GRILLING & CHILLING
Randy Shore presents a consumer guide to summer backyard cookers.
If you want the sear, smoke and sizzle of humankind’s first and best cooking method, you’re going to need a backyard grill.
How close you come to the smoke-kissed flavours enjoyed by our prehistoric ancestors will depend on your level of financial commitment and whether you choose gas, charcoal or whole wood as your main heat source.
The technologies range from burning wood in a metal dish to high-tech, Wi-Fi-connected marvels. Prices range from about $29 for a cheap portable to $2,900 for an infrared model with multiple heat sources and searing temperatures up to 1,800 F. From there, money is your only limitation.
Gas grills with two to six elements for heat control are the meat and potatoes of the residential marketplace.
Well-known chefs — Michael Smith and Andrew Richardson in Canada, along with Dan Barber and Sean Brock in the U.S. — have embraced live-fire cookery, many of them influenced by Argentina’s Michelin three-star chef Francis Mallmann.
“The flavour that live fire imparts to food is absolutely unique,” said Richardson, chef at CinCin Ristorante in Vancouver. “Customers ask if we have some secret seasoning or spice rub, but we don’t. It’s the different kinds of wood and the heat.”
Other grilling enthusiasts are opting for a more refined experience. Outdoor kitchens have become a fixture on Food Network programs featuring Jamie Oliver and Bobby Flay, which helps to drive their popularity. “There has been a huge surge in sales of outdoor kitchens,” said Nash Shivji, owner of The BBQ Shop. “People are building kitchens outside because it is so easy now with components that bolt together.”
Adds barbecue champion and Grilling with House of Q author Brian Misko: “It’s becoming a lot more common for backyard cooks to have multiple devices, starting with a grill, but maybe including a smoker. There are a lot of toys out there and they all bring something to the table.”
THE PORTABLE GRILL
Compact, cast-iron charcoal grills in the Japanese tradition cost less than $100. The hibachi is the original balcony grill for apartment dwellers (check with your landlord before firing it up), but they are also great for a picnic in the park or a camp-out by the lake. Use lump charcoal for clean, intense heat to put a good sear on hotdogs, burgers and kebabs. There are handful of portable camping grills in this price range — especially those fuelled by throwaway propane bottles — but you should be wary of flimsy construction.
THE INFRARED GRILL
Typically, these are gas-fuelled grills that use radiant energy to heat the cooking grill and “sizzle zones” that get very hot, very fast. Some infrared units are sidemounted heating elements for rotisserie cooking. Barbecue champion Brian Misko warns that high heat comes with a price in higher fuel consumption. Napoleon and Saber are popular brands.
THE GAS GRILL
The natural-gas or propane-fuelled grill is a workhorse. Stainless steel and cast-iron grilling surfaces have plenty of thermal mass, ensuring you get the grill marks and seared meat flavour that is the holy grail of outdoor cooks. Plan to spend at least $1,000, but be prepared to shell out more when you see some of the cool features available. Weber and Canada’s Napoleon and Broil King are all popular brands.
THE OFFSET GRILL
These wood pellet-fuelled units make it easy to create real barbecue, with low, slow cooking and an indirect heat source. If you love the smoky taste of pitsmoked brisket and ribs, Green Mountain Grills and Louisiana Grills make affordable, offset smokers. Digital heat control and Wi-Fi monitoring can push the price close to $1,000. Misko favours the Yoder brand offsets.
THE WOOD-FIRED ARGENTINE GRILL
If you are a wood-cooking fanatic and willing to shell out $4,000, $5,000 or $6,000 to live out your Patagonian cooking fantasies, this is your jam. Top-end stainless steel grills are made by Grillworks of Michigan and NorCal Ovenworks of California. There are Uruguayan grill kits, too, that you can buy for less than $1,000 if you are willing to build a brick fire pit for it.
THE BUILT-IN
Want direct heat, ceramic radiant heat and a rotisserie element? Would you like that built into a stone-faced kitchen unit with tile countertops? If so, get out your chequebook. The ultimate outdoor kitchen starts with a $3,000 grill unit. A grill and searing station with cupboards and countertops will cost at least $5,000 and more likely $10,000.