If you’ve known me longer than 15 minutes, you know I think grilling is the most bombay way to cook. Grilling is, hands down, the best way I’ve found to create crazy amounts of flavor while simultaneously cutting out calories (and reducing dirty dishes – which I’m all for). Being a frequent griller, I’ve sort of hit a brick wall: My grill.

It may be dirty, but at least it heats unevenly

A Member’s Mark 2-burner Gas Grill that I bought at Sam’s Club a couple years ago ($200 range). Don’t get me wrong, this grill has served me well in its time, but it took some figgerin’ out. Here’s the deal. Two burners is great if the grill is pretty small. This grill actually has a fair amount of real-estate inside. When I bought it (before I knew what I was doing) I thought that was a good thing. “Holy cow, look at all this space, and only two burners to boot!” Basically, I was saying, “Wow, they found a way to defy the laws of nature!” Because that’s what it would take for two burners to evenly heat a space that big. I can literally place my hand over some parts of the grill without feeling any heat, while other spots produce food that looks like it was in the pocket of some poor Pompeian man who decided to hike Mt. Vesuvius one fateful morning.

Long story short, I started grill shopping. Because I spend so much time on the grill, I wanted a unit that had more to offer. In my quest, I stumbled upon this beauty:

Who’s that in the back? Oh well, who cares.

The Stok Quattro (surprisingly still under $300). As if the jump from 2 burners to 4 wasn’t enough to get me excited, this grill also has a few surprises up its sleeves, which I’ll get to shortly. This picture was taken about 30 seconds after I finished putting it together, and about 45 seconds before I lit it up and got cookin’. Let’s take a tour.

onions, zucchini, mushrooms

bone in pork chops

Put some cooking oil on a plate and coat your pork chops with it. You’ll notice that I always talk about grilling being so healthy, yet every time I grill, I completely coat my food with oil. “What is this nonsense?!” You might ask. Well, it’s not nonsense. The unhealthy part of cooking with oil is when your food sits in the oil and sizzles away. The food actually takes in the oil, which you later take in when you eat it. As with all cooking techniques, adding cold oil to a hot surface before adding your food will prevent it from sticking and any extra will run right off (don’t use too much though, because oil will catch fire pretty easy with a grill). Sometimes you’ll see people brush oil onto the grate. Yeah, then take a look at their brush. Completely melted/singed/burned. There’s no reason for that. Just put it on the food.

soaking vegetable tray