I’m at the pizza oven. I’m at the burger grill. I’m at the combination pizza oven and burger grill.
Oh, and did I mention I’m also at the griddle? And at the, uh, gas burner? The new, hulking Cuisinart Propel+ 3-in-1 on my back patio is one of those unholy Franken-cookers that always seem like wonderful and terrible ideas at the same time. They fill you with both envy and suspicion.
The Propel+ is on the one hand a honking big but basically standard four-burner grill with two side tables. But flip up the lid on one of those side tables and you’ll find a fifth burner beneath a cast-iron griddle big enough for a sextet of burgers or pancakes. Beneath the griddle, the gas burner is also set up so it could heat a pot of sauce if you need it.
But the coup de grâce, and the bête noire—and probably some Italian words, too—is the pizza oven. Instead of the usual grill-top, the lid on this four-burner grill is instead shaped into the somewhat squat segmental arch of a stainless steel pizza oven, complete with a smoked-glass oven door. Also included is a 15-inch cordierite pizza stone, complete with a wrought-iron mounting bracket that’ll affix it to the top of the grill.
Damn, that’s a good idea—one that seems like it should already exist. But very few comparable devices do. Cue covetousness, and suspicion.
An Argument for Grill Pizza
I’ll get the suspense out of the way. You absolutely can make a pizza you’ll be proud of with this Cuisinart Propel+.
It took a few failed attempts, however, in part because I was lured away by false temptation. This Cuisinart is a monster: a 44,000 BTU grill that can heat to 600 degrees Fahrenheit in 10 minutes with the lid down, and crest 700 in 10 or 15 more. With everything on high, this thing draws enough juice to drain a 20-pound propane tank in less than 10 hours. The side griddle adds 11,000 more BTUs.
With burners at max, you can also heat up the cordierite pizza stone north of 800 degrees. At that point, we’re near Neapolitan pizza territory. Or so I hoped. But alas, it was not to be. The middle burners under the pizza stone will indeed superheat the stone. But ambient oven temp won’t get quite high enough, topping out below 750 degrees. Unless you turn the middle burners down to medium, you’ll scorch the pizza’s bottom before cooking the top.
