Fire It Up - Andrew Schloss [2]
Chapter 1
A Primer On Grilling Methods & Equipment
Grilling is not simply a matter of tossing food over fire. Rather, grilling is a set of cooking methods made possible by your equipment. In fact, your equipment determines the type of grilling you can do.
Most grills are designed for direct grilling—putting food directly over fire. This basic form of grilling works on all grills, including big and small gas grills, and charcoal and wood grills such as campfire grills, hibachis, and kettle grills.
But add a lid and ample grilling space, and the possibilities expand. Indirect grilling, which means putting food on the grill grate away from the fire and covering the grill, turns a grill into an oven. With the lid down you capture smoke, which infuses your food with its aromas. A lid also allows you to do grill-roasting, grill-braising, grill-baking, and other hybrid forms of grilling.
Here’s a look at the various types of live-fire cooking we employ throughout this book:
• Direct Grilling
• Bilevel Grilling
• Indirect Grilling
• Adding Smoke
• Rotisserie Grilling
• Grill-Braising and Wrapping
• Planking and Blocking
• No Grill Grate
*At this temperature, you should be able to hold your hand (palm down) about 4 inches above the grill grate and count, saying “one thousand” after each number (“1 one thousand, 2 one thousand . . .”) the number of times listed in the chart without having to withdraw your hand.
Direct Grilling
Light a grill, put food over the fire, and you are direct grilling. Typically the grill grate rests 2 to 6 inches above the flame, and quick-cooking foods are placed on the hot grate. Direct grilling works best for searing small, relatively thin foods that will cook through in less than 30 minutes, including hamburgers, hot dogs, sausages, steaks, chops, poultry parts, small whole fish, fish steaks and fillets, shellfish, sliced or tender vegetables and fruits, flatbreads, and sandwiches.
To set up any grill for direct grilling, preheat it to high with the grill grate in place and the lid down (if you have a lid). Adjust the heat to the appropriate level for the food you are cooking, and then get grilling. The way you adjust the heat will depend upon the type of grill you’re using.
To adjust and manage a live fire, keep in mind that fire is, at its core, oxygen combining very rapidly with another substance—so rapidly that it releases heat energy. Managing the temperature of the fire is a matter of controlling the flow of oxygen to the fuel. In a gas grill, the oxygen flow and fuel supply are regulated. Turn the temperature knob up or down, and you get high or low heat. With a charcoal or wood fire, heat adjustment is less automated. The flames are completely dependent upon the air and the fuel that you make available to them. Without oxygen and charcoal or wood, the fire can’t breathe and it dies.
That’s the real meaning of live-fire cooking. It’s up to you to keep the fire alive by adding charcoal or wood and adjusting the air flow with vents or by manually blowing onto the fire. On a charcoal grill, keep the lid off and the vents 100 percent open, and you’ll soon get high heat. Keep the lid down and the vents only 50 percent open, and you’ll get less oxygen and low heat.
The thickness of your coal bed also determines how hot the fire is. Four inches thick (about a triple layer of charcoal briquettes) and glowing red is best for high heat. A bed 2 inches thick (about a single layer of briquettes) with only a little orange glow is best for medium-low heat. See the chart above for details. Note that in the chart, we give a range of temperatures for each heat level, but in the recipes throughout the book, we specify a temperature within that range.
Direct temperature is measured with an oven thermometer placed on the