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One thing we routinely find in our testing of charcoal grills is that the results—how your food turns out—are largely dependent on the skill of the user, who has to be ready to adjust dampers, monitor cooking temperatures, and handle coals to get outstanding results.
Kamado and pellet grills don’t require the same hands-on approach.
But despite all the oversight, charcoal grill enthusiasts think it’s well worth the effort. “Smoke is a byproduct of combustion, and the smoke from burning gas and charcoal are different,” says Craig “Meathead” Goldwyn, a celebrated grilling expert and judge on the professional barbecue circuit, on his website, Amazingribs.com. “Charcoal makes more smoke than gas, with a broader range of tasty flavor molecules, because it’s burning complex organic molecules.” In other words, the smoke from charcoal makes food taste better.
Below you’ll find our video tutorial on how to cook on a charcoal grill, as well as step by step directions. If you’re still looking to learn more about all kinds of grills, start with our grill buying guide. CR Members can also jump right to our ratings of charcoal grills.
The Charcoal
Choose the right coals. Novice grillers should start with charcoal briquettes. In our tests, they heat more evenly than irregularly shaped lump charcoal. Seasoned grillers can give lump hardwood charcoal a try. It burns slightly hotter, which makes it a good choice for searing.
How much to use. One charcoal chimney’s worth, give or take. Charcoal starter chimneys hold about 3 pounds of coal, a good amount for most grills 16 to 26 inches across. If you want to be precise, check to see if your grill has a maximum fill line—otherwise, consult the manual.
How to light the charcoal. Fill the chimney to the top and rest it on a level, heatproof surface, like an asphalt driveway—or directly on the grates of your grill. Place a single, natural fire starter under the chimney—crumpled newspaper will suffice—and light the starter with a long match or electronic igniter. Allow the starter to ignite the coals and let the flames travel to the top of the chimney, burning until all the coals are lit and slightly ashed over, a process that takes about 20 minutes.
The kettle grill below works well with a single chimney of charcoal.
Controlling the Heat
How to arrange the coals. For foods that cook quickly without much risk of burning, like hot dogs, burger patties, and cut-up veggies, dump the coals in the center of the grill and distribute them evenly across the grill’s lower grate.
For foods that require a hot sear, like a steak, or that take a long time to cook through, like a bone-in chicken breast, you’ll want to build a two-zone fire. Arrange all the lit coals on one half of the grill’s lower grate. That creates a searing surface over the side with coals, and an indirect cooking area on the side without. With either method, add coals continuously every 30 to 60 minutes to roughly maintain the quantity that you started with.
When to close the lid. There’s no hard and fast rule about when to use the lid, so you’ll need to take clues from what you’re cooking. Generally, most foods that cook quickly, over a single-zone fire, can be cooked without the lid in place. You’ll want the lid for foods that take longer to cook because it helps trap hot air, producing indirect convection heat, which cooks foods through without scorching the surface from direct contact with flames.
Adjusting the dampers. Most charcoal grills have two sets of dampers, one near the bottom and the other on top of the lid. Both can be opened or closed, as needed, to control the flow of air through the grill and, in turn, the heat inside. Opening the dampers makes the coals burn hotter, and closing them does the opposite.
The model below has a door to add coals during the cooking process, as well as easy-to-adjust dampers.
Grilling and Smoking
Monitoring the temperature. When grilling, there are two temperatures worth tracking: The internal temperature of your grill and the internal temperature of your food. For food, we recommend an instant read digital thermometer.
For monitoring the temperature of your grill, you can use any leave-in digital meat thermometer. Choose a model that has a braided steel sleeve over its wires, designed to prevent crimping or melting where it touches the hot surfaces of the grill. Position the probe on the grates, without the tip touching metal, so that it measures the temperature at the cooking surface.
Adding smoke. Pros of the barbecue circuit use smoke the way chefs use salt—to develop deeper flavor profiles of whatever they’re cooking without overwhelming the senses. Whole muscle cuts of meat, like pork ribs or lamb shoulder, tend to take smoke best. To get that smoky flavor, use one to two handfuls of wood chips for every chimney of charcoal.
Getting Rid of the Coals
When you’re done with the grill, close the lid and shut both sets of dampers. That will tamp down or extinguish the coals. Anything unburned can be transferred to a metal can and saved for future use.
To get rid of any residual ash or embers, place them in a waterproof metal can, saturate with water, and allow them to sit overnight or longer before throwing them away.
