted ... ).