Burnt on the Bottom
Last night, I made some homemade pizza using a Weber gas grill, too hot to use the oven in the house. I cobbled together a French bread recipe from Uncle John's Bread Book (the crusty french bread recipe on p.112 if you have the book), a You Tube video about putting the pan higher up in the gas grill and some advice here.
I made the French bread recipe (although halving it) followed the rising times (used the French Fold, too), and put the dough in a rectangular pan sprayed with Pam to keep from sticking. The pan was placed on four tin cans placed on the grate and I turned up three burners to get a heat reading around 550 degrees.
It cooked for about 15 minutes when it looked brownish and pulling away from the pan. I then put the toppings on and cooked about another 10 minutes. It came out really nicely except the bottom was burnt black in the middle but not on the ends.
So why the burning? Was it the Pam spray? A little too hot? Too much time on the first bake through before adding the toppings?
As I recall, the recipe was 3 cups AP flour, one packet yeast proofed in warm water with sugar and a bit of salt, 2 hour rise, shaping, one-hour rise, baking. It tasted fine; I just wanted to get rid of the black burnt on the bottom.
Thanks for any help
Neal Lavon
Takoma Park, MD
USA