From Memorial Day to Labor Day – and often before and after – Americans practically live outside with our grills. Something about the warm weather just makes us start craving those smokey, charcoal, and wood-fired tastes. So why is that so many of us don’t ever really learn the “right” way to grill or barbecue? We hear a lot about when we learned how to cook, but those lessons seem to be firmly rooted inside. Grilling and barbecuing, on the other hand, aren’t really exact cooking methods, so how do we know we’re doing it the best we can? By paying attention to the experts at America’s Test Kitchen! They’re here today showing us their six best tips and tricks for making sure our barbecue is definitely the best. Watch and learn.

6 Tricks For Grilling And Barbecuing

1. Shield your grill from the wind as much as possible to keep the internal temperature from fluctuating too much and the smoke from escaping too quickly.
2. If you use charcoal, measure or count out the briquettes to make sure you have the right size fire.
3. Soak wood chips in water to insure that the smoke slowly releases over a long period of time.
4. Position the vents in the lid directly over the meat to draw the smoke across it.
5. If you’re cooking a large cut of meat, bank the coals steeply to keep the meat further away from the fire and insure that it cooks gently.
6. Keep that lid on! You want that internal temperature to stay consistent, so no peeking. Use a grill thermometer to monitor your food’s progress instead.

What do you think? Did any of these tips or tricks surprise you? Did anybody ever teach you to grill, or did you just figure it out on your own?