SWMBO is nominally Catholic so I've been making meatless meals for the last couple Fridays. It has been fish and while we both enjoy that, man (nor woman) does not live by fish alone. I'm going to have a go at pizza tomorrow. I thought I'd review my plan so those with more wisdom can suggest improvements.
My understanding is that one of the bigger problems is getting enough heat to the top to cook the ingredients w/out charring the bottom of the crust. This is mostly due to the heat on the Weber coming from the bottom. To this end I have picked up
some fire brick at the local building materials store. These are 1 1/4" thick (3+ cm) and I plan to lay them up the middle of my 26. Before that I will have made a fire and set it up more or less for indirect cooking on either side of the charcoal grate and aligned with the openings to the side of the fire brick. I plan to cook on top of the fire brick using
cast iron tortilla griddles of which I have two. At 9" they're about right for a personal size pizza. (They also match the length of the brick)
I made some whole wheat pizza dough this afternoon and it is in the process of trying to escape from it's container in the refrigerator. I have fresh mozzarella, provolone, parmesan and other cheeses that I plan to use for topping along with mushrooms, red peppers, anise bulb, onion and kalamata olives. I'll probably warm some garlic in EVOO to bring all of the flavors together. (I have fresh basil, parsley and cilantro too.)
Starting with two chimneys of lump should put me in the range of 500°F in the cooker. The brick should approach that heat but the mass of the cast iron should moderate that when the pizzas are put in the cooker. Hopefully they'll cook fast enough from the top to avoid scorching on the bottom.
I appreciate any thoughts and suggestions on the plan. I'll also be doing a search to see what others have done so I can study what worked for them.
thanks,
hank