Grilling is a cherished American summer pastime. And just like drinking a Bud or taking in a ballgame from the cheap seats, the cost of entry is usually pretty low. You can pick up a classic Weber Kettle charcoal grill for less than $150, or a no-name knockoff for considerably less. Stepping up to the convenience of a gas grill will set you back around $500 for a decent one, or maybe a couple grand for what most people would consider a premium grill. But what if you want the best grills in existence? For that, you turn to Kalamazoo grills and brace yourself to spend an order of magnitude more.
Kalamazoo Outdoor Gourmet, as the brand is officially known, occupies a singular space in the grill market. The "cheapest" grill the brand makes is the Shokunin Kamado Grill, which starts at $11,225. If you want gas, you'll need to spend at least 19 grand for a drop-in grill head — freestanding grills start around $24,000. And for Kalamazoo's flagship Hybrid Fire Grill and Argentinean-inspired Gaucho Grill? Those start at $21,995 and $31,855, respectively.
No other grill maker comes anywhere near these prices, so why do Kalamazoo grills cost so much? To find out, I traveled to the brand's Chicago showroom and met with chief designer and grillmaster Russ Faulk.
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Kalamazoo K750HB Built-in Hybrid Fire Grill Read More -
Kalamazoo K750GB Built-in Gaucho Grill Read More
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Kalamazoo K54DT Freestanding Gas Grill Read More
Nothing But the Best
The leading factor behind Kalamazoo's eye-watering prices — by far, according to Faulk — is how much it costs to make them. The grills are handmade in the U.S. using very expensive raw materials, and those costs make their way into the final product. For instance, here's how Faulk describes the brand's sheet metal process, just one step involved in crafting a Kalamazoo grill:
"We use nothing but Midwestern stainless steel from local mills, and everything is a very laborious process. It starts as flat sheet stock. We cut it on the laser and then we form it all to shape in separate parts. Then it is hand welded together very meticulously using a TIG welding process. The next step is finishing, and the finisher's job is to make those welds disappear. So they grind off the welds and then they hand regrain the stainless steel so that it looks like it came as one monolithic piece. But nothing is stamped or formed in a 3D sense. It's all 2D bent, welded and finished. That's just the sheet metal process."
Those materials all need to be heavier duty than your average grill, too, since temperatures in the Hybrid Fire Grill and Gaucho Grill can reach upwards of 1,200°F and all components need to be able to handle those extremes. That means heavier-gauge steel, more welding and, because Kalamazoo offers marine-grade steel as an option on its grills, all the grills have marine-grade hardware.
"When we launch a product, our mission is really only to make it the best. We need it to be distinctive in design, distinctive in performance and distinctive in quality," Faulk says. "That is the overriding mission. We design and engineer and test the product to those standards, and then what it costs to make ends up determining the price."
Built Different
To borrow a bit of slang from sports culture, Kalamazoo grills are just built different — literally. As the brand's chief product designer, Faulk has engineered Kalamazoo's grills in ways that no one else has. Take the firebox used in the Hybrid Fire Grill, for example, or what Faulk refers to as the "heart of the grill." It's considerably deeper than what you'd typically find on any grill, let alone a built-in, stretching almost all the way to the ground. And there a few reasons why the grills have been engineered in such an unusual way.
"Every burner operates on two sources of oxygen: You have your primary combustion air, which comes in through the venturi and is mixed with the gas inside the burner, and then you have your secondary combustion air, which comes from within the firebox," Faulk explains. "We have a huge amount of secondary air, more secondary air available for your cooking heat than any other grill, because we have such a bigger volume of air below that burner."
All that extra secondary air translates into higher cooking temperatures during direct grilling, and it also pays big dividends when using indirect heat for things like roasting, baking and smoking.
"For any of those indirect fire techniques where the food is not above the fire, it's next to the fire, what we're doing is we're creating air circulation," says Faulk. "We've got a very tight lid structure, so we keep in a lot of the smoke and it's able to cycle around and around in a sort of natural dynamic convection created by the fact that our heat source is vertically centered within the volume of air in your cooking space, in the firebox." That extra room for the air to circulate — about 30 inches with the lid closed — creates more even heat, eliminating hot spots regardless of your chosen cooking method.
"Our warming rack, I like to say, runs hotter than a lot of people's conventional grill grates," Faulk says. "We roast rack of lamb up there."
Unmatched Performance
Of course, expensive materials and unique engineering don't matter much at the end of the day if they don't add up to better performance. But according to Faulk, you won't find a better-performing grill than the ones made by Kalamazoo.
"I really do believe the hybrid fire grill is the best gas grill on the planet," Faulk says. "It really put us on the map because it has a gas grill, a charcoal grill and a wood grill all in one. You can use those three fuels in any combination you like or any one of them on their own."
