Portable BBQ? Put on some muscle and get grilling with the Q

I’m a serious griller. I grill throughout the entire year, and I live in Canada. I believe that if you’re going to grill, just like cooking in a kitchen, you need quality ingredients. But I’ve noticed that when it comes to grilling, a significant amount of successful grilling is determined by the equipment. That said, I look for a few things when it comes to purchasing a grill:
1) Heat control
2) Heat distribution
3) Heat containment
There are lots of other little things that make a grill stand out; looks, BTU’s, grilling area, etc., but for the most part, grilling is about putting food on or around a fire - so it should be all about heat.

When I purchased the Weber Q, I did so on the laurels of the Weber name. I have a Weber Genesis Silver at home and know that the Weber brand has put some serious thought into making a grill. All 3 heat objectives are satisfied with excellent performance on all fronts on my home grill. So how does the Weber Q stack up? Well, first of all, you have to realise that if you’re going portable, you have to accept some lower standards in order to support portability. You just can’t carry around a big grill. With that in mind, here’s how I found the Weber Q:

1) Heat control
Heat control is great. The low setting is nice and low without the possibility of it blowing out in the wind (I’ve been to the beach 3 times with relatively strong winds once and the flames kept steady). The high setting is really high - this grill heats up fast.

2) Heat distribution
Ok, so distribution of heat isn’t the greatest. Again, you have to sacrifice something for portability, and in this case you only have 1 burner. The burner is rectangular, sits in the middle of the grill and is about 11” x 7” and about 1” thick. With the burner that size taking much of the grill space, there is NO REAL spot on the grill for indirect grilling. Meaning, most of your food will be directly over the fire.
Secondly, the fire coming out of grill burners these days have some sort of covering over them to
a) prevent direct contact with food (to avoid burning) and
b) to prevent drippings from getting onto the burner.
This BBQ covers the burner via the grill grate (the thing you put your food on). The grate is a pretty standard, heavy cast iron, oval shaped grate. However, in order to protect the burner below, the grate is solid directly above the areas where burner sits (below) Drippings that would normally fall onto the burner are cast off over the edges of the solid area (which is about 2” wide). While it DOES protect the burner, food tends to build up in the solid areas and because it’s directly over the fire, it really gets caked on. REALLY caked on. Eventually, grilling over the solid area will leave you with no grill markings on your food because it’s basically become a flat area due to caked on debris.

3) Heat containment
Grilling involves a great deal of patience and trust (that your food wont burn). Keeping the lid closed ensuring heat stays in the BBQ and not have it escape is important to even, consistent cooking. The Q does a good job of this. The heat stays in and is very hot in all areas of the grilling surface except for a portion in the front. I found that, burgers, for example, take longer to cook through in the front of the grill than in the back and middle. But other than that, I can safely say that with the lid down, the food doesn’t burn (unless you forget about it) and that you have pretty much consistent heat all over the place. However, the side work areas that fold out tend to get quite warm due to the proximity of the edge of the work area to the lid.

4) Design
The Q grill comes with foldout work areas which are AMAZING when you’re dealing with portable grills. Most parks will not let you put a grill on a picnic table because you might burn the table top. So you either have to grill on the ground or on a stand. This leaves a problem of where you put your food for prep work, utensils for cooking, etc. The foldout work areas are great for just that though they don’t support a great deal of weight. I had a heavy glass dish with 8 burgers (in total about 5 pounds of weight) and the work area started to dip. I quickly loaded the burgers on the grill and that’s that. But still, a great concept for portable grills. When folded in (open the lid, fold work areas in, close lid) they do NOT touch the grate…which is pretty cool.
The grilling surface is a heck of a lot larger than I had imagined. Yes, the adds say you can roast a whole chicken in there…that’s great, but without indirect cooking, while you can fit a bird inside, it’ll nice and cooked on the outside and probably underdone inside. Anyway, it’s a huge surface. Enough for 10-12 5oz burgers.
The Q grill also comes with hooks to hang utensils, mitts, etc., on and a small recessed tray to hold smaller items.
The gas control knob is large (a little bigger than a baseball) and very easy to adjust the heat with.
The fuel (a 14.1 oz propane canister – those used for portable blowtorches) is easily attached and supported by a metal ring.
Lighting is simple and effective. A little red button on the far left ignites the burner. It take about 10 seconds to get the whole burner going as the propane needs to travel the circumference of the burner.
Cleaning the thing isn’t quite so easy. The gas control knob and propane tank can get dripped on as you are moving food onto or off the grill. But for the most part, it’s something you do after you get home.
The overall design is absolutely BEAUTIFUL to look at. It’s a domed top and domed bottom to allow food funnel into a large drip tray. Anyone that walks pass the thing will look at it and be impressed. Without a doubt (you’ll read this in my conclusion) this is a hardcore, portable grill.

5) Portability
As far as portable grills go, this one isn’t that portable. It’s heavy. VERY heavy and takes quite a bit of effort to carry around. A lot of it has to do with the large aluminum belly and lid but a significant portion of it comes from the cast iron grill. It’s so heavy that (I believe) Weber came out with a Baby Q: smaller, lighter, and with no work surfaces after the Q had been released. However, weight aside, this thing was meant to be moved around. Food remains, oil drippings, debris all fall into the bottom dome or the drip tray and wont be falling all over the place (outside of the grill) when being transported.

6) Accessories
You can buy 2 types of covers, a rolling stand, and hose adapter to fit standard size (large) propane tanks. The 2 types of covers are one rolling duffel and one standard cover. I have the latter and it fits snugly over the top of the grill protecting it in storage. It does NOT cover the bottom portion of the grill so dust and insects CAN get into the drip tray, spider screen (in the gas line) and gas connector. I don’t own the rolling duffel but from what I’ve read, you can load the Q into the rolling duffel and pull it along with you…sounds good to me.
The stand is wonderful and well worth the investment. You can convert the stand into a dolly like apparatus where you can sit the Weber Q on top and pull it along…just don’t expect to pull it over rough terrain. The stand is light, durable and once set up with the Q on top, provides another storage/work area below the BBQ almost at ground level (perfect for bread, buns, empty dishes, etc.). It’s a must for areas that do not allow BBQ’s on picnic tables or where there are no tables to begin with.
The hose adapter is mainly for those wanting to use this grill as their main home BBQ.

7) Price
It’s not cheap. $179 US at most retail outlets and online with the exception of EBay. You’ve got to love grilling or cash to spare to justify this grill. The price associated with my review was $199 US but that included the hose adapter, stand and cover.

8) Setup
It comes in a large box…very large for something that’s portable but let’s see; take parts out, attach lid, attach handle, attach propane, grill. It was that easy.

9) One last word of advice
Season the grill first. There are no instructions on this in the manual so I assumed you didn’t need to do this. Big mistake. Most of the food did NOT release even after it was cooked especially directly over top of the burners. After my first time using it, I decided to season it. I charred the remains on the grill, scrubbed it off with a bristle brush, had to further use a scouring pad with detergent, then a flat screw driver to get in between the grate. Finally, heated it up, covered it in vegetable shortening and let it sit. Heated it up, covered it again with shortening for good measure. Since then, no problems releasing food. I regularly season the grill after every other use just in case.

Conclusion
If you like grilling a lot, and I think you have to like it a lot in order to spend the kind of cash for this grill, then you wont be disappointed. It is as close to grilling at home but with a portable aspect. If you’re going to get it, consider the accessories – in the least, the cart. It’s very well made from a brand that knows about BBQ’s. This is a hardcore grill and built accordingly.