Chad Thomas: A New Grill

My old grill, which I have had for over 11 years was wearing out. The burners and grates were falling apart. I had already replaced the burners a couple years ago and the new ones have already rusted out. The main reason for that was the deflectors that came with the burners would not work because the pieces the deflectors sat on rusted off. I had been on the fence about buying a grill and what type of grill I wanted to get. I had been looking at propane gas grills, pellet grills and propane gas griddles. My plan had been to wait until after I got a shed for my backyard, but I changed my mind when my sister said her and her family were coming to visit. I wanted us to be able to hangout and cook outside.

The grill I went with was a Napoleon Prestige PRO 500 RSIB. I learned of this grill from Embers Fireplaces and Outdoor Living YouTube channel. The Napoleon Prestige Pro was their top pick for "quality" grills. Which seems be the third step down in the grill space. With "premium" and "luxury" above "quality". I would love to get a premium or luxury, but that will need to wait. The Napoleon is great for me now. It is made in Canada and the quality looked very good to me. My only gripe is the doors on the grill stand. They give a diagram on how to adjust them, but it felt no matter how much I adjust or tried to adjust the hinges, the doors stayed the same. I say try to adjust because the screws shown to adjust would not turn anymore the direction the diagram suggested to turn them. It is annoying seeing crooked doors, but I do not notice that until I need to open or close them and then I forget about right after using them. The other thing that was annoying was that the grill needs to be plugged in to get full functionality. There's a plug on the back, but the grill does not come with a cord to plug the grill in. You need to supply that and there really isn't any place that mentions this. After getting the grill started and messing with the control box, I looked over the owner's manual again to see what I missed. I finally found a troubleshooting section that says I needed to actually plug the grill in with an extension cord. Again, nothing said about supplying your own cord. Luckily I happened to have an extension cord that would work with the grill. I plugged it in and then the grill lit up. It looks a lot different with the LEDs on. With the grill plugged in the interior grill hood lights worked, which is one of the selling points for me.

I am happy with the grill and I'm looking forward to using it to its fullest. I purchased a griddle plate that sits in place in onside instead of the grill grates. This will be a temporary griddle until I get a full sized griddle to cook with. To finish out my start of an outdoor kitchen, I am going to purchase a burner stand that can be used to cook/boil/fry with. I found a recipe for Nashville hot chicken sandwiches from Meat Church that I have been wanting to make for a few months.