Grilling is a quintessential holiday activity. From Memorial Day to Labor Day, and sometimes even Christmas Day, there are always grills firing up somewhere. Grilling, however, like all good artforms is easy to pick up and difficult to master. You need to know how to set up your grill for grilling and how to cook different types of food on it in order to get great results every time! In this blog post, we will discuss some grilling basics by looking at the two-zone fire so we can look at two core elements of good grilling: cooking with direct and indirect heat. Let's get started.
What is a two-zone fire?
To put it simply, a two-zone fire is when you create a direct heat zone and an indirect zone on your grill. This means there is a heat source directly underneath one part of the grill, but there is no heat source under another part of the grill. This doesn't mean that the other part of the grill is cold though. In fact, it will still get hot there when you close the lid on your grill, which means you can still use that part of the grill for cooking too. What it does mean, however, is that it won't be exposed to the extreme heats that will be coming directly from the heat source.
A two-zone fire then, is a fire that offers you more control over your cooking. It offers you extreme heat from a direct heat source and a more mellow and even heat from a firebox that contains that same heat source.
The best way to imagine how this would work in practice is to think of a nice, fat, juicy steak. You throw it on your grill directly above your heat source and cook it until you get the nice griddle marks you're looking for on your meat. Then, to stop it getting burnt or too charred on the outside, you move the meat away from direct heat and place it over a part of the grill with no heat source underneath. This indirect grilling method is the best way to cook steak and ensures that you get a rich, caramelised crust on your meat while cooking to the perfect internal temperature.
How to set up a two-zone fire
Let's look at how to set up two-zone fires on the most common types of grill out there; the gas grill and the charcoal grill.
Gas Grills
This one couldn't be easier, you simply turn the gas burners on and off using your grills controls. You want to turn some of them on and leave others off so you've got a hot direct heat zone and no heat source under another part of the grilling area.
Charcoal Grills
Setting up two-zone fires with charcoal grills is also easy, but it does take a bit more preparation than with gas grills. First, you'll need to light your charcoal using your chimney starter and then wait for the charcoal to start glowing red. Then, using a protective glove, pour the hot charcoal into a pile on one side of your firebox. After that, you pop your grill on and get to work.
Cleaning up with Grillbot
Now that you know the core cooking technique that sits at the heart of all great grill master's arsenals, it's time to start thinking about maintaining your grill like a master too. Grillbot is the first automatic grill cleaning robot that will clean your grill while you’re enjoying spending time with your friends and family. Furthermore, Grillbot can handle direct and indirect heat zones alike up to a whopping 250 degrees F and will sound an alarm if the heat is too high. You just concentrate on eating that juicy steak while Grillbot does the hard, dirty work for you. Now that is how to grill like a pro!
