Commercial charcoal grills can be a very expensive investment, so thorough research will prove to pay off the hassles and time spent.
If you are an owner of restaurant, hotel or bar and looking to get new commercial grills to replace older ones, it best to conduct with you chef and see what he or she has to say. After all it is them who will be using the charcoal grill the most.
If you are an entrepreneur looking to start business serving barbecue meat, whether indoor or outdoor, you’ll find some useful information about general things to consider when you plan to buy commercial charcoal grills and reviews of popular models amongst professional chefs and caterers.
Price Range
When you go after industrial grade charcoal grills, expect to pay ten times or more than if you would spend on home or residential grills. The price can very greatly from brand to brand, depending on size, features, cooking quality and durability, anywhere from around $500 to above $10,000.
While cheaper end charcoal grills might be ok for low level of use (lets say you only use it to occasionally make steaks, chops, ham, burger, kebab, sandwich, thin slices of meat, pizza or small pie portions) in many drink bars. But as the demand becomes more commercial in nature, like frequent grilling of barbecue in restaurants, you need to get one of the heavy duty stainless steel models with large cooking space and full smoking features, such as temperature control, timer dial and etc. Initial serious investment will prove to be more cost effective in the long run, considering all the man hours that can be saved on more specialty-skill demanding tasks.
Durability
For most home barbecue grilling, durability is often overlooked to compensate for lower budget price. But when it comes to commercial charcoal grills, you should make it a top priority in the list. Imagine how much money will your business loose if out of the sudden the grills stops working and you can’t quickly find some one to fix it? Always consult with knowledgeable people in the field, like seasoned chefs or restaurant owners who have first hand experience with their commercial meat smoker.
Ventilation
Charcoal grills involve burning wood lump or commercially processed briquettes. When cooking in large capacity, these burners produce a large amount of smoke and poisonous carbon monoxide which can quickly pollute the air in the kitchen or your whole restaurant. Some expensive charcoal commercial smokers come as total unit with in-built ventilation system to minimize the smoke leaking. Some other might require external ventilation system installed and connected to the grill. If you mainly do catering outdoor, then this won’t be an issue, but if you make food in restaurant or hotel set ups, plan ahead which type of commercial smoker is likely to fit into your working kitchen the most.
Mobility
Are you buying commercial charcoal grill for outdoor food servicing or for restaurants and hotels gourmet food cooking? If you do a lot of outdoor barbecue service, for example, at festivals, holiday carnivals or sports events, make sure the grill is designed as mobile trailer mounted units that are easy to transport with your car or truck.
Cooking Capacity
If you are owner of brick and mortar business, you know pretty well how many customers you serve in a day and when is the busiest time. So choosing a correct size commercial smoker grill for your need won’t be a problem. But if you, however, plan to serve food outdoor in mobile truck types, it would be wise to do some research first to see how many customers you’d likely receive. Buying too big commercial grills than you will need has serious impact on your cash flow, especially at the beginning when your business would benefit from even minor savings. While not having large enough smokers will leave some potential money on the table. So calculate and predict the use thoroughly before you invest on commercial bbq grills.
Review of Commercial Charcoal Grills
While you can find many brands out there who offer commercial meat smoker, we have narrowed down the list to just one quality and reliable name you can trust. The brand is Traeger.
Traeger Wood Pellet Grills has both stationary and mobile trailer types of commercial bbq grills – which are great if you do outdoor food service operation.
The Traeger COM150 Stationary Smoker Grill is great for delis, hotels or restaurants where gourmet food is served. This is so far the most budgeted grill in their charcoal commercial line, priced at around $2000. It’s big enough to serve a dozen of people at a time. It comes with smoker shelves for convenient meat storage during long cooking sessions and has dual hoppers and firepots that provide even heat distribution across the smoking area.
Their Traeger COM200 Large Trailer model is one of the most popular unit that sells for under $9000. It has large wheels and is very easy to connect to the back of your car. You can also get the COM190 Double Trailer at cheaper price which has extra cargo storage and accommodates two individual smoker units at about $5,700.
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