Grilled Pineapple Pizza
Pizza friends are the best friends! A shared love of pizza ensures that when two of my closest friends and I get together, that we're very likely going to be spending our time indulging in hot pies. These two wonderful humans also get the credit for getting me to move to North Carolina, and on one of our earlier dinners as new neighbors, I offered to pick up some pizzas on the way to their house and they made me promise not to judge them when they gave me their order of a pizza topped with pineapple, red onion, and finished with a barbecue swirl. I really didn't have any qualms over their order, but if I had, they would have melted away quickly with one bite because that topping combo was indeed a winner. So when I hosted them for a backyard pizza party recently, it made sense to me to recreate that pie, but I added a few of my own touches to the formula by grilling the pineapple and adding pickled jalapeños, both elevating an already great pie even more.
One of my favorite, and least used, grilling accessories is my KettlePizza. I always wanted to build a pizza oven, but the KettlePizza has left me no need to since I can get it up to a temperature that can produce restaurant quality results. While I aspire to use it more often, when I do get it going, I make my pizza sessions count and try out a whole host of topping ideas as once. This time around I started by making a double batch of Kenji's Neapolitan dough, weighing the ingredients for accuracy and best results.
Besides the facts that the dough stretches really well and tastes great, one of my favorite aspects of the recipe is how easy it is to make. The need here is really time, not effort—after mixing the ingredients together, I just had to let the dough rise at room temperature for eight hours first, then divide it into individual portions and stick those in the fridge for two to four days more.
All that time results in a dough with a really nice lightly tangy flavor. The downtime is also great for allowing ample opportunity to leisurely put together the rest of components needed for a pizza party.
One of those things is almost always pizza sauce. I go back and forth between two sauce recipes, one that is a thinner and lighter sauce more apt for Neapolitan-style pies, and another thicker and more robust variation for heartier creations. The later seemed to be a more fitting choice for this particular topping combo that features heavy hitting flavors, so I whipped up a batch of it.
Pineapple certainly fits in that heavy hitting category in a number of ways. The debate over this fruit's acceptability as a topping will likely never die, but I'm in the camp that's ok with it. I don't think I'd ever order a pineapple-only pizza, but I like the way its sweetness contrasts with other toppers, especially spicy peppers.
I thought I'd give my pineapple a boost by grilling it, enhancing its sweetness, texture, and depth. I had my grill going for other things, so it was no big deal for me to toss some pineapple rings over the fire and quickly cook them until they were well browned and tender. If you're not into getting a fire going for the sole purpose of pineapple cooking, you could skip this step or caramelize it in a pan with a little oil on the stovetop.
Once the pineapple was done, I roughly chopped it and got the rest of the toppings in order—slicing a small red onion, grating the mozzarella, and grabbing my jar of pickled jalapeños. After getting the KettlePizza up and running with a combo of charcoal and wood, I stretched out the dough, spread on the sauce, and arranged the toppings.
Then into the KettlePizza it went, and being the first pie of the day, the fire was incredibly hot, probably clocking in at around 950°F. This had it cooking in just under three minutes, and also the crust charring very quickly—I like a bit of char on the crust, so I was personally happy about that. After the pizza was cooked, I removed it from the oven and squeezed on that important barbecue sauce swirl.
I'm sure glad my friends introduced me to this topping combo, and even happier I tried it at home and made some improvements, in my opinion. The sweet pineapple was a central focus, but it got good contrasts from the sharp and crunchy onions along with the spicy and tangy peppers. That created a well balanced flavor that was enhanced lightly by the complexity of barbecue sauce. Previously, I had only enjoyed this pineapple pizza in thicker crust scenarios and questioned whether it would translate well into a Neapolitan-style pie, but those worries faded as this light, airy, and flavorful crust continued to work its magic, just making the whole thing all the better. To keep content flowing on the blog and to satisfy my own creativity, I don't repeat my pizza creations that often, but this is one topping combo I feel like I'll need to bust out again and again just to spread its gospel.
