Get your motor runnin’!  (And by “motor”, we mean grill.)

I’m sure we’ve mentioned it before, but seriously:  We love grilling.  Like, really love it. If grilling were a person, we might be considered a little bit of a stalker.  I mean, if grilling were a person, we might be required to keep at least 200 yards away from them because we spend all of our free time talking about just how much we love grilling and can’t stop thinking about them....

...but I digress.

Yes, we love grilling and we are fast approaching our season.  Spring gives way to summer days, and with summer days some charred meat, toasted buns, and vegetable shishkabobs.  Grilling in the summer is as American as apple pie, pickup trucks, and hot dog eating contests.

But as any athlete knows, in order to maximize any season, you must prepare.  If summer is Grilling Season, then spring is Pre-Season.  Hence, we’d like to give you 4 important tips that you need to know if you’re going to be prepared for a prosperous, successful, and tasty Grilling Season.

1. Know Your Hose Your grill has sat around all winter, lamenting the cold weather and missing the searing smell of charred beef.  While it has sat around, parts may have shifted, including any hoses or connecting materials on your grill.  Why does this matter?  Those hoses are hooked up to gasses that could literally explode.  Just double check that everything is in good shape, well connected, and intact.
   
2. Get Your Clean On  Have you had your grill sitting outside or in a garage all winter? It’s had that long to have leaves, dirt and stuff grow inside it. Squirrels will often use grills to store their nuts in the inner workings of a grill in the fall. And like all of us, they often forget where they put them (not our nuts necessarily) Anyway, clean that. Scrape it. And don’t you dare use the “I’ll just kill it all with fire” frame of thinking. Don’t ruin the 4th of July burgers with last Labor Day’s brats.
3. Dump the Trap  Yes, we could count this along with cleaning, but cleaning out your grease trap is important enough to have its own spot on the list.  If it is really nasty, go ahead and dump it and buy one of those sweet disposable traps.  Or, better yet, just line your traps with foil and clean it regularly.  Leaving a trap filled with gunk can actually attract animals, bugs, and yes, maggots.  Don’t have be that guy with maggots hanging around in your grill.
4. Season Before the Season  After you’ve done such a great job cleaning your grill and the trap, give your grill a nice coat of high smoke point grease.  Give it a good rub and then turn your grill on as high as it will go and allow it to burn off any excess.  Then give the ol’ pal a quick test run before the big season is upon you.

With these tips, your summer, your grill, and all the food that comes forth from said grill will be easy, breezy, and full of awesome outdoor eating memories!

(And seriously, grilling:  Call us.  We love you.)

How do you prep your grill for the season? Send us your best preseason grill tips and don't forget to follow us on  Instagram and Twitter @WaywardGourmet.