The Hybrid Fire Grill gets hot. When using gas only, it has a temperature range of 220 – 750°F at the lid thermometer, which translates to around 850°F. If you're using charcoal, that cooking surface temp can get well into four-digit territory. What this means is that literally any part of the grill can sear, regardless of what type of fuel you're cooking with.
"The benefit of that is we don't have to dedicate any of the zones to an infrared searing burner that can really only do that," Faulk says. "So one night, your right-hand grate might be your searing station, and the next night it might be turned down way low for slowly roasting some vegetables. It's very versatile, very flexible."
The Hybrid Fire Grill also incorporates other bits you won't find on gas grills, like a built-in mechanized rotisserie that you can use over a roaring wood fire. "That's real user boon," Faulk says.
"One of the ways that I like to ease our clients into wood-fired cooking is with wood-fired rotisserie. We’ll build the wood fire across the front of the grill while the rotisserie is toward the back/middle of the grill. That way, the wood is not under the food, so it makes the heat more gentle."
Another trick Faulk likes to do to show off the Hybrid Fire Grill's versatility is cooking a steak via the "sear and slide" method, where he'll set up a charcoal fire in one of the medium-sized grill's three heating zones and use gas for the other two zones. The crazy heat of the charcoal zone will sear the steak in under 30 seconds, at which point Faulk slides the steak over to a gas-powered zone and closes the lid, where it will cook low and slow to medium-rare perfection in 20 minutes on a 2.5-inch-thick steak.
"The benefit of sear and slide over the other popular method, which is reverse sear, is by starting the Maillard reaction at the beginning of your cook, you’re building up that flavorful crust, those caramelized proteins and sugars throughout the entire 20 minutes that we're talking about cooking," Faulk says. "I think it's the best steak you'll ever grill at home."
And if you don't want to trust Faulk on his word — after all, these grills are essentially his babies — then just look to those who've had the chance to actually review the grills. Reviewers from outlets as disparate as USA Today and Forbes have previously tested the Hybrid Fire Grill, and both raved about it ... while lamenting that they themselves could never afford one.
And therein lies the rub. These grills may be outstanding — the best, even — but are they really worth paying several times the cost of grills that will get you close to the same performance?
Who Is Spending This Much on a Grill?
Having spent a day at Kalamazoo HQ trying a bunch of food prepared by Faulk on said grills, I can certainly see the appeal of owning one. They're beautiful, incredibly well-made and perform far better than any other grill I've ever been around. They're also exceedingly simple to use — or, at least Faulk made them look that way preparing his various recipes. (The guy is a wizard when it comes to flavor, and I wholeheartedly recommend picking up his cookbook if you like eatin' good.)
And while Faulk doesn't label Kalamazoo grills as a luxury product — "We don't use the 'L' word," he tells me — that's clearly what they are. Just like people gobble up luxury watches to the point where some models — many of which cost much more and do much less than any Kalamazoo grill, mind you — have years-long wait lists, there are plenty of people with means who are more than happy to shell out for the best grills money can buy.
Kalamazoo grills are not the type of grill one picks up on a lark on a Sunday afternoon at Home Depot and loads into the bed of their F-150 to set up on their patio in time for dinner that evening. The brand's official name is Kalamazoo Outdoor Gourmet, and that's because its main business is building out custom outdoor kitchens for clients. In addition to grills, Kalamazoo offers luxe cabinetry, refrigeration and other cooking appliances and has in-house designers who work with you to build out your dream outdoor cooking space. All of Kalamazoo's grills are offered in freestanding variants, but Faulk tells me that around 90 percent of the brand's business comes from built-ins.
If you happen to be a member of the grillerati who's looking to level up your backyard BBQ, then take your pick from Kalamazoo's offerings below.
Kalamazoo Hybrid Fire Grill
The flagship grill you've just read nearly 2,000 words about. The deep firebox, the triple-fuel cooking ability, the crazy-high temperatures with no heat spots, the unsurpassed build quality ... it's all here.
Kalamazoo Gaucho Grill
Inspired by the gaucho grills of Argentina, this wood/charcoal grill is the most striking (and most expensive) grill in Kalamazoo's lineup. You can't miss that massive wheel, which is used to raise and lower the cooking surface from several feet above the flames to all the way down into the firebox itself, giving you maximum control over your heat in the most stylish way possible.
Kalamazoo Freestanding Gas Grill
Don't want to go the built-in route and have no desire to cook with wood or charcoal? Then you can opt for Kalamazoo's most traditional grill in the form of its freestanding gas grill. It lacks the unique upgrades and versatility of the previous two grills but still boasts the brand's unmatched build quality and performance.
