I bought this grill based on the reviews here and from friends recommendations about the Weber brand. This is my very first grill I've ever owned personally...and oh my gosh, I'm in heaven! (and so is my wife!)
From the moment it showed up (Amazon, you guy's ship stuff awesome! Even the Cevia delivery guy was cool!) I was thrilled.
Build Quality:
While it does take a while to put together, I was extremely impressed with the build quality throughout. Stainless steel fittings, oversize bolts, well built panels, even the doors are double-lined metal!
It came with everything I needed to get set up and went together without a hitch. Even the kids were impressed with it!
Ease Of Use:
My gosh, if grilling is this easy, I should've gotten into it years ago!
Just turn on the gas, turn on the burners, light, walk away for a while, come back & throw the food on and cook away!
Instead of feeling like you're cooking over a flame with a bunch of hot spots, it feels a lot like cooking on a gas range. The heat is incredibly even and flare ups are really rare. The taste it gives food is nothing short of miraculous!
Incredible Taste!
This probably isn't unique to this grill, but the taste that this thing infuses into food is nothing short of amazing! We've found ourselves grilling all sorts of things (veggies, pork, chicken, burgers, hot dogs, steak, etc) because of how incredible the taste is!
Really Quiet!
One thing that really struck me about this grill was how quiet it is when it's running. While this is my first grill I've personally owned, I've grown up with BBQ's my whole life & cooked on several others and I've NEVER seen a grill this quiet when it's going.
I don't know what kind of magic Weber has done, but it's practically silent when it's running. Not that normal gas sounding "Whoosh! SHHHHHHHHHHHHhhh" that you normally hear when you fire up other grills. I have to look down into it to see that the fires going just to be sure because it's so quiet! I love it!
Heats Up Fast!
Everything I've read say's these things heat up really fast. Well, I'm here to say that they're dead on. Within 5 minutes of firing it up, it's up to 600 deg. F and ready to cook on! Talk about fast grilling!
We've had the grill now for a couple months and are using it multiple times a week. My wife actually prefers to cook on it vs our stove inside the house now! Looks like I'll be stocking up on propane.
I Love The Flavorizer Bars!
Those flavorizer bars have got to be the coolest thing on that grill! I'd read where it keeps the flare ups from happening and that they help season the food too. Yep! It's all true! We had some really oily London Broils that we'd marinated the other day that we threw on the grill & I was curious to see how they'd do (they were literally DRIPPING with oil).
They fired up a little, but the flames quickly subsided and never got really high. So, being curious, I dumped a bunch of the marinade on them just to see how well the grill would do at "flaming up". I can report that it did an awesome job! Yep! It'd flame alright, but it never got out of control and the flames subsided very quickly and were well under control.
I've also noticed that as the grease drips down onto the flavorizer bars it really does "sizzle" and smoke like they say and it gives the food a really nice flavor. I guess because it smokes the grease instead of burning it, you get a much better flavor in the meats.
I was impressed!
Versatile:
We probably have a unique use for this thing...once we got it up & running we decided to open a brand new dutch oven that we'd had for a couple years. Part of getting a dutch oven includes "seasoning" it.
I'm proud to announce that not only is my Weber Grill great at cooking food, it seasoned that dutch oven incredibly well!
We're finding new uses for it now all the time and absolutely love the thing!
Weber, you've got a fan in me!
8/4/2012 Update:
Still loving the grill! Still cooks awesome! The battery did corrode in it's holder though & I had to clean that out, but I put an alkaline battery in it this time. I highly recommend getting the cover. We have one and our grill still looks brand new. We still love it & expect many years of continued service.
Also, I cleaned out the inside of it a few months back (after several years of occasional use). Man that was easy! Gotta hand it to Weber! They really know how to make a grill that's not only easy to use but easy to clean too.
