Then he’d empty out the old ashes into a brown paper sack and hand me the cooking grate to go clean in the laundry room. When I got back, he’d pour a big pile of charcoal into the Weber’s shiny black bowl. Then came a spray with some lighter weber charcoal grill fluid, and the strike and toss of a match. Cart-style grills have a handle and wheels that make them easy to move around, and the Char-Griller Patio Pro BBQ Grill is a compact and budget-friendly option for your deck or patio.
The Napoleon’s four legs, versus the Weber’s three, make this grill more stiff and stable, and allow for a nice big shelf underneath. Its construction is simple and solid, and the materials—rust-proof aluminum legs, porcelain-coated steel for the body, and a nickel-plated steel grill—are designed to last. And while the basic design has barely changed since 1952, Weber has added helpful new details over the years—this latest iteration has convenient tool hooks on the side handles, for example.
It features a modest 250 square inches of cooking space, but it has all the features you need to whip up a delicious meal. Weber makes charcoal grills for every budget, ranging from around $50 to over $2,000. The most popular weber charcoal grill, the Original Kettle, can be found for between $100 and $450, with the differences coming in diameter, ash management, colors, and cooking grates. Since Weber Grills released the iconic Weber Kettle Grill in 1952, they have become the biggest name in BBQ.
The short of it is – the Weber Kettle is what I believe to be one of the best grills and even smokers to exist, especially at a fair price-point. Our rib experience with a few of the other grills was far from ideal. At times, the inside of this grill hit temperatures as high as 400 degrees F. And sadly, the ribs it produced came out burned, charred and overdone. Interior temperatures had a greater swing, jumping up to 300 degrees F during periods of cooking.
Sarah Vanbuskirk is an accomplished writer who tested her grill out on her family of seven to see if it could live up to the rigors of feeding a large family. Gear Patrol participates in various affiliate marketing programs, which means we may get paid commissions on editorially chosen products purchased through our links to retailer sites. Weber’s grill covers cost close to $100, while these off-brand ones are about half that. Easy to Clean- With the patented One-Touch Cleaning System in Weber Grills, charcoal ash can be removed quickly with one hand.
In fact, it’s probably easier than most, given how roomy it is. Temperature is controlled with vents at the bottom of the bowl, and one up top on the lid. Another option is to use an electric charcoal lighter, which you put on the grill along with charcoal to bring the coals up to temperature. The basic kit comes with an aluminum pizza tray, but we recommend using a classic pizza stone portable bbq for a crispier foundation. While a charcoal chimney is one of the most highly recommended methods for lighting charcoal, Electric starters, such as the Looftlighter, work great (and they’re fast). BBQGuys has the largest selection of charcoal Weber Grills available, and our BBQ experts are standing by 7 days a week to answer any questions you may have about this iconic brand.
The Weber can also smoke low and slow at a rock-steady cooking temperature. For the high-heat, whole-grate burger test, we lit a chimney’s worth of briquets—the equivalent of six quarts, or about 90 coals of a former runner-up from our extensive briquet tests. We then oiled the grates and distributed 10 to 12 six-ounce patties across the whole cooking surface . While the burgers cooked we kept an eye out for undesirable flare-ups, which can char the meat and create acrid smoke, and examined the evenness of cooking on the different areas of the grates. After about 10 minutes of cooking , we compared how well each grill had seared the burgers, looking for any patties that were charred or unacceptably raw, and took a taste. The Smokey Mountain Cooker™ smoker has two cooking grates to smoke two large items at once or plenty of ribs.
We were underwhelmed with the performance of the Napoleon 22-inch grill, which is most likely a result of the grill needing more briquettes to really work well. The kettle on this model is pretty deep and you can adjust the cooking grate to two different levels. We wouldn’t advise cooking with the grate at the highest level if you’re looking for a nice sear since it’s too far off the heat.
The porcelain-enamel blast-fired coating allows for effortless removal of soot with just some soapy water. Many folks strongly believe charcoal produces better flavor than gas. Let’s just say different fuels have different characteristics—and we won’t even get into all the different types of charcoal available today. If you’ve ever found starting a grill to be a hassle, and even if you haven’t, this will make grilling so much easier. Is there a portable grill that works as well as a full-sized one? Meet the Kudu Open-Fire Grill, which allows for all the romance of this kind of cooking, with none of the hassle.
Thanks to more than six decades of continuous refinement, it’s the most versatile, most user-friendly, and best-performing charcoal grill we’ve tested. FITS MOST 22” BARBECUE GRILLS – Is your charcoal grill missing a side shelf? BBQ Dragon’s innovative side shelf easily clips on to most 22-inch round kettle-style charcoal grills, like the popular 22 in. You can even use two of these shelves at the same time and clip one onto each side of your charcoal grill. Grilling is easier when you have a side shelf to set things on.