Fresh corn cooks in about 15 minutes with a couple turns, which is perfect on a portable grill with limited fuel. As with other “full-size” options, the Traveler’s biggest flaw is… Traveling. Weighing nearly 50 pounds, you’ll want to keep it pretty close to your car or wherever Charcoal Grills Combo Grills you plan to store it. The grill has wheels, so it’s easy to move around, but it’s not great on unpaved roads or situations where you might need to carry it for a long stretch. The stylish, carbon-steel BergHOFF Leo Portable Tabletop Barbecue Grill is a piece of modern art.
We recommend this grill to cooks who are interested in grilling for a crowd, as the XL surface area tends to lose heat quickly when accommodating just one or two pieces of steak or fish. The tiny Cuisinart CGG-180T Petite Gourmet Portable Tabletop Gas Grill suffered major flare-ups when cooking burgers and turned into a raging grease fire when cooking chicken pieces. Everything Grills Portable Grills we cooked on this grill had a dark, sooty film and tasted like torched fat. Wirecutter staff who have used the Q 1200 at home have found it easy to clean both the grates and the grease tray under the grill. You don’t need to buy Weber’s specialty tins for the grease tray either—instead, just line the catch pan with aluminum foil and pull it off when you’re done.
It’s cooking, the old-fashioned way, but if you haven’t done that much you might want to practice before you have hangry kids clamoring for dinner. Still, if your primary criteria is portability, this is the best grill around. A porcelain-enameled lid and base help you retain heat, while the double vents allow you to control the airflow for the best grilling results. The plated steel grate is easy to remove, clean, and heats up evenly, too. The one downside to this camping grill (if you can call it such) is the ~10 minutes of assembly required right out of the box.
Many of these grills will work off the very small 1-pound propane cylinders, with a different attachment needed for larger propane tanks. The difference between the two kinds is weight—larger tanks are heavier and need to be carried separately from the grill—and amount. The smaller tanks are easier to carry in a backpack, but will run out of fuel Expert Grill Combo Grills within a couple of hours. This grill is for serious tailgaters and is specifically designed to ride on the back of a car attached to a hitch. The monster Forge 15 has 355 square inches of cooking space so you can feed the whole gang and two powerful 7,500-BTU burners (15,000 total) will make sure your steaks, dogs and sausages get a proper seer.
Portable grills cost anywhere from $50 for a simple Weber charcoal grill all the way up to $500 or more for fancier gas and propane grills with bells and whistles galore. My favorite portable grill, the Weber Q-1200, sits at about $259 but you can find it for less on sale. Most sturdy small grills should last you several years to a decade if the unit is cleaned, covered and cared for properly. Our ranking of heat output also considered each manufacturer’s BTU reporting, grill surface area, and lid sealing and construction.
She resides in New Hampshire where she can be found hiking, camping, and paddling in the mountains, lakes, and seas of New England. It’s an extremely versatile cooking appliance for anyone who plans to spend a long stretch in the great outdoors. If you’re looking for a larger model, the best way to get the weight off your back is by going with a wheeled model.
One downside during assembly was the drip pan didn’t fit properly, which necessitated a small trim to get it to slide in. Out of the box, this can be powered by 1-pound gas canisters, but Weber does sell an attachment if you want to use 20-pound tanks. We also tested and recommend the Q 1200, which has 189 square inches of cooking space and a 8,500-BTU burner. The Grillster is an excellent option for searing steaks and other high-temperature cooking, but controlling the overall range on this rip-roaring grill is challenging. Unless our goal was blackened chicken or blistered peppers, we rarely found ourselves using anything other than the lowest gas setting.
A temperature dial lets you control the heat as easily and quickly as on a kitchen range. My only complaint about the Venture is that the grease tray is small and therefore prone to spilling if you aren’t careful when you slide it out. Despite that, this is a clever, fun, well-designed grill that’s perfect for searing on the go. It’s big enough for a family of four and strikes the best balance between ease of use and cooking performance. It has a thermometer and some side tables to hold your plates and tongs.
We’ve also tested a slew of portable grills as part of our typical grill testing over the years. Each time we test, we use the same testing methodology and ingredients to make sure our results are comparable. We also update our tests as needed to ensure they’re still relevant and we’re keeping up with the trends and latest innovations. Curious about which portable grills were worth buying, we tested seven popular models from trusted brands. If you’re searching for a gas grill you can bring on all your adventures that also performs well enough to be used at home, look no further than the Weber Q 2200.