Instead of a fixed open flame like gas or charcoal grills, pellet grills use a hopper and firebox system. The hopper continuously feeds the firebox with fresh wood pellets that allow the grill to run for hours at a time . Hoppers usually feature an electric auger that feeds the firebox as needed. The smokey heat produced by this continued cuisinart soup maker wood-burning is trapped in the grill, slowly cooking meat while infusing that sought-after, authentic smokey flavor. Plus, you can experiment with different types of wood pellets to produce unique flavors. If you’re looking for a grill that performs well and looks good doing it, the Cuisinart Clermont Pellet Grill is the way to go.
When it came to low-and-slow cooking, the grill had no problem hovering around 225°F, and we only noticed a +/-10°F swing during the 10-hour smoke time. The brisket turned out smokier than most of the briskets we cooked, too. I’ve assembled a handful of Cuisinart BBQs before so I’m starting to know the “drill”. The thing is, the assembly is not my favorite part, probably just like many of you.
Step 1 Open hood to cooking chamber and remove cooking grates, heat plates and heat baffle from inside the grill. Never use heating grade wood pellets as they are not safe for cooking. NEVER add cooking pellets to a hot fi re pot by hand. If the hopper runs out of pellets or your fi re goes out while cooking, let the grill completely cool and follow the Initial Lighting Instructions.
The grill itself has ample surface area for all your grilling needs. It’s more compact than some of the other grills we tested, but it contains dual racks inside, each boasting roughly 400 square inches of grilling surface area. There’s plenty of room to grill several briskets, pork shoulders, or racks of ribs in this grill. This pellet grill did a fantastic job of holding temperatures at higher temps. Our chicken wings cooked evenly throughout the grill and resulted in a perfectly crispy exterior when set to 500°F. Unfortunately, the Cuisinart struggled a little with holding low temperatures, and we had to set the grill to 210°F to maintain an even 225°F for the brisket.
That might be good for opening up the sear plate and grilling a steak, but it wasn’t ideal for indirect-heat baking. The wings burned on the right side of the grill while cooking perfectly on the left. We’ve tested many Weber grills over the years, but they’ve never sold a pellet grill until the Weber SmokeFire. We tested both the first- and second-generation Weber SmokeFire grills .
You can get many of these on other grills, but few have all of them at this kind of price. At $700USD the Cuisinart Clermont seems like a steal. Well in colder weather, the pellet cooker has to burn more pellets to achieve/maintain cuisinart pots and pans set the set temperature than it would on a warm summers day for instance. As David shows in the video above, without an insulated cover and with an outside air temperature of 32 degrees his grill consumed 3.3lbs per hour.
Personally, if the pellet/smoker is not twin-wall insulated I’ve always recommended getting an insulated blanket if you want to cook in colder weather . As I discuss in my article on using a pellet grill in cold/winter weather. Though, previously I didn’t have any information I could reference to prove they are a good idea, until now.
The Cuisinart Clermont Pellet Grill & Smoker hopes to offer the ultimate outdoor culinary experience thanks to its 8-in-1 cooking capabilities. Through this grill, you can smoke, BBQ, roast, sear, braise, bake, chargrill and, of course, regularly grill, too. The grill offers a large 1,400-square-inch cooking space with an intuitive design so you can get a lot cooking done all at once.