Hello all - hope you all had a wonderful weekend. This week we’ll continue our posts about the grilled pizza, plus a few recipes for some antipasti starters that we served at the meal.
Below are Vincent’s instructions for grilled pizza making…
There have been many Grilled Pizza methods and books with literally dozens of techniques. The original and most popular version was created by Joanne Killeen and George Germon, the husband and wife team behind the Providence , RI restaurant, Al Forno. Their book, Cucina Simpatica is a must have for any serious grilled pizza chef. Although you can you a cast iron stove top method at home as well as a gas grill, charcoal works best. The flavor of real NY style brick over pizza will as well as the high temperature make charcoal the best source for full flavor. When you stack the coals for your fire make sure to build a higher stack of coals to the side if the grill where you will be stretching your dough on a prep table. This makes the all challenging transfer from stretching surface to the hottest part of the grill much easier.
Hold your hand 3-5 inches above the hot part of the fire for a count of 3 before the heat forces you to remove it. Then you know the fire is hot enough to start grilling pizza. A cold grill is not going to work. Then place a 5 oz ball of dough on a well oiled metal sheet pan and stretch it out with your fingers, some of my friends use a roller, thats ok but make sure it doesn’t stick. Oval shaped almost football like are the easiest shape to achieve. The thickness should be about 1/4 inch to 1/8 inch and even all around. Don’t make a loop around for extra crust as you would a traditional pizza, make the thickness consistent throughout.
When the pizza is about 8-10 inches long you can transfer the dough lifting it on each side with your thumb and pointer fingers and spread it across the hottest part of your grill. Let it cook for about 2-3 minutes or until bubbles appear on the top almost like a pancake.
Using tongs and a spatula flip your pizza over on to the cool part of the grill. Quickly brush the top with olive oil and add toppings as fast as possible. The idea is to get each ingredient on to every part of the pie evenly. Then using the tongs slide the the pizza over to the hot side of the grill. When the cheese is melted and starts to bubble its ready. Slide it of to a wooden cutting board, garnish cut and serve right away. The ideal crust is chewy in the center and crunchy at the same time. Practice makes perfect.
It’s a little hot here to call it a beautiful fall weekend, but we’re excited to be here anyway ! Here are a few tips on what to do this weekend….
This dinner at Roberta’s Saturday night looks awesome. It combines all their talents + hard work with a live DJ from their Heritage Radio Network, dinner featuring farmers from the Heritage Farmers USA, and six point ale. And Saturday day we’re pretty intrigued by the oyster extravaganza at the Grand Central Oyster bar. Stop by for demonstrations, tastings and contests, from noon to four. And maybe end your weekend with multiple microbrews and an amazing locally sourced (from Brooklyn Grange) dinner at Jimmy’s 43 this Sunday. Buy your tickets here . What else are you guys up to while we still have warm weather to enjoy ? We hope you have a lovely time, and be sure to come visit next week, where we continue the grilled pizza posts.
The trick to a great sauce is in the quality of the tomatoes and we love The San Marzano tomatoes. They come from volcanic soil and have a natural sweet and smoky flavor that is wonderful with pizza sauce.
This is a great easy sauce to keep in your fridge as well – enjoy.
Vincent Rotolo, our instructor and grilled pizza extraordinaire taught our class how to make the most perfect grilled pizza dough. The end result is perfectly crispy and thin, and just wait till you see the toppings, so yummy. The class really got in there, fists and elbows – and everyone took home a large ball of dough so they could make their pizzas at home as well. The recipe is below on the recipe card. Let us know if you try it out – we don’t think you’ll be disappointed.
Photos by Karen Mordechai
Recipe Courtesy of Vincent Rotolo/Sunday Suppers
We’re back…Many of you noticed our brief hiatus last week…while we were traveling out of the country – we were attacked by a virus ! Some of you may have seen that horrifying error message when you tried to log onto the site. Honestly, we had no idea how serious this could be in the web world – apparently someone had hacked into our site and was up to no good. We worked round the clock to get things back up and running and we’re happy to say that we are back and ready to (finally) post our grilled pizza recipes ! So…photos from the pizza class coming this week and some posts from abroad as well. We’re so happy to be back – we have lots to share !
