It's that time of year again - Tailgate season. While you pull out your barbecue and dust off the cover, here are a few quick tips to help you get in shape for the months ahead of excellent tailgating.

Cleaning Grates

There are a lot of products on the market for cleaning your grate but really any good stiff wire brush will do. Now, few people seem to know the best way to perform this little task. One way is to place aluminum foil sheets over the cooking grate; light the grill, close the cover and let it run at maximum temperature until the grill stops smoking, up to a maximum of 30 minutes. Aluminum foil helps intensify the heat for more effective cleaning. Caution: Heating the grill for longer periods may warp the grill body, particularly if it’s made of aluminum. Scrape any residue off the insides of the grill body once it cools completely. The inside surfaces of most gas grills are straight, so it’s easy to scrape away accumulated fats and foods with a putty knife or similar metal tool. If that is to much for you, remove the grates and wash with hot soapy water. If you have a cast iron grate clean completely then, brush on some oil with a paper towel to keep your grate healthy.

Charcoal Grills

One of the great things about charcoal grills is that you clean it out after every use. However, many people don’t take advantage of the situation and simply dump the ashes out. Keeping a good wire brush handy to sweep out the cooked on remains will make any further cleaning jobs much easier. And don’t think that because you have one of those grills with the ash catchers that you don’t have to do any cleaning. Everything you cook with requires cleaning. So every time you use your charcoal grill, clean the grate and brush out the ashes and cooked on foods. This will cut down on excess smoke and bad flavors. Periodically get in there and really scrap out all that stuff that just seems to develop on the bottom of your grill. And at least once a year get out a bucket of soapy water and give it a really good clean. If you need to touch up the paint get a can of grill safe paint (the guys at the hardware store will know exactly what it is). If you do this, your grill will last for many years and produce great food.

Gas Grills

The bad thing about many gas grills is that they have this setting on the regulator marked “clean”. This leads many people to think that this is how you clean your grill. Like a charcoal grill, you need to clean your gas grill every time you use it. Make sure that the grates are cleaned after you grill and brush off the sides and lid after every use. Use the clean setting to preheat your grill, yes it will burn up stuff that has fallen down into the grill but it doesn’t really clean. Regularly you should lift out the cooking grate and clean off the barrier above the burners. This might be lava rock, briquettes, or a variously shaped metal plate, but it should get cleaned of the cooked on grease and food particles periodically.
Once a year you need to do a good clean on your grill. This requires that you pretty much take it apart to do it, so first start by disconnecting the gas and then lift out the grill parts layer by layer. Once you get down to the burner, make sure you inspect it thoroughly. There shouldn’t be anything that will get in the way of the flow of gas. If the burner is clogged it will give you uneven heat and make for poor grilling. If you can clean it, do so, if not, replace it. If your grill uses lava rocks or ceramic briquettes you need to make sure that these are not too heavily encrusted with cooked on foods, if they are, replace them and avoid bad tasting smoke that dirty rocks can produce.
With everything out of the grill, clean it completely with soapy water. If the paint is coming off, or if your grill is showing signs of rust then you need to do some painting. Other than that, put everything back in, check to make sure that all connections are good and then turn it on. Let the grill heat completely before you cook again to make sure that any left over soap residue gets burned off.