Grilling series, Part II: Learn to build a perfect fire and assemble the essential tools.
By Clifford A. Wright
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Tuesday, 20 July 2010 |
06:23
GRILL, BABY, GRILL!
Second of a three-part series on the art and science of grilling. See the series to date.
Essential Grill Tools
Basting brush: Many grilled foods need to be basted before or during cooking. A long handled brush is ideal. Dedicate a 2-inch wide paint brush for larger pieces of meat. Alternatively, you can use a bunch of herb twigs tied together. Grilling some lamb with a rosemary brush is delightful.
Beer: Personally, I always drink beer when I grill and I think you should too.
Fish grill: These are hinged devices used to enclose fish for grilling and turning. They must be oiled before using, but I think the grill topper (below) works better for fish. The only time you really need a fish grill is when you are grilling whole fish that weighs more than 4 pounds , and believe me that will be rare.
Garden shovel: I use a little garden shovel to hold and move the grilling grates (top one for food; bottom one for coals) in order to put in more coals or to remove the grates when the ash needs to be disposed of. They're quick and easy.
Grill baskets: Like the grill topper (see below) they are useful for cooking vegetables. You can also toss the vegetables by shaking, which you can't do with a grill topper.
Grill forks: Don't use them; they only puncture food. Use your finger for poking to tell doneness, not the fork. Likewise, long-handled two-prong forks should never be used. Use tongs and spatulas to turn and pick up food.
Grill toppers: These are only necessary if the grates of your grill are too wide apart. They are excellent for cooking whole fish, small vegetables, and other small foods such as un-skewered shrimp or scallops.
Hot pads: Keep a couple of pads with your grill -- you'll be surprised how often you need them at a critical moment.
Lighter sticks: Useful for lighting fires or those rolled-up newspapers in the fire starter cans.
Long tongs: An essential tool for turning skewers and any other food except fish.
Nut shells: Don't throw away nut shells; save them and use for throwing on the fire for nutty smoke.
Pail: I keep a metal pale next to the grill to dump ashes.
Rotisseries: This is an essential accessory for spit-roasting. Unfortunately, not all grills come with an attachment for a spit and those that do usually have electrically-driven rotisserie attachments. The key to successful spit-roasting is to make sure the piece of meat or bird is attached securely and evenly onto the spit. If it is not secure, it will spin and never turn. If it is not even, the weight is uneven and during its revolution the spit will turn a little too fast and the food will cook unevenly.
Roto-kebabs: Kebab-holding devices where one handle turns multiple kebabs. Roto-kebabs are very cool and convenient, but very hard to find, and you would need a spit-rotisserie attachment to use them.
Skewers: Either metal skewers or wooden skewers. Metal skewers are best for things like shish kebab, but remember that metal skewers should be flat, like little swords, not round, otherwise the meat will spin while grilling. Flat sword skewers made out of metal are often found sold in Middle Eastern markets. Wooden skewers are always round and therefore skewering is often done with a double set of wooden skewers so the food doesn't swing around. This also provides for easier handling. The ends may burn if your fire is very hot. You can retard this by soaking the skewers in water first or let them burn off and remove the remaining skewer before serving.
Spatula: A spatula is indispensable, either the long-handled grilling spatula or a professional long-blade offset spatula, ideal for turning larger pieces of fish or small whole fish, hamburgers and other stuff.
Thermometers built into the grill: Unnecessary. Learn to use your judgment. On the other hand, a quick-read thermometer for taking the internal temperature of large pieces of meat is useful.
Water: If a fire starts out of control you can retard it be turning off the gas or covering the firebox. If it is a more serious fire than that, it will have been wise to have kept a hose nearby for a quick dousing.
Wire brush for cleaning: Why bother? Just let the intense heat do the cleaning--it's the same principal as a self-cleaning oven. I usually scrape the carbonized remnants off with the edge of a grill spatula.
Once you've invited the family and friends over for a cookout and set yourself up with a grill that suits your needs, it's time to get cooking. But your meal will be going nowhere fast unless you understand how to build a proper fire in your grill and when those coals are ready for cooking.
Preparing a coal fire
The most effective method for preparing a charcoal fire is to mound the charcoal to one side of the firebox or to make two mounds on each side leaving the center empty. This is what is called an indirect fire. The idea is to have some part of the grill much cooler than the other so you can move food around to less intense heat. If you are grilling food that is fatty, such as a duck -- a quite tricky enterprise -- mounding on two sides, leaving the center available for a drip pan, works very well. If you are barbecuing (slow roasting) you absolutely need a cool spot on the grill and you need to let your fire die down before starting, otherwise your meat burns.
Although I'm not against using lighter fuel or pre-soaked charcoal briquettes, I much prefer starting a charcoal fire with a fire can. A fire can has two compartments. The smaller of the two holds crumpled-up newspaper, which you light to ignite the charcoal sitting in the top and larger compartment. The coals are piled into the can, which is a kind of large coffee can with a handle, and the newspaper is lit. After just a few minutes, the coals will be ready to dump into the firebox of your grill.
If you use newspapers as kindling for charcoal, make sure they are not loose because the pieces can fly about and cause fires. Roll newspapers up very tightly, like branches, before using for kindling. Or you can use lighter fluid. Liberally douse the charcoal and set it on fire at three different points. It will blaze a while, then the flames will die out. Do not add more lighter fluid when this happens; it's not necessary because the briquettes are now lit and will burn slowly. You can leave the charcoal to burn until it is ready for grilling, in about 35 minutes, or sooner, when all of the coals are completely covered with white ash. Knock the ash off, push the coals around a bit to cover a large grilling area, leaving some room for a cool spot, and start grilling food. Do not start grilling food if any black shows or if there are any flames from the fuel.
The heat can be regulated by opening and closing vents on the bottom of the grilling well, on top of the cover, if your grill has them, and by lowering and raising the grilling grate (if your grill has adjustable grates) and by closing or opening the cover.
Preparing a wood fire
I learned to do this in Boy Scouts. At one jubilee I participated in, I had three minutes to build a fire from scratch, without newspapers or lighter fluids, using no more than three matches, to burn through a string set 14 inches above the ground. I can still do this, but you can take your time.
Starting a good fire revolves around well-seasoned wood kindling of different sizes. Kindling can be found lying around the ground everywhere. If it bends instead or snaps, don't use it. Children, thankfully, love snooping around collecting firewood kindling. Start by building a little tepee of twigs that crack when bent and are about 1/16th of an inch in diameter.
Around this base arrange slightly larger twigs, say an ⅛ inch, then another layer of ¼-inch twigs. Light the innermost, thinnest twigs and as the fire starts to build, add one or two branches ½- to 1-inch in diameter. Do not add wood too fast because until coals form, you will have a fire that will go out. Keep adding wood as you see the need until you've got a roaring blaze. Now keep your eyes open for the coals forming, placing logs on top of the fire. After about an hour, you can begin grilling.
Clifford A. Wright won the James Beard/ KitchenAid Cookbook of the Year award and the James Beard Award for the Best Writing on Food in 2000 for "A Mediterranean Feast."
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