The fact that the carrying handle doubles as a lid holder is also useful for keeping an eye on the food when cooking. Once you have attached the liquid propane tank correctly to the grill unit, most portable gas grills feature a “click and turn” button for igniting the grill. Some of the grills we tested featured just one knob, used for both igniting the grill and controlling the strength of the flame. (Of course, to properly ignite any gas grill, you must ensure the propane tank is open). Two separate burners allow for multiple types of cooking (like searing and indirect heat), as with a standard-size grill. It gets hot and has, as one tester noted, “highly responsible” temperature control.
When it comes to cooking with this grill, we’d recommend using only a few coals at first during a handful of test cookouts to really get a sense of how the grill performs. Carrying this grill to various different cookout sites is easier than ever thanks to the Tuck-N-Carry lid lock. She’s an experienced product tester and recipe Grills Portable Grills creator, trained in classic culinary arts and culinary nutrition. She has worked in test kitchens for small kitchen appliance brands and national magazines, including Family Circle and Ladies’ Home Journal. With the ability to Grill, Smoke, Bake, Roast, Braise, & BBQ all on one grill, there’s no limit to what you can cook.
The stainless steel fire pit unfolds in one easy motion to give you an inverted pyramid of a basin, which is punctuated near the lip of the fire pit with ventilation holes to aid in stoking the fire. The Snow Peak Takibi Grill is our best camping grill for its clever folding design, quality of heat distribution, and ease of use. Camryn Rabideau is a freelance writer for PEOPLE, specializing in home, kitchen, and pet products. For this article, she consulted our testing insights and interviewed pitmaster Shannon Snell of Sonny’s BBQ for her tips on finding the best portable charcoal grills. In terms of performance, the Smokey Joe fell in the middle of the pack during testing. It reached over 500 degrees after 10 minutes of preheating and its dampers made it easy to adjust the heat, but our food ended up looking more baked than grilled, with minimal char lines.
This well-built barbeque is an innovative take on the manufacturer’s classic design, incorporating their enameled, cast-iron construction into a convenient, compact package. The rectangular basin can hold a coal bed that is both Grills Portable Grills deep and evenly spread. A plated steel top grate settles securely into place thanks to deep-seated insets cast into the grill frame, so you can easily adjust heat zones without fear of dropping your whole meal into the coals.
The burners all sit under the solid center sections of the grates, which our bread test revealed to be the hottest area on the grill. You will need to carefully manage indirect heat when cooking thicker things like chicken on the bone—we kept it over the open grates around the edges of the grill. When we tested using battery power, with the fan set on medium speed, we were able to grill for about five hours. The grill features a porcelain-coated, cast-iron cooking grate that helps provide even heat—and which we found easy to clean.
No matter how you measure it, the Traveler’s 13,000-BTU burner gets plenty hot and really shines when searing. The 320-square-inch grilling surface is big enough to grill for a crowd. It’ll still fit in the trunk of most cars, but it definitely takes up a considerable amount of space. The packable, rollable GoBQ is unlike anything else listed here—it’s made of a fire-proof, non-stick, non-toxic silicone-coated fabric, essentially the same stuff that’s used in baking mats.
(Pun intended—have you seen that handle?) We didn’t choose the Weber Go-Anywhere Charcoal Grill based on handles alone, but what stands out on this camping grill fits so well with its chosen title. Portability (and room for multiple patties) reign supreme with this camping grill. The cover locks in place with moveable, steel-plated legs that tuck up and around, making the top handle as good as a suitcase handle. However, if that doesn’t suffice, two other handles on the long ends will do the job, especially if you’re moving this portable grill with warm charcoal inside. To find the best portable grills for camping, we grilled dozens of burgers, hot dogs, veggies, and chickens to judge the ease of use, speed of cooking, and heat levels of each grill.