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Grilling is something of an art. Everyone鈥檚 got their own favorite grilling tips, tricks and techniques. Yet some approaches are better than others 鈥� and it can take time to understand just how versatile your barbecue can be. Whether you already know how to master healthy grilling or need pointers on how to work with foods beyond meat alone, we can all benefit from fresh grilling tips.

And some of us are making more mistakes than we might realize. Here are seven common grilling mistakes you鈥檒l want to avoid for better dishes and easier cooking.

1. Oiling Your Grill Grates Instead of Your Food

In order to prevent food from sticking to your grill grates, it鈥檚 imperative to add grease 鈥� and plenty of grill enthusiasts oil up those grates before they add any food. While this technique technically works, it鈥檚 a pretty big grilling mistake in the eyes of experts.

Oil is important, but you don鈥檛 want to waste it on the grill grates. When you apply oil to your hot grates, it actually starts to聽聽almost immediately. This can infuse your food with a weird, unpleasant taste. And sometimes, if your grates have a carbon outer layer, adding oil can actually make food聽more聽likely to stick.

Instead, you should put oil on your food. Cover meats and veggies with a light coating of oil. You can brush it on or toss it in an oil-based marinade; either will do the trick.

2. Over-Marinating Meat

Marinades infuse all kinds of meat with delicious flavors, and they also do the double-duty task of tenderizing tough meats. While marinades can range anywhere from just 30 minutes to a full day of soaking up juices, herbs and spices, here鈥檚 something most people don鈥檛 realize: you can over-marinade.

If you leave your food in a marinade for too long, you can actually achieve the opposite effect that you intended. As聽聽explains, letting food soak longer can over-tenderize meat and make it mushy. Extra-long marinades will break down the protein bonds closest to the surface of your food. In addition to mushiness, this can dry out meat.

Double-check your recipe before marinating to make sure you aren鈥檛 overdoing it. Make sure you aren鈥檛 leaving any kind of meat in its marinade for longer than one full day 鈥� even for the toughest cuts of red meat, 24 hours is usually the max recommended time.

3. Failing to Properly Preheat the Grill

You always preheat your oven before baking or roasting, and you always let your pans come up to temperature on the stove. But do you always take the time to preheat your grill?

If you鈥檝e been turning up the flames and immediately putting food on the grill, you鈥檙e going to want to slow down and start preheating. It鈥檚 important to let the grill鈥檚 grates warm up before you start cooking. Cold grates can cause food to stick more stubbornly, which is both frustrating and messy.

Preheat your grill like you鈥檇 preheat your oven and wait about 20 minutes before tossing anything on its cooking surface. The hotter the grates are, the better those seared grill marks will be 鈥� and the more perfectly your food will cook.

4. Frequently Opening Your Grill鈥檚 Lid

Have you heard that opening your oven or lifting the lid on your slow cooker increases your cooking time by as much as half an hour? Well, the same goes for your grill.

It鈥檚 incredibly tempting to lift up the lid of your grill and check on what鈥檚 cooking. But every time you fuss with that lid you鈥檙e exposing your hot grill to cooler temperatures. That, in turn, drops the temperature inside and slows down the cooking process. The more heat escapes, the more challenging it鈥檒l be to achieve evenly, quickly grilled food.

Regardless of what you鈥檙e grilling, keep the lid shut as much as possible. If it鈥檚 too tempting to poke your head in, set a timer and walk away. To ensure you aren鈥檛 overcooking your food, check in at around 10 to 15 minutes for leaner meats and 20 to 30 minutes for thicker cuts. Veggies can take anywhere from 8 to 30 minutes, so you can pop in on these earlier.

5. 鈥淕uesstimating鈥� When Meat is Cooked

There are countless tips out there that are meant to help you determine when your food is fully cooked: touch tests, tenderness tests, and visual cues have all been touted as easy methods. But you really can鈥檛 tell when meat is completely cooked unless you get inside it.

If you rely on how meat looks or feels, you鈥檙e running the risk of serving yourself 鈥� and anyone else who鈥檚 dining with you 鈥� under- or overcooked meat. There are only two ways to get an accurate 鈥渄oneness鈥� assessment: by cutting into the meat or using a thermometer.

Avoid this grave grilling mistake by making sure you have a meat thermometer in your arsenal of tools. You can easily stick one into anything you鈥檙e cooking and get a quick temperature read. Many even offer guides or alerts to let you know ASAP when your proteins are cooked and ready. And you鈥檒l know every time that your meat is at a safe-to-consume temperature.

6. Putting Fish Directly on the Grill Grates

There are plenty of sins you can commit when grilling, but one of the biggest is placing fish right on the grates.

