How to Grill and How to Barbecue, Where to Begin??

Hello again,

Just a word to start off. These posts will be progessive in the detail and difficulty of the content. They will start of as basic as possible with the assumption that the reader is interested in using a grill but doesn't quite know where to start.

If you are wanting to learn how to grill and/or how to barbecue a couple of basic things to know:

Grilling is the process of using direct heat for a relatively short period of time. Barbecuing is the process of using indirect heat over longer periods of time. Sometimes Grilling uses a combination of direct and indirect heat and Barbecuing does the same. But, for the most part that is the main difference; placement of the source of heat. Barbecuing also uses smoke as a source of flavor, but we'll get into that in another post. Direct heat means that the food is placed directly above the heat source, allowing contact with the highest heat available. Indirect heat is just what is sounds like; the food it placed off to the side of the heat source. Indirect heat allows the use of lower temperatures which results in a longer cooking time.

There are 2 types of heat sources for grills: Gas and Charcoal

Using a Gas Grill provides quick start up time and temperature control is easy. You can walk in from work and have food on the grill in 5 minutes. It's fairly easy to cook chicken at 350 degrees for 30 minutes with little or no major checking up on it.

Using Charcoal takes a bit more time to get going, but the one thing, in my opinion, that you get from charcoal that you don't from gas is that true "Grilled" or "Barbecue" flavor. You can buy special "rocks" to use in your gas grill to give it that charcoal taste, but to me it's just not the same.

Well, I'm gonna leave this one as it is. Please comment or ask questions, I'd love to hear from you. If you have any requests for getting started, please send those as well.

See ya soon....

Welcome to Ask Papa T How To Grill and How To Barbecue

Thank you very much for checking out this blog. The main purpose of this blog is to help people learn how to grill and how to barbecue as well as share thoughts and ideas on the many many different ways to accomplish the same goal which is creating fantastic food!

The focus of the blog is for home or backyard grilling and barbecuing on a scale smaller than a commerical restaurant would use. Information will be based on serving 10 or less people in most cases.

There is no end to what you can grill or barbecue. If it can be cooked on a stove or in an oven, it can be done on the grill as well and the results will be awesome!!!! Meats, Vegetables, Fruits, Desserts, Appetizers, Breads! You name it you can grill it.

It doesn't take a $7,000 grill and 500 fancy grillng gadgets and attachements to create excellent food this way. All it takes is some patience and understanding.

Any questions are welcomed as well as comments and I certainly don't know everything the world has to offer on the subjects of how to grill or how to barbecue, but together we can figure it out!