Barkeeper's Friend on cooking grates

[Jerry N.]

why clean your cooking grates?
what is it you're cleaning off?

what am i missing here?

On my gasser, I don't clean the grates. High heat and a brush work very well. On the WSM, some food will usually stick to the grate that needs cleaned off. The WSM doesn't get hot enough on a regular cook to burn off the residue.

 

[Rusty James]

I like to keep the edges clean in case I bump my clothes with a dirty grill.

Nasty stuff, that cooked-on grease.

 

[TonyUK]

A quick brush both sides after cooking, & ready to go for next time.

If the grills haven't been cooked on for a good while, crank it up to 11 to kill any bugs, then wire brush. Cook. Never been ill all the years I've been q-ing. 0.02¢

 

[David Ward]

Go to Lowe's or HD and pickup a Hot Water Heater tub. You can get metal or plastic, I have plastic much easier to work with. Fill with hot water and add dish soap, soak grates for a couple hours and than hit them with a Scotch Brite Pad. Easy Peasey

Cool!!! Now I have something I can use the waterheater base for, which I bought back in 2005 when I first got my WSM. Here is a photo that Chris used in the protecting decks area of the TVWBB site! Photo is actually from the first lighting of the WSM in 2005. I long since moved on from that deck and my WSM now sits on one of those round concrete like mats to protect the deck of it's current home under my 10'x30' covered porch with 11' ceilings. Smoking in the rain and snow is no longer an issue.

But back to the point, I'm going to give this a try as I still have that old aluminum water heater pan (just need a plug for the PCV outlet.

 

[Bill W San Diego]

David, I never would have dreamed of using the a hot water pan for that. Thanks for sharing.

Bill

 

[Rusty James]

A bit off topic, but I can't get over how high the flames get on the Weber chimney. No wonder they come with two handles.

 

[Jerry N.]

(just need a plug for the PCV outlet.

You probably don't need to plug that outlet. It looks high enough to allow the pan to hold some water. You really don't need much (that's one of the nice things about a large pan), you just need the water to be deep enough to go over the grates. That's about 1/2 inch. The handles will be sticking out of the water, but that's no big deal.

 

[JRAiona]

I'm with Jim and Bob. Other than aesthetics I don't see the need to go to extremes in cleaning the grates. After a cook I just take mine to the kitchen sink and use a scotch Brite pad on it. It's not shiny new looking but it's clean.