The Advantages of Pellet Grills

Whether you’re a backyard BBQer or a professional pitmaster, you fire up the grill with the same goal in mind – creating the best food possible. Several different types of grills can get the job done, but only one can deliver the experience of effortlessly imparting unforgettable flavor. There are many advantages to cooking on a pellet grill. We will take an in-depth look at the many advantages of pellet grills and why they are the best choice, whether you’re cooking for family or for a table of judges.

Pellet Grills Make Barbecuing Easy

Plug it in, fill the hopper with BBQ pellets, turn it on, set the temperature, and let the grill do the rest. Pellet grills are designed to allow one to take a hands-off approach to cooking by letting a controller do the majority of the work. 

You don’t need to haul logs or arrange charcoal. You can put away the lighter fluid and flint. The Ignition sequence on a pellet grill starts with a single button press. 

MAK Grills use the Flashfire Igniter, a ceramic igniter that reaches 2000 degrees in seconds and works in combination with our industrial variable speed fan to blow superheated air onto the pellets. This allows us to reach high grilling temperatures in mere minutes. 

Once the ignition sequence is complete, the controller’s capabilities determine to what extent it is able to control the cooking process. Pellet grill controllers have evolved over time from simple low, medium, & high setting devices to the advanced controllers found on high end pellet grills today.

The Pellet Boss® controller that comes standard in every MAK Grill is a proprietary controller designed and built in Oregon no more than half an hour from the shop where we build our grills. The programs and algorithms that comprise its firmware were designed by us to ensure peak performance, consistency, and accuracy whether you’re grilling steaks in the sub-zero Alaskan winter or smoking a brisket all day in the blistering deserts of Arizona. 

This level of control also allows you to choose cook length, temperature, and when that temperature should change. You’re in control and can fully customize the longest and most complicated of cooks to your exact specifications. 

Add to this the convenience of technologies like Wi-Fi and BlueTooth and it’s easy to see the appeal of the work smarter, not harder approach to smoking and grilling meat. 

Pellet Grills Make Cooking Fun

Most of us are in this for the same reason – we love the outdoor cooking lifestyle. We love sharing great food with those closest to us and experimenting with recipes. We didn’t get into this because we love micromanaging a fire or cleaning. 

Pellet grilling frees you up to have fun and do more of what you love and less of what you don’t. 

Once you put food on your wood pellet grill, you don’t have to stand around and babysit it. The grill does the work, leaving you free to focus on friends and family. 

Pellet grills drastically reduce the amount of work required and create consistent results. Because the stress and labor normally involved with BBQ is eliminated, you may be inclined to have cookouts with friends or family more often. Pellet grills allow you to devote your energy to enjoying yourself or creating new recipes. 

Pellet Grills are Safe

Gas can explode.

Charcoal and wood logs are messy and can smolder for days after use.

Direct cooking over fire increases the likelihood of flare ups and grease fires. 

Pellet grills cook indirectly, meaning no open flame, flying sparks, or direct contact between fat drippings and fire. MAK Pellet grills create small, precisely controlled fires in a stainless-steel firepot. This firepot is surrounded by a stainless-steel body and covered by a stainless-steel diffuser, and drip pan at a minimum. 

Pellets are released in small quantities and consumed completely. As long as you maintain relatively minimal cleaning routines, which we make as easy as possible by using a removable firepot, the chances of anything out of the ordinary happening are extremely low.

The pellet grill is the safest outdoor cooking device ever invented.

Pellet Grilling is Better for Your Health & the Environment

No added oils or fats are needed to achieve the tremendous flavor that cooking on a pellet grill imparts. You’re cooking with real wood, which means you’re using a fuel that has been used since the dawn of time. Because you are cooking indirectly, excess animal fat drippings are not burned up and made carcinogenic by open flame. Instead, they hit a grease pan and convert to gases which help flavor your food. Hardwood BBQ pellets burn with a more than 98% efficiency. This reduces the exposure of carcinogenic substances and HCA’s to you and the environment. Avoiding the creation of carcinogenic smoke is not only good for your health. Extremely low particulate matter means fresher, safer air to breathe. Barbecue pellets reduce landfill disposal of sawdust by millions of tons per year. Barbecue pellets are not only a sustainable biofuel, they are also the ultimate example of re-purposing.

Pellet Grills are the Most Versatile Outdoor Cooking Machine

If you can cook it on a stove or in an oven, you can cook it on a pellet grill. Not only will a pellet grill effectively replace your stove or oven, it will maintain and recover temperatures more quickly and accurately. Pellet grills use convection cooking which surround food with hot smoke and air, cooking food thoroughly and evenly, while keeping it moist.

Pellet grills are incredible smokers that impart real wood smoke flavor, without all of the labor and babysitting required by stick burners. Long low and slow cooks no longer have to monopolize your day. You’ll still have the most tender, juicy, delicious results with the golden, brown bark you love and expect. If you choose a pellet grill with cold smoking capabilities, that opens up a whole new world of possibilities. Smoke cheese in the fall and ice cream in the winter. Cure fish and jerky in the spring and summer—your only limit is your own imagination.

Not all pellet grills can actually grill, so make sure the one you’re considering has direct heating capability. The best pellet grills are safe, reliable replacements for your oven, smoker, grill & searing tool. 

Hardwood BBQ Pellets Create Unforgettable Flavor

We saved the best for last. Hardwood pellet smoke imparts flavor that has to be tasted to be believed. Food prepared any other way will forever be ruined for you.

If you choose a model that has direct heating capability, like our funnel FlameZone system, you can make a hot and fast steak, seared to perfection, anytime you like. More and more though, you will find yourself thinking a smoked and reverse seared steak is worth the wait.

Soon after, one of the foremost questions in your life will be, “Will it smoke?” Tomatoes, peaches, avocados, nuts, cheese, SPAM even.

Nothing will be safe from your relentless need to enjoy food filled with the flavor of real wood smoke.

It’s not just one flavor you can look forward to, but a variety of them. Each wood type has a unique profile, but all of them are as wonderful as the last. For every food, there is a wood that best compliments it.

Automated Cooking without Compromise

Cooking incredible wood fired meals outdoors has never been easier. Say goodbye to propane, lighter fluid, and chopping wood and experience the machine that has perfect BBQ down to a science. Pellet smoking is automated stick burning. You can get the flavor, bark, moistness, or char that you expect every single time without worry or work. Machines like the MAK Two-Star General connect our modern technologically advanced and demanding lives to the tradition of cooking outdoors over a wood fire shared by our ancestors.