Green Mountain Grills-Daniel Boone
As our anniversary present to each other in August, 2010, Ed and I both agreed that we wanted a good grill. We'd purchased a gas grill when we built our house in Maryland, and it gave us a good 8 or 9 years until it crapped out. So, the desire for one set in.\
I had a budget in mind, no more than $500. I didn't want to cheap out this time, nor did Ed. We visited the various retailers and weren't wowed by what we saw. Ed mentioned going to the Outdoor store on the north end of town. They didn't have grills, but the salesperson told us we should check out Grills Plus More on the other side of town.
We're glad he did.
When we walked in the door, the smell of 'que hung in the air and told us we'd come to the right place. In short order, Ron (the owner) was chatting with us about what we wanted, that we missed grilling, did a lot of cooking already and wanted a better quality grill than what we were finding around town.
He lead us over to the grill pictured here and opened it up.
The smell that came out of the grill spoke to me and what it said is "you WILL buy me." Meanwhile, Ed smelled the same thing and immediately was thinking "How am I going to talk her into this one, because I WANT IT!".
Fortunately, this was Ron's display model of the Green Mountain Grill (GMG) Daniel Boone, he had a newer version to put out on the floor, so he offered us a price break and it was just a hair over the budget. Twenty minutes later, we were loading it in the back of the van.
We picked up GameTeen from school and made a detour to Sam's Club for some pork chops. I had plans of loading up the entire grilling surface to find hot spots, and wound up grilling 9 chops, a package of Zweigle's white hots, and a bunch of corn.
It was (and still is) ridiculously easy, easier than the charcoal and gas grills I've owned. This grill plugs in to an electrical outlet and can be used with a generator if the power goes out, something that is a consideration in Florida, where we can see long power outages with a hurricane.
The picture below shows the hopper, which takes about 1/3 of a bag of the wood pellets you see below. The bag costs under 20 bucks, and well, even with grilling 2-3 times a week, takes me over a month to use. Yep, wood fired flavor over and over for less than filling up a propane tank once.
The hopper has a rocker switch to turn it on, then you press one of the temperature buttons and it starts through the warm up cycle. There's an auger that funnels some of those pellets into the big box and in about eight minutes, the digital indicator shows 350 and you're ready to grill. No more guesswork on whether the charcoal is hot enough, no more worrying that things will cool off too quickly.
Something else to consider is that there is a fan within the heat box, which means there is convection heat-meaning food cooks quicker. I have become spoiled by this grill and tend to use the grill before my stove most of the time.
In addition to the usual grill fare of burgers and dogs, a Boston Butt ends up on the grill once or twice a month. I make pizza about once a week and those always go on the grill (parchment paper makes them easier to turn, but they can go on without it). Steaks, even the turkeys for Thanksgiving have been grilled. Ed's not a fan of turkey, but he didn't complain about it when I made them on there.
So, the outlay for a GMG is a little more than that grill you might purchase at your local home improvement store, but in the long run, my GMG has been used more in the 1 3/4 years than all of my other grills combined. Should we move to a colder region of the country next year, I'll be plunking down money on the thermal blankets that GMG sells, because I will not give up grilling year round ever again.
That picture above is my pulled pork. It's got that smoke ring that you look for when dining in those 'que joints. I've got a kick butt rub I created, and I found an awesome recipe for Pig Pucker Sauce (I even sent the guy a thank you email, it is that awesome). I've got GameTeen's teachers looking forward to the end of year lunch that I'll be bringing to them next week.
The above picture shows why I prefer to use parchment, we left behind some of the pizza on the left.
If you're in the market for a grill and want great flavor and ease of use, take a look at the GMG website and find a dealer. Go check out their wares. It's likely you'll be like us and have one, too.
The irony? Ed was trying to figure out how he was going to talk me into 'letting him' buy this grill, when I'm the one who uses it all the time. I absolutely LOVE my grill.
Comments
Despite what you'd think, the pellets burn very hot and efficiently, leaving very little ash or residue in the bottom of the grill. Pellets can be purchased in additional wood 'flavors' if you want as well.
The electronics of the grill use very little power. A simple car battery and power inverter can power this thing for days in an emergency (or tailgating!)
And while it's used by you most of the time, it's MY GRILL!
I actually found your blog hunting for the recipe for Grandpa Johnson's sweet potato souffle. I ended up reading your review of Johnson's.
Nice to find another blogger in our neck of the woods!
--Mary