This smart, app-controlled charcoal grill removes two of the classic charcoal grill problems completely.

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For the first decade or so of my “adult” life (if we can call the years following college adult), I was a diehard charcoal grill devotee, even looking at gas grills with a bit of judgment, I must admit. The advent of children changed things, though, because I just didn’t have the 15 or 20 minutes to sit around waiting for the coals to reach cooking temperature before I could even start cooking, nor did I have the luxury of low and slow grilling anymore.

With the ever-growing need for more efficiency in our lives, in 2016 I took what I thought was the proverbial plunge and bought a gas grill. And I loved it. The food still tasted great, I could have the thing lit in seconds, and heated in just a couple of minutes, so I really never looked back. My gas grill had solved problem #1 of the charcoal grill: heating time.

The second big problem with charcoal vs. gas? Maintaining a constant cooking temperature with a charcoal grill is a challenge for even the most seasoned outdoor chef, and I consider myself only a moderately skilled grill guy. (Or whatever sounds one notch better than that… but I digress.)

I don’t think I cooked more than two or three meals over charcoal in all the years between 2016 and 2022 except for a few times I helped out a buddy, and I know I never really paid it much mind. But I did always love the taste of charcoal grilled food, so I was at once intrigued when I learned about a grill that purported to remove those two biggest charcoal grill issues. And on testing out a Spark Grill, I was thrilled to see that the company wasn’t just blowing smoke.

This is a charcoal grill that lights instantly and heats fast, and that allows for precision temperature control. How? Because they kind of thought of everything.

A Spark Grill does not use traditional charcoal – it uses a large square-shaped slab of charcoal that’s about an inch thick and that comes in a vacuum-sealed pouch. That’s to protect the ethanol infused into the slab that helps the entire thing light in less than a minute, the result being a plethora of even heat produced fast.

As for how Spark Grills are temperature regulated, that’s thanks to airflow that can be increased or decreased as needed (less air, less heat, more air, more heat, etc.) via a dial on the grill itself or via a connected smartphone app. Yes, this is a smart charcoal grill—it was only a matter of time. Also smart? The real-time temperature updates the app gives you, plus lots of extras like recipe ideas.

And how is the actual cooking experience? Pretty damn good, thanks to the pair of large, evenly heating cast iron grates that offer enough space to cook a dozen burgers at once or, in the case of my family, to reserve one half of the grill for meat, the other half for vegetarian-friendly foods. The built-in side table doesn’t hurt the cooking process, either.

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