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The bigger the grill, the better the food?

As pointed out by Nicole, backyard barbecue grills are fast becoming more and more exotic. This trend, first started in 1995 with the introduction of the Dynamic Cooking Systems DCS Professional Grill. The 48-inch-wide cooking behemoth hit the market with a $5,000 price tag, it included H-shaped cast-iron commercial-quality burners, a heavy-duty side-burner and more B.T.U.'s per square inch than any other grill then available.

Monster grills are similar to luxury sport cars in that the fancier, bigger and more gadget encrusted, the more impressive and popular. In the beginning of the luxury grill trend, it was the ultra-rich people who were purchasing them and spending anywhere up to $6,500, plus more for backyard renovations to showcase their grills. But in the past few years the luxury trend has filtered down to the more modest homes, where for $2,500 a machine with accessories like rotisseries, warmer drawers, side burners and hand lights can grace your backyard patio.

These new grills have something to offer to just about everybody in the family. For the "have meat, must cook it" fellows  these stoves are a dream come true. For the barbeque aficionado, the one who ponders which sauces will best compliment the mood of the day, the type of meat etc, this trend is a gift to his artistic cooking expression. And for those of us who just want to sit down and eat, the increased cooking power means the meal will be finished that much faster.

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Filed Under: New Products, Methods
Tags: america, barbecues, grill, grills, patios

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Reader comments (Page 1 of 1)

Bill Bumgarner

5-29-2006 @11:03AM Bill Bumgarner said... These aren't so much grills as outdoor kitchens. While they do a brilliant job of kitchen like cooking tasks, including tasks that produce too much smoke to be done indoors, these devices are no substitute for a properly executed traditional grill.

If you really want to grill -- to cook over an open flame -- you need heat mass. Ceramic. Lots of it in either the form of a brick lined firepit of some kind, preferably with brick walls around the cooking area, or a ceramic cooker.

For grilling, "the increased cooking power means the meal will be finished that much faster" simply isn't true. I cooked ribs yesterday with a simple dry rub for over 4 hours at 200 degrees in a ceramic cooker. The results were amazing, but I could have cooked them longer -- several hours longer -- to achieve an even more tender result.

My outdoor cooker of choice is the Big Green Egg. It is large ceramic egg with an 18.5" grilling surface. Amazing device. I'm documenting my adventures here (and the rib recipe will be up shortly):

http://www.friday.com/bbum/category/life/entertainment/food/

And this is exactly the kind of recipe for which "more BTUs over a gas flame" just wouldn't work:

http://www.friday.com/bbum/2006/05/14/easy-incredibly-yummy-roast-salmon/


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Bill Bumgarner

5-29-2006 @5:35PM Bill Bumgarner said... The rib story is up. I dare anyone to try and achieve this level of rib near-perfection on a high BTU gas & metal behemoth:

http://www.friday.com/bbum/2006/05/29/smoked-ribs/

If your answer starts with "First, you boil the ribs", then you are already wrong.
Reply

2 Comments / 1 Pages

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