Section 01 of 08 · 4 entries
Heat
What the fire is doing before anything is on it. Nothing else on this site makes sense until the fire does.
Nothing else on this site makes sense until the fire does. A bed of glowing solid fuel radiates from its whole mass, and everything a cook can control — where the coals sit, how deep, how far below the grate, how much air reaches them — is a decision about where the heat is and, more usefully, where it is not.
Temperatures and times in this section are the conventional figures, stated as they are given. Nothing here departs from standard food-safety guidance — see Reference.
Everything in Heat
The thing, the condition, the value. In the order the decisions are taken, not by how much they matter.
- 01Two zones, or nothingA single even bed of coals gives you one setting and no way out of it. Bank the fire to one side and you have a hot side to build colour and a bare side to finish on — which is the difference between a burnt outside and a cooked middle.A long read
- 02Charcoal against gasRadiant heat from glowing solid fuel behaves differently from a burner, and the gap shows most on anything thin.A short read
- 03Reading the coalsAsh colour, the hand test, and why a thermometer at grate height tells you less than you think.A short read
- 04The lidOn, it becomes an oven; off, it is a grill. Two different cooks.One page
What the fire is doing before anything is on it.