[EXPLAINED] Do You Need to Use All Burners on Grill?

Grilling is an excellent option to make your summer party more entertaining. Whether it’s a family get-together or an anniversary, a BBQ program is always a great option to make things more enjoyable. And when it comes to BBQ grills, you can find various grills available in the market including charcoal grills, natural gas grills, and propane gas grills.

Even though charcoal grills are renowned for ensuring maximum heat, they aren’t as convenient as gas grills. Thanks to gas grill burners, gas grills offer better heat management than charcoal grills. But there’s a common confusion regarding the grill burners – whether it’s mandatory to use all burners on a grill.

Actually, it mostly depends on how much heat you need to produce to do your grill. For easier understanding, we’re going to explain this matter in detail in the following section. Therefore, read the post till the end.

Is It Necessary to Use All Burners on Grill?

Most people prefer gas grills because of their convenience in use. With a gas grill, you can adjust the temperature and even produce more heat at any moment. Basically, most gas grills come with 4 burners or 6 burners. It mainly depends on the grill’s size. The big and expensive ones have 6 burners. The mid-level grills have 3/4 burners.

Now back to the point. Frankly speaking, the necessity of using all burners depends on some basic factors. For example, how many foods you’re going to grill, how long you want to take to do that, and which portion you want to provide heat and which portion you don’t. Still seems confusing? Don’t worry! Read the following passages thoroughly to understand what factors depends on.

1. The Amount of Food

If you’re grilling for a party then naturally you’ve to grill so many foods. That’s why you may want to use all of the grate or griddle at a time. And That’s when you’ll need to use all your burners. The more burners, the more space you can use for grilling. 

2. The Amount of Time

Here, the fact is kind of similar to the previous one. If you’re in a hurry for grilling, it’s better to use all burners on the grill. When you don’t have much time but the situation demands a quicker grilling to serve BBQ food as soon as possible. With all burners, you can cover maximum space for food to grill, and if you adjust the heat to a maximum level, you can grill more food within a short time. 

3. The Amount of Space

If you’re thinking of preparing some grilled food for yourself and you don’t prefer having too much food, most likely you won’t need much of the grate’s space to grill your food. Therefore, you only need to light the burners that are underneath the space you’re going to use for grilling. You can turn the other burners off. Otherwise, if you want to grill lots of food, you may need to light all the burners to provide heat all over the grate space. 

NOTE: When you’re grilling varieties of food like big steak, meat cut pieces, and vegetables at a time; you may need to balance the heat according to the food. Unlike big chunks of steak meat, meat cut pieces and vegetables require less heat and comparatively cook quicker. Therefore, when you’re up to grilling them simultaneously, make sure the heat for steak meat or heavy food item stays high, and the heat for veggies and small pieces of meat stays low or medium. 

Most times cooks prefer to keep one-third of burners on low or turned off and two-thirds of burners on high heat.

Frequently Asked Questions and Answers (FAQs)

How do I grill indirectly with 3 burners? 

It’s pretty simple to do. As a 3-burner grill consists of 3 burners, all you’ve to do is put the food in the center of the grill, keep the middle burner turned off, and light the other 2 burners on both sides. This way you can grill the food with indirect heat that’s being away from the actual heat source.

How many burners are best on gas grill? 

Well, it’s pretty much common sense that the more burners you have on your gas grill; the more grate space you can cover, the more heat you can produce with them, and the more food you can grill at a time. There are 5 or 6 burner grills available in the market. Currently, those have the maximum amount burners and which also means they are the best. 

How long does a 6-burner gas grill last? 

For your information, an average gas grill has a lifespan of 5 to 10 years depending on the maintenance. However, a 6-burner gas grill belongs to high-end grills, and it has been found that with proper maintenance and staying out of outer impact, a 6-burner can last for nearly 15-20 years. 

Conclusion

To conclude, you only need to use all burners on your grill when you need to grill a lot of food (require more space), at different temperatures (based on food type), within a short period. Otherwise, two-thirds of all burners are perfect for regular grilling. That’s all about it. Let us know if the post proves helpful.