Top 11 Accessories for the Grill

A good pair of tongs let you get a good grip on your food. They need to be easy to squeeze, yet bounce back quickly. Good tongs allow you to grip on to small and large items without crushing even the most delicate foods. Good tongs have a gripping edge that holds on but doesn't cut into meats. Find tongs that fit your hand and have enough reach to get deep into your grill without leaving your hand over the fire. Also avoid tongs that are too heavy. If you have a lot of cooking to do you don't want to add several pounds of tongs to the weight of the food you are flipping.

A good barbecue spatula doesn't need loads of funny little gadgets on it. I have one that has a cutting blade on one side, a vicious turning fork and an opener for your bottle of beer. Does everything, but isn't good at sneaking under delicate fillets of fish. A good spatula can easily slip under foods to lift and turn. That's all it needs to do, but it needs to do it well, because sometimes things stick and you need to get them up without tearing them apart.

Most people will tell you that you should never use a fork on meats that you grill. This is a barbecue myth. If you have a stack of chops to flip the easiest and fastest way to flip them is with a fork. This fork has a good, 18-inch handle and the classic two prone design that lets you hook and flip foods quickly and easily.

The problem with most "BBQ Brushes" is that they have scrappers on the front that make it impossible to get to the back of the grate. The scrappers can damage porcelain coatings. A good, simple brass brush won't damage your cooking grates but still does a good job of cleaning. This, spiral style, cleans a wide section of the grill and allows you to get to the back and corners of the grill.

Have you ever gone to turn a kebab on the grill and have the skewer turn and not the food? What you need is a good flat blade skewer. Kebabs where invented on Bedouin Swords. A great kebab needs to be held firmly on the skewer and turn with the blade. Look for broad skewers and not those black metal sticks everyone sells. These skewers are large so they will let you load up the kebab with lots of great foods. These are also stainless steel so they won't rust in the bottom of your drawer (yeah, I know where you keep them).

The problem with using a spatula on your grill is that it can tear apart delicate foods like fish that tend to stick to the cooking grate no matter how much oil you use. To solve this you can use a very thin bladed spatula to try and get under the food better. Unfortunately foods and droop between the grates on your grill. The GrillSpatula uses steel filaments to slid along the grates, slipping under delicate foods so you can more easily lift them. While this might not replace your regular wide blade spatula, it is a must for anyone who grills a lot of fish.