A thin oval of pizza dough cooked directly on a wood-fired grill, blistered on both sides, then topped and finished briefly off-fire. Crisp, smoky, charred-edged; invented at Al Forno in 1980 by Killeen and Germon.
Where to eat it: 1 restaurant across 1 city.
George Germon and Johanne Killeen invented grilled pizza in 1980 when they opened Al Forno on South Water Street in Providence. The technique (dough straight onto the grates, no pan, no peel) had no American precedent; the closest analogue is the Apulian focaccia-on-coals tradition. The original Al Forno grilled pizza Margherita (tomato, mozzarella, basil, olive oil) is still on the menu. The technique was widely copied through the 1980s and 90s; Germon and Killeen wrote the Cucina Simpatica cookbook in 1991, which spread the method internationally.
Common allergens: Gluten, Dairy
Tip from the editors. Don't pre-bake the dough; the whole point is direct fire. If the grates aren't ferociously hot, the dough sticks.
Johanne Killeen's Al Forno on South Water Street invented grilled pizza in 1980. Wood-fire kitchen, baked pasta, Providence's most enduring fine-dining room.
Order: A grilled pizza Margherita and the baked penne with tomato cream.
Tip: No reservations for parties under five; arrive by 17:15 or book parties of five-plus on Tock.
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