StanHenson
TVWBB Member
Hi all,
My Char-Broil cast iron kettle grate came today. I cooked tonight, and here are some pics and a review.
Your chimneys will absolutely fit inside the outer grate. Mine is a generic Home Depot model, and it's fine.
The cast iron is about 1/8" thick. It's not incredibly massive, but the grate does have some heft and holds a good amount of heat.
Here I am half way through removing/flipping zucchini pieces. This is my biggest complaint with the grate: The bars are too far apart and things slip between them. I don't normally drop food through the grate bars, but I lost at least 5 zucchini pieces because the gaps were so large. The grill marks were very good, however, and the heat was fairly evenly distributed.
Here's the zucchini and some pork chops rubbed with wild fennel pollen. Don't worry about the grate's stupid brick pattern. You can turn food to get traditional looking diamond hatch-marks. See the chops for proof.
Here's the finished product. Grilled porkchops, grilled pineapple, a grilled zucchini salad with marinated mozzarella and roasted ears of corn.
Overall, I liked the grates, and will keep everyone posted.
Pros:
-Cheap. I paid about half of what a Craycort grate would have cost.
-Works with the gas assist of a Performer, and will fit all chimneys.
-Enough thermal mass to hold heat and recover when the lid is off, but not massive enough to be crazy heavy.
-Sears beautifully, cooks evenly.
Cons:
-Grates are far apart and things can fall in between them.
-Probably not a good idea to remove the center section during cooking to mess with the coals. Craycort definitely wins here.
-I have doubts about the finish on the cast iron. Char-Broil says they're porcelain covered, but they're the roughest porcelain I've ever seen. I'm going to assume they're raw iron and treat them as such.
-They're from Char-Broil, and I didn't have a great experience ordering from them. If Weber made a solid cast iron kettle grate, I would have ordered from them. Your mileage may vary.
Questions?
Stan
(Sorry about the multiple edits. I'm still figuring out how to embed photos.)
My Char-Broil cast iron kettle grate came today. I cooked tonight, and here are some pics and a review.
Your chimneys will absolutely fit inside the outer grate. Mine is a generic Home Depot model, and it's fine.
The cast iron is about 1/8" thick. It's not incredibly massive, but the grate does have some heft and holds a good amount of heat.
Here I am half way through removing/flipping zucchini pieces. This is my biggest complaint with the grate: The bars are too far apart and things slip between them. I don't normally drop food through the grate bars, but I lost at least 5 zucchini pieces because the gaps were so large. The grill marks were very good, however, and the heat was fairly evenly distributed.
Here's the zucchini and some pork chops rubbed with wild fennel pollen. Don't worry about the grate's stupid brick pattern. You can turn food to get traditional looking diamond hatch-marks. See the chops for proof.
Here's the finished product. Grilled porkchops, grilled pineapple, a grilled zucchini salad with marinated mozzarella and roasted ears of corn.
Overall, I liked the grates, and will keep everyone posted.
Pros:
-Cheap. I paid about half of what a Craycort grate would have cost.
-Works with the gas assist of a Performer, and will fit all chimneys.
-Enough thermal mass to hold heat and recover when the lid is off, but not massive enough to be crazy heavy.
-Sears beautifully, cooks evenly.
Cons:
-Grates are far apart and things can fall in between them.
-Probably not a good idea to remove the center section during cooking to mess with the coals. Craycort definitely wins here.
-I have doubts about the finish on the cast iron. Char-Broil says they're porcelain covered, but they're the roughest porcelain I've ever seen. I'm going to assume they're raw iron and treat them as such.
-They're from Char-Broil, and I didn't have a great experience ordering from them. If Weber made a solid cast iron kettle grate, I would have ordered from them. Your mileage may vary.
Questions?
Stan
(Sorry about the multiple edits. I'm still figuring out how to embed photos.)