Fish is incredibly delicate. With flaky meat and thin skin, any kind of fish can immediately adhere to your grill鈥檚 grates and leave you with a sticky mess. Even worse, making this grave mistake can lead fish to fall apart (and through your grates).

To keep your fish from sticking, put it on anything but the grates themselves. There are a few options you can try: cedar planks, foil packets or griddles. You can also cook fish in a cast iron skillet or grill pan.

7. Using Lighter Fluid

Have you been using lighter fluid to get tall flames roaring from your grill? While lighter fluid certainly gets a fire going and your grill hot, it鈥檚 a mistake that can leave your food smelling (and potentially tasting) like gas. Instead of a smoky, classic grill flavor, you鈥檒l find that lighter fluid makes your food pretty unappealing.

If you need some help getting a fire started on your grill, there are other ways to do so without imparting a fuel- or gas-like scent and flavor. You can try a chimney starter, which lights a fire with old newspaper to get charcoal glowing with heat. That way, you鈥檒l get the heat you need and keep your flavors in check.

Once you鈥檝e made sure you aren鈥檛 making these critical grilling mistakes, take your expertise to the next level. Discover even more grilling tips and recipes:

Grilling Hacks: How Not to Overcook Shrimp

Brad Leone鈥檚 Summer Grilling Advice

Grilling Rules, According to Barbecue Legend Rodney Scott

The post 7 Common Grilling Mistakes That Could Be Ruining Your Barbecue appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

It鈥檚 not hyperbole to say that Franklin Barbecue in Austin, Texas, is the biggest name in the business. The man behind the聽 brand鈥擜aron Franklin鈥攈as become a celebrity in his own right after doing the unthinkable: giving away his recipe for perfect brisket in his first book ($29.99, Ten Speed Press, 2015). In doing so, he fundamentally changed the reach of barbecue in this country.

鈥檚 barbecue editor Daniel Vaughn says: 鈥淲hen the most famous brisket cook the world has ever seen tells you exactly how to replicate his cash cow, enterprising pitmasters are going to do exactly that,鈥� he wrote in 2021. 鈥淢uch of our current glut of superlative smoked brisket comes from barbecue joints that opened in the post-Franklin barbecue world鈥 whole lot of Texas brisket tastes like we鈥檙e eating a cover song. Granted, it鈥檚 a cover of the greatest barbecue tune ever written.鈥�

His second book, , details the glory of steak. And in聽 May, his third book was released: , and no doubt, it too will become a bestseller. But where Aaron Franklin has the know-how, it鈥檚 the trilogy鈥檚 co-author Jordan Mackay, a wine writer since turned barbecue fanatic, who brings Franklin鈥檚 wisdom and technique to the page. We sat down with Mackay to talk about the book, the difference between barbecuing and grilling, the importance of smoke, and a favorite recipe.

国产吃瓜黑料: Tell us about this new book, the third in the Franklin trilogy.

Jordan Mackay: This one is more of a cookbook. The first one is about what Aaron does at Franklin Barbecue. It鈥檚 very classically based around the staples of central Texas barbecue. The second book is a super deep dive on steak鈥攔anching, quality of beef, dry aging, cutting, preparing, grilling. I don鈥檛 think that鈥檚 been done before and I鈥檓 really proud of it. This third one is an intersection of grilling and smoking. The aim is to get the most use of the fire from beginning to end, and get some of the smoke qualities and things we love about barbecue with the fast action of grilling.

国产吃瓜黑料: Many people use the terms 鈥渂arbecuing鈥� and 鈥済rilling鈥� interchangeably, but they鈥檙e not the same. Can you help define each?

Jordan Mackay: Barbecuing is very different than putting pork chops on a deck grill. Grilling is fast cooking and it requires certain ingredients and cuts of meat that cook quickly. Flavors are largely born of鈥攊n the case of a gas grill鈥攖he vaporization of juices hitting a hot surface and emanating back up to coat the food. Barbecuing is slow and what we really love is cooking with wood and [the flavor of] wood smoke. When you cook over wood coals, it鈥檚 different from gas or charcoal in that you get the best out of grilling and you get the most out of the smoke action.

国产吃瓜黑料: There鈥檚 good smoke and bad smoke, yes?

Jordan Mackay: It鈥檚 so crucial to get good smoke versus bad smoke. [For the record, the best, most flavorful smoke is faintly blue and a result of your fire being 650掳F-700掳F.] Some chefs really get into 鈥業 can smoke this and that,鈥� and they鈥檒l put coals in a hotel pan and cover it. Often that鈥檚 not good smoke, it鈥檚 acrid. As much as Aaron and I represent the existence of smoke鈥搘e also caution against it. We鈥檙e not into doing everything with smoke. We treat it like a seasoning.