Below are photos from our grilled pizza class- the decor was straight up rustic italian. We had flowers created by the very talented (somewhat new on the scene) Kat Flowers. We used white tablecloths, and these awesome fog linen placemats from brookfarm as runners. White enamel vessels and pitchers, wooden pizza boards – and matching checkered napkins all brought the rustic but modern pizza vibe together. The menus were a neat trick – we had one large rubber stamp made snd stamped our menu onto precut stock. This is such an easy diy project! And for favors, pizza cutters for each guest.
Happy Labor day ! Like most, we are headed far out of town ; to Israel and Wyoming ! But if you’ve made this weekend a staycation, don’t despair, there’s lots of fun activities right here in our backyard. First you must check out the new Eataly market/restaurant/rooftop pub and so much more. Between the oyster + wine bars, gorgeous charcuterie platters, a plethora of busy men with beautiful Italian accents, and every Italian candy and canned tomato the side of the Atlantic it is, quite frankly, not to be believed. And did you see how nice the weather report is ? Sunday you should check out The Eagle Street Rooftop Farm with a special presentation from food writer Cathy Erway (remember her quest to avoid restaurants for a year ?!) . We’ve been dying to get over there for their beautiful produce ! We’re also a little jealous of the Parked : Food Truck Festival on Governor’s Island this Sunday. Take a free ferry over and taste the best there is to offer on wheels.
Above photo is a sneak peek from next week’s posts from our grilled pizza supper.
Hello all - hope you all had a wonderful weekend. This week we’ll continue our posts about the grilled pizza, plus a few recipes for some antipasti starters that we served at the meal.
Below are Vincent’s instructions for grilled pizza making…
There have been many Grilled Pizza methods and books with literally dozens of techniques. [...]
It’s a little hot here to call it a beautiful fall weekend, but we’re excited to be here anyway ! Here are a few tips on what to do this weekend….
This dinner at Roberta’s Saturday night looks awesome. It combines all their talents + hard work with a live DJ from their Heritage Radio Network, [...]
2 large cans whole San Marzano tomatoes- about 12
1/4 teaspoon chopped garlic
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
salt to taste
1- in a medium sauce pan saute the garlic in olive oil until golden brown. Be careful not to burn the garlic.
2- stir in the tomatoes and lower the flame to med. if you have time to chop the tomatoes in half and scoop out the seeds if makes for a much sweeter sauce.
3- stir slowly for about 5 minutes then place heat on low and cook covered for about 20 minutes.
4- add salt to taste and set aside off heat for cooling.
1- envelope dry yeast
1- cup water – room temperature or warm
1 teaspoon honey
2 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/3 cup fine ground flax meal- corn mean can also be used- I even sometimes substitute semolina flour
3 1/2 tablespoons whole wheat flour
1 1/2 tablespoons good quality virgin olive oil
3 cups all purpose flour
1- in a large bowl add the water, yeast and honey
2- after all is dissolved slowly stir in the flax meal, whole wheat flour, salt and olive oil
3- slowly stir in the flour until a firm dough has formed
4- remove all contents from bowl and continue to knead on a floured surface until a smooth dough has formed adding additional flour to prevent the dough from sticking.
5- after you have achieved a smooth sough clean of any lumps transfer to a large bowl that has been lightly coated with olive oil. add oil to the top make sure a skin does not form while rising. cover the bowl and let rise for about 2 hours. remove dough and knead again.
6- let the dough rise again for about 30 minutes.
We’re back…Many of you noticed our brief hiatus last week…while we were traveling out of the country – we were attacked by a virus ! Some of you may have seen that horrifying error message when you tried to log onto the site. Honestly, we had no idea how serious this could be in the [...]
Happy Labor day ! Like most, we are headed far out of town ; to Israel and Wyoming ! But if you’ve made this weekend a staycation, don’t despair, there’s lots of fun activities right here in our backyard. First you must check out the new Eataly market/restaurant/rooftop pub and so much more. Between the [...]
