Griddles are different from grills, in that they don’t provide an open flame. However, they offer excellent searing capabilities and a very versatile cooking surface that can easily be divided into zones. The grill comes with an app for your smartphone to use as a remote control. The hopper can store up to 22 pounds of pellets to ensure several hours of burning time.
However, I believe charcoal/gas combo grills and pellet/gas combo grills are very different beasts. The appeal of both types of combo grills is essentially the same. You use the pellet/charcoal side when you have more time, and you want to get Charcoal Grills Combo Grills a better flavor into your food (smoking a brisket). While pellet/gas combo grills are a relatively new addition to the market, combo grills have been around for many years. However, previously they would have been charcoal/gas combo grills.
Smaller griddles usually have surface areas of around 300 in.² or less and are perfect for cooking for a small family. Larger griddles will require dedicated space but can cook more food. They usually have cooking surface areas of 500 in.² or more and can cook for a large family. Griddles let you cook everything from eggs, pancakes, and other fragile foods that would fall straight through a gas griddle surface. Gas griddles (AKA flat top grills) can be a great alternative to a regular gas grill.
Traeger’s first step away from pellets and into gas came with all the plusses I found cooking on its pellet grills—excellent heat control, quality construction, and user-friendly controls. The grill also comes with a Traeger-level price tag, but that’s to be expected and really is justified here. If you’ve always been a grill person, switching to a griddle is conceptually a big change, but it comes with a lot of conveniences grill grates don’t.
Unfortunately, its also an expensive technology currently, though the cost should hopefully come down over time. As I discuss in my article on which pellet grills get the hottest, some pellet grills get much hotter than others. Now, you can use GrillGrates to Grills Portable Grills improve the searing performance of a pellet grill. Well, the reason is while they don’t feature any gas burners, they are actually a combo grill with the help of their induction hob. Indicating the thicker steel construction of the more expensive Pit Boss.
We recommend this Pit Boss griddle grill for its size and features relative to price. For starters, it’s pre-seasoned and offers a total of 62,000 BTUs split between four push-button-ignition burners, and features two large Expert Grill Combo Grills fold-in side shelves for prep that double as a cover. When selecting our flat-top grill recommendations, we relied on knowledge from our extensive grill testing, as well as our experience with brands we know and trust.
However, since you likely came across this article searing for the term ‘pellet/gas combo grill,’ let’s presume you know you want one, and let’s get straight into what’s available. There are several different reasons why you might want to consider a pellet/gas combo grill, and I’ve written about those reasons at the bottom of this article. Don’t stack anything on top of your griddle, as this can damage the cooking surface and the griddle as a whole and will lower the tool’s overall lifespan. If you plan on cooking for a lot of people frequently, a more expensive griddle will be well worth the cost. On the other hand, if you only use the griddle sparingly, perhaps a cheaper option is in order.
Unless you’re the type of person who needs to cook on charcoal, the Flatrock is worth a look. This stainless steel flat top grill has an impressive 62,000 BTUs of cooking power, plus a 750-square-inch cooking surface. Its 400 square inches of cooking space give you enough room to prepare food for a family of four or five. In front, there is a grease trench the full width of the griddle. Once the griddle is cool, you can remove it, then pour and dispose of the grease.
The griddle is made from heavy-duty steel and is finished with Camp Chef’s patented “True Season” process to extend its lifespan and durability. Clean up and maintenance is easy, with a small hole in the bottom corner to scrape grease and debris into and a removable pot for dumping. The grill arrives pre-seasoned but we found it was still worth doing a few rounds of seasoning with vegetable oil and then frying some bacon to give it an even better finish. The Camp Chef is a strong competitor for best flat top griddle with the Blackstone and Pit Boss we reviewed earlier. While this is good in theory, I find that when I want to griddle, I’m always running out of space. If you don’t want to invest in a dedicated griddle, the Little Griddle is a great option.