The Absolute Best Way To Set Up Your Charcoal Grill For Smoking Prime Rib

The reason steak tastes different at a restaurant keeps coming up — steakhouses have better equipment and can source nicer meat than most consumers can. If you're frustrated by the disparity between restaurant prime rib and what you're able to produce at home, we totally understand. Prime rib is an expensive treat, and a lot of home cooks don't have tons of experience in how to cook this piece of beef. Little did you know, the answer might be staring you in the face ... it's your charcoal grill!

Smoking prime rib on your charcoal grill actually allows for immaculate temperature control, all while providing a low, even heat that creates an inimitable golden crust and flavorful smokiness. The technique is totally doable, too. All you need is the "snake" or "c" method of arranging your charcoal briquettes.

Basically, you create a letter "c," or semi-circle with two rows of briquettes touching one another, then you stack a second layer of briquettes single-file along the top. At the "12" and "6" positions (assuming you leave three o'clock open), you insert a piece of wood for controlled smoking. After starting the charcoal cooking by igniting the briquettes on one end and leaving the grill covered for a little over three hours, you have the perfect environment for measured, subtle heat. No more cooking prime rib wrong by making a common mistake with the temperature.

Cooking prime rib with fire isn't exactly an alien concept – chef Thomas Keller uses a blow torch to finish his prime rib – but the snake method ensures that there's nothing wild or uncontrolled about your smoking. By igniting just one end of the briquettes and letting the slow-moving fire do its work, you get hours upon hours of steady, smoldering heat that is ideal for the "low and slow" cooking under which prime rib shines. You can kick things up a notch by shimmying a disposable pan of water into the curve of your "c." The water bath acts as a heat sink, catches drippings, and is a second line of defense for making sure there are no flare-ups.

Best of all, this isn't a grilling technique that demands a lot of babysitting when you are trying to get the rest of your special-occasion feast on the table. As long as there are no high winds, which can cause uneven movement of the flames between your stacked briquettes, you can rely pretty faithfully on the movement of the heat around the semicircle. Your wood chunks will provide even smoke for deep, penetrating flavor. Sure, smoking on a grill is an unusual way to cook a prime rib, but you'll just have to trust us on this one ... the results speak for themselves.