国产吃瓜黑料: This book is first and foremost about fire鈥攂uilding it, tending to it, eking out every bit of its heat and magic. According to Aaron, there are six stages of fire鈥攊gnition, white smoke, flame, coals, embers, and ash鈥攁nd each can and should be used for cooking.

Jordan Mackay: If you鈥檙e going to create a fire, it takes a lot of effort and resources. It鈥檚 a lifestyle choice for that day or night and you don鈥檛 want to waste it. Cooking over fire makes everything better. It鈥檚 like when you go camping, my mom used to say that when we went backpacking鈥� even when we were adding water to freeze-dried meals that we got at REI鈥攖hat eating and cooking outside is better.

国产吃瓜黑料: Of the many recipes in the book, one that gave me a double take was Jordan鈥檚 Perfect Green Salad. There are just five ingredients (of which one is 鈥渞estraint鈥�) but it鈥檚 two pages long, three with the photo. Tell me about this.

Jordan Mackay: First, [the salad] is really the perfect antidote to barbecue and grilled meats. But as much as this is a recipe book, we鈥檙e not into recipes, we鈥檙e into technique. We鈥檙e geeks about technique. I can pretty much take any recipe, including a salad, and spin it out into 2 to 3 pages. When you learn the underpinnings of why something works, then you can add your own twist. As much as there are more recipes [in this book], they鈥檙e meant to be inspirations and templates to cooking on your own.

国产吃瓜黑料: OK, recipe or not, name one of your favorites in the book.

Jordan Mackay: The pork shoulder steaks. They鈥檙e a commitment but worth it.

Pork Shoulder Steaks Recipe Here

The post All Your Questions About Homemade Barbecue, Answered appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

Reprinted with permission from Penguin Random House and .

This preparation of pork combines the dynamics of a slow cook with the fast grill, producing a flavor that hearkens to both. Pork steaks absorb the delicious effect of the grill as their drippings vaporize on the hot coals and subsequently rise up to perfume the meat. Yet they also pick up gentle smoke from the coals and burning wood.

While this pork is cooked like a steak or a chop, it is actually cut from the shoulder, aka the pork butt. As you know, the meat from the shoulder is much tougher than meat from the loin, where the chops are. Consequently, pork shoulder is usually cooked long and slow to break down the collagen and make the meat pull-apart tender. The goal for this approach to shoulder steaks is to cook them over direct heat, like a pork chop, but slowly and deliberately so they soften a bit over time. You鈥檙e not looking for exceedingly tender, pulled-pork consistency here. But you鈥檙e also going to cook well past medium-rare as you might do for a chop. The length of the cook allows the meat to pick up precious flavor from the fire.

Speaking of pork chops, they would be equally delicious cooked over the firepit and basted with the mop recipe listed here, but they are an entirely different muscle鈥攆rom the loin, not the shoulder鈥攚hich cooks quite fast, should be served at a lower internal temperature, and doesn鈥檛 need all that time to break down tough muscle fiber. Cook thick-cut pork chops as you would a steak (though not as rare), but feel free to baste them with this mop for added flavor.

THE MEAT

I recommend using rich, well-marbled pork, as the fat content helps the meat hold up over a long cook. Definitely try to avoid modern, conventional pork, which has been purposely bred to be lean. I look for heritage breeds such as Berkshire or Red Wattle. There鈥檚 even a ranch raising Ib茅rico pigs in Texas, the same breed that produces the world鈥檚 greatest jam贸n in Spain.

Use a bone-in pork butt and ask your butcher to cut it into steaks two to three inches thick. You could also buy a whole shoulder (more affordable but also more work) and then break out the old bone saw, which I sometimes do much to Stacy鈥檚 chagrin (not her favorite thing to find lying around the kitchen), and cut through the bone yourself. Most of the steaks from a pork butt will have a sliver of the blade bone in them. This is what you want. Boneless butts have to be butterflied to get the bone out and then are tied up in a round. This is fine for roasting a whole piece, but the steaks need to retain their structural integrity and thus must retain the bone.

THE MOP

A mop is necessary here to add pork-friendly flavors and to keep the meat moistened so it doesn鈥檛 burn while it cooks for a good long while over the coals. The mop also provides additional fat that your pork might not have (even a well marbled heritage breed), augmenting the supply of vaporized juices as it drips onto the coals.

You can prepare the mop on the stovetop in advance and then warm it over the fire when it鈥檚 time to use. Doing this advance prep makes it easy to cook these steaks at home or at a campsite.

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