Find the Best Grill Spot With a Slice of Bread
If you’ve been grilling, you’ve probably set the food on the grill on fire. Are you familiar with skewers with leather steak and perfectly fried vegetables? Or maybe a charred but dubiously deep-fried chicken breast? No more. Today marks the first step on your journey towards understanding your gas grill – and as a special bonus, I’ll add a whole bunch of toast. Compared to charcoal grills, which allow you to create your own fire pattern, gas grills hide secret hotspots, this can be frustrating. Accumulation and clogging due to dripping on the burners, reduced quality of production or grates so rusted that they resemble the best Alpine Swiss cheese are just a few of the factors that can affect the heat output of your grill.
How the hell are you going to decide whereto put the steaks in the straw ? Yes with a loaf of white bread and 90 seconds of your time. Take a bite and cold broth and go outside. We’re grilling tonight.
Yes, white bread is a great tool for identifying the heating zones of your grill. Its lighter color and higher sugar content provide almost instant feedback on what is hot and what is not. I recommend investing in a denser, country-style bread like Pepperidge Farm or Arnold, and here’s why: Softer bread like Wonder and Dave’s Killer Bread will hold more moisture and will stick and fall apart on the grill. Wait for the sale if you need to, then the difference is worth that extra dollar.
Now that you’ve spent many hours looking at a selection of breads at your local grocery store, reheat your grill over a high heat for 15-20 minutes. Clean the grates and wipe them with a damp towel to remove excess deposits – this applies to well-seasoned grills and new shiny ones. When your grill is as flawless as possible, reduce heat to medium and let it stabilize for a few minutes. Use this time to wrestle with the tie on the bread bag and get ready: we put the whole loaf on the grill.
Starting at a corner of your choice, fill the wire rack with bread. Ask your phone’s friendly digital assistant to set a timer for 90 seconds, time a clock, or simply count Mississippi. Wrap the bread around the grill and memorize the pattern – once you’re done, you’re going to flip each slice of bread in the same order that they were placed, starting with that first slice (which hopefully doesn’t burn.).
Okay, could you take a look at this?
Darker, but not yet burnt pieces indicate higher heat dissipation, while lightly browned and still soft spots indicate cooler areas. Now you know where to park your steak when you fry it backwards or toss a cedar board to char and smoke fish fillets. These cooler spots are obviously great for toasting buns and buns, but also better for leaner cuts like chicken breast or pork that take too long to dry on too high a heat. If you use your grill a lot, you can easily remember these places. For weekend warriors, you can take a picture or make a chart for quick reference. The manual heat test is not as accurate as you might think. And what to do with all this toast? Well, you can spread the lighter slices with butter and keep toasting the bread over medium heat to make grilled Caesar croutons, whisk mayonnaise quickly and make BLT for the crowd, or just toss a few slices of the best pasteurized processed cheeses on top of them to cook literally grilled cheese sando. And the next time you grill, be in awe of the fact that you will be eating evenly grilled pork chop, not a bunch of toast.