Indirectly Explained

Almost 3 weeks ago I promised you a post explaining the concept of indirect cooking in the very near future.
Unfortunately, end of quarter at work plus Pesach cleaning got in my way. I now have time to remedy my failure to blog.

A Quick Overview

There are only two (legitimate) main ways to cook on a barbecue.

• Direct
• Indirect

There is obviously the possibility of using these two methodologies to create different heating zones within the same barbecue.

Indirect

I will start with the methodology I have used the most.
Indirect cooking simply changes your bbq into a type of oven. You place the heat source within the bbq – but away from the food and this allows you to use the heat, flavour and atmosphere of a bbq to infuse the food (and company) without risking the food becoming a burnt offering to the gods of shame (maybe I shouldn’t be reading Rick Riordan within hours of writing blogs).
In a nutshell, above, I have described the theory of indirect cooking – but I have not described the practicalities.

Temperature

Lets keep things simple. To use a barbecue as an indirect cooking source you really need a thermometer. Would you buy (or use) an indoor oven in which the temperature is not only unknown – but will drop in time without telling you?
So a thermometer is – if not a requirement – an essential part of your barbecue. I have two thermometers that I use. I bought a cheap bbq thermometer on ebay and attached it to my weber’s lid. This thermometer is inaccurate showing a temperature about 10-15% above the actual temperature – I doubt this is that different to the thermometers in a normal oven. I also have an electric thermometer with probes for both the bbq and the meat that I am cooking. I will talk about the electric thermometer in a different blog later.
The thermometer tells you what the temperature is. To arrive at and maintain the required temperature is the skill of barbecuing and this is done by consistently using the same quality coal and knowing how to use the vents on your barbecue to control the temperature as you will.

Fire –  This is the main heat source of any barbecue, but what is needed to create a fire? Just three things :

• Fuel – in our case either charcoal, wood or gas
• Food – This is oxygen, however hard you try, a fire will not light or stay alight in a vacuum.
• Ignition – A fire needs to be started, we will cover this topic for coals in another blog

As with us poor humans – the more food we have, the more energy we have. Therefore the more oxygen a fire has – the hotter it will be.
This knowledge can be used to keep a barbecue at a good temperature for a long time.
If you open up the vents at both the bottom and the top of the barbecue – you will get the hottest temperature possible (in an indirect methodology) for the amount of fuel that you have. You will also use up that fuel in the shortest time possible.
If you fully close the vents then you will starve the fire of its fuel and it will go out (this is what fire blankets and extinguishers do to put out fires).
Ideally you will have exactly the right amount of coals to allow the vents to be open a few millimetres each so that the fire will burn slowly at a good temperature. As the coals start to burn out you can then light more coals on the side whilst opening the vents slowly to increase/maintain the correct temperature. Once the new coals are ready you can reduce the air flow and add in more coals to keep the temperature correct for longer.

Placement

In indirect cooking we are using the heat of the coals as an indirect heat source. Therefore we have to place the coals away from the cooking area – this obviously means that you cannot use the whole grill to cook (unless you have an external firebox).
The two most common methodologies are :

• put all the coals on one side of the grill and then put the food on the other side
• put half the coals on each side of the bbq and cook in the middle – this is the method described by Weber in their documentation

There are other options though – depending on the shape of the item you are cooking. Examples are the coals in a circle around the edge – and the food in the middle. Or the coals in a circle in the middle and the food in a ring around it.
Play and find what you find the most convenient. I generally use the coals on one side method as I find this the easiest (and cleanest solution to maintain).

Drip Trays

When cooking indirectly it is traditional to put an empty drip tray under the food. This will catch any dripping fats and liquids and stop them making your bbq dirty. If you add a small amount water or other liquid (think beer, wine, juice etc) into this drip tray then you will add additional flavour to the food – and maybe even be able to use this liquid as a base for gravy to put on the food.

Baffles

This is not traditionally part of indirect cooking – but a useful trick.
If you think that your meat is a little too close to the heat source (and one edge will be at risk of becoming burnt whilst the rest is undercooked) then a temporary baffle is your solution.
Attach silver foil between the griddle and the base of the barbecue. This baffle should be placed between the coals and the food to direct the heat away from the cooking area and up into the top of the barbecue allowing the heat spread more evenly within the cooking area.

A word of warming

I have now mentioned all the main points about indirect cooking – except one (possibly two). This may even be the most important point.

Do not open the bbq lid unless you absolutely need to.

Every time you open the lid you will add approximately 15 minutes to the cooking time. I do not care how good your food smells – until it is ready (or you are adding coals or marinades) do not open the lid.

Here comes the “possible” point 2. If you are not opening the lid – how do you know if the food is ready? The answer is in simple technology – buy yourself a digital food thermometer and cook the meat to a specific temperature. A simple thermometer can be bought for around 100 to 150 NIS. At best you can buy a brisket at 30NIS a kilo. Most briskets in Israel (are just the point and are) around 3-4kg. If you do not cook a brisket to the correct temperature – even once, then you are wasting at least 120NIS which is the cost of a thermometer that could prevent this mistake.

Next time I will talk about direct cooking and temperature control with this method.

Adam.