How to: Grill the Best, Juicy Pork Chops

During grilling season, it seems that a lot of coverage illuminates a high/low dichotomy: humble foods like chicken breasts, tough-to-eat ribs, even hearty vegetables, get elevated to something else entirely through the application of open flame, rendering them somehow newly desirable. Or, investment foods like fresh fish or the ubiquitous steak demand a seasoned griller, so as to not reduce their luxury.  But, done properly, few foods also occupy that perfect middle ground – those who could be cooked inside but simple taste better with some char, and those that are deserve special attention since they’re not actually that inexpensive and can be tough to cook properly. A prime example, and one of my very favorite foods to cook on the grill in the summer: the pork chop. 

As Daniel Gritzer points out, “Grilling pork chops seems simple enough. It’s a cut of meat that’s available just about everywhere, and it’s tasty even with just a sprinkling of salt and pepper. Still, there are grilled pork chops, and then there are unbelievably juicy, charred-on-the-outside, rosy-on-the-inside grilled pork chops.”

Serious Eats grill expert Joshua Bousel offers a sure-fire approach for getting ’em just right on the grill, with nothing more than salt, pepper, water, sugar, and the right technique. 

The Best Juicy Grilled Pork Chops [Serious Eats]