The first step for each was to assemble the grill, rating it on the clarity of instructions and how easy it was to accomplish the task. Next, we judged the grills’ portability, such as how easy they were to move and if lids or grates fell off easily. For those with carts, this included how easy or difficult they were to move, pop up, and collapse.
Rounding out the bottom of the list for this metric is the Camp Chef Portable Pellet. This model is really heavy compared to the others, and it has a short handle. You also have to lay it on its back to convert it from travel to cooking mode, which is not ideal. But if you want a pellet grill for tailgating or base camping, this is still your best option.
Nicole Papantoniou is the director of the Good Housekeeping Institute’s Kitchen Appliance and Culinary Innovation Lab where she oversees all kitchen appliance content and testing. This is her third season testing grills for Good Housekeeping and has had weber q her hands on at least 35 grills and counting. The summer is favorite season, mostly because she can put one of her many grills to the test nightly. Some folks mentioned having trouble with assembly and misaligned parts in verified purchase reviews.
Next, the heat distribution was very uneven, where a uniform layer of coals still resulted in a hot spot in the center. Surely you’ve seen — and possibly owned — one of these little guys in the past. The Weber Smokey Joe is a staple at park cookouts and on camping trips and that’s for good reason. Our experts test thousands of products each year using thoughtful test plans that bring out key performance differences between competing products.
Whether you’re looking for a gas or charcoal grill, a tabletop, or one with a stand and wheels, we’ve tested a range of top-rated and best-selling portable grills to find the best performers in each category. The grill runs a little hotter with the lid down than the temperature indicated on the built-in thermometer, and there were minimal flare-ups in cooking. Cleanup is easy; using a grill brush on the grates and wiping down the inside of the lid to prevent grease buildup did the job.
As a rule of thumb, a grill with thicker construction will retain and spread heat better than one with thin walls and bottoms, with some exceptions. The Everdure CUBE, for example, has thinner construction but is specifically designed to distribute heat evenly. Single-use grills exist, and while they may not be the most practical option for everyday use, if you have one long hike planned and want to do some grilling, this is a good option. The Casus grill can only be used once, of course, but it actually gets fairly hot in about five minutes and stays lit for over an hour. It also has enough space to cook three or four burgers, sausages, dogs, veggies or chicken. The clear champion of this section of our assessment is the Camp Chef Portable Pellet.
The cast iron grates are easy to scrub clean with a grill brush and the drip pan (located inside the grill) removes so you can wash it before storing. The Cuisinart Venture, with its picnic basket appearance, is a good entry-level grill for the uninitiated and a value model for more experienced grillers. It’s a model intended for direct-heat cooking, as there’s no lid to control humidity for “low and slow” cooking. The burner packs 9,000 BTUs under enameled cast iron, providing adequate heat for small-group cooking. The grill comes to temperature quickly, but there is some variation in hot spots, especially towards the outside edges of the grill, which charred more than the center, where foods cooked slower. With 189 square inches of cooking surface, this grill was not the biggest on the list, but it’s plenty big enough to cook burgers, chicken, fish, and veggies for a group of six hungry people.
Control is the criteria that most distinctly separates the highest performers from the rest of the contenders. For gas and electric, this metric was scored based on how many burners each product has and whether they can be adjusted to high, portable bbq medium, and low temperatures. For charcoal, we assessed how easy it was to maneuver the coal bed to create heat zones. For pellet grills, we studied the user interface and considered the details of the startup and shutdown process.
It’s a little more expensive than some on the market, but it’s built to last. If you want portable charcoal grilling in a truly portable package, this is the portable bbq best small grill to buy. In the realm of larger portable propane grills, the Coleman Roadtrip 285 is a cut above the rest when it comes to output power.