Charcoal arranged on one side of a grill for indirect cooking.

Have you ever read a recipe that said, “Prepare your grill for cooking over indirect heat?”

And did you think, “Uh, what?”

For grilling, indirect heat translates to: not over the fire. When you’re cooking over indirect heat, you’re using the ambient heat of the flames to cook the food, rather than the fire itself (you know, directly!).

Cooking over indirect heat is useful for thicker cuts of meat that may cook quickly on the outside without being cooked through on the outside. You may be familiar with this scenario, as it happens every single time any person cooks hamburgers for a crowd of people. They burn on the outside, but the inside is raw. Stress city!

Set yourself up for success next time. Indirect heat is simple on a gas grill: light one side high, the other side low.

But on a charcoal grill, you can go a two different routes. For really serious indirect cooking (meaning, whatever you’re cooking will need 20 or more minutes to finish cooking after it’s seared, like a leg of lamb), you can arrange your lit coals along one side of the grill, leaving the other half completely empty of coals.

Charcoal arranged on one side of a grill for indirect cooking.

For smaller items, like burgers or thick-cut pork chops that just need a few more minutes to cook through, you can arrange all of the coals stacked in the very center, which will leave the outer ring of the grill for indirect cooking.

Coals arranged in the center of a grill.

Does that clear things up? Let us know what other recipe instructions leave you scratching your head, and we’ll do our best to fill in the blanks!