Charcoal Grilling

The first thing that I am going to tell you to do is GET RID OF THE LIGHTER FLUID, unless you like the taste of burnt fuel on your meat. Buy a chimney starter at the grocery store for around $10 and ditch the lighter fluid. If you must use lighter fluid I will describe how to correctly use it later in this article (Yes there is a correct way). The Items you need are as follows:

1. A Chimney Starter
2. 2 Full Sheets of Newspaper
3. A Fire Source (Match or Lighter)
4. Charcoal

First, take the grate off of the grill and open any vent holes on the grill for air circulation. The more air you can produce over the coals the hotter and faster they will burn. This is a very important lesson when making any fire, you need oxygen to make it burn hot. A sealed grill will do nothing more than extinguish the fire. Now that you have established good circulation in the grill, turn over the chimney starter and stuff the newspaper into the bottom. Set the starter in the bottom of the grill and fill it up with coals. Apply fire to the newspaper in the bottom of the starter and let it burn. You will see smoke coming out of the top of the chimney, that means that it is working. Fresh air drafts up from the bottom of the starter and supplies oxygen to the coals as they start to burn. The paper ignites the bottom coals, and as they burn, they light the coals above them. Within about 15 to 20 minutes you will see that your Chimney Starter in full of red hot coals. When the top coals are red hot you are ready to pour the coals out onto the grill. There are different ways to set up your grill depending on the type grilling you are trying to do.