Re: Looking for a 'high end' Gas BBQ Grill................
Hit 115 here yesterday. If it had kept up a little longer you wouldnt have had to hang them outside. Our power went out for about 10 minutes and the wife and I were just staring at each other praying silently for it to come back on. It was still 88 this morning at 5:30 when I took the dogs out.
Weber is a fine place to go for a gas grill, they generally get good marks from all the reviewing folks. Small to large can be had. Never owned one, but the 'silver' and 'gold' models (at least thats what they used to be called) always seem to make top choices in any shootout i've seen.
I bought a fully 304 stainless steel grill (including stainless grates) from home depot under the 'charmglow' name. I believe its made by Nexgrill or Nextgrill. I've also seen it advertised under a half dozen names. About $300. Not too small, but not too big. Easy maintenance. Nominal rusting. I've gotten it to hit 700+ degrees, so you can definitely put a serious sear/crust on a steak.
You can also do well by going right back to the same place you bought your meat and seafood from. Costco and Sams club throw out some pretty nice higher end featured grills at very reasonable prices.
This doesnt suck:
http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?Prodid=11099194&whse=&topnav=&browse=&s=1
Neither does this:
http://www.samsclub.com/shopping/navigate.do?catg=535&item=328120&prDeTab=2&pCatg=3996#A
The costco one is a bit big, but you'll want some shelf space to put your food about to go on the grill and a place to put some platters to take it off. And the side burner IS very useful...anytime I dont want to heat up the kitchen, cook something stinky or do a little saute/sauce and keep an eye on everything at once, that burner gets put to use. Think sauteeing some onions and mushrooms while you're flipping steaks or steaming that huge pot of mussels outdoors.
Lastly, consider having a plumber come out and run an extension from your natural gas line to the grill and getting one with a natural gas option. The costco grill does both LP and NG and almost any grill can be converted from one to the other. No more running out of gas or having to run to the propane dealer a couple of times a year. Multiple bottles solve most of those issues, but if your gas is in the right place you can run it to your grill for not much more than the cost of buying a bunch of propane tanks.