For an interactive dinner party, bring the grill inside and let guests cook their own meal with this home-made, yakitori-inspired tabletop grill. In this episode of You Can Do This, host Clifford Endo is your guide to creating a hands-on, indoor-meat-cooking experience — and the build might sound complicated, but all the materials for this project can be found at a local hardware store. Here’s how to make it happen without burning the house down.
Start with two terra cotta flower pots. Make sure they’re unpainted, as the heat from the flames could melt any glaze. Line the pots with aluminum to plug the drainage holes, and place one pot inside the other. Next up, grab a bag of play sand: Pouring sand into the planter provides some insulation so that the bottom planter doesn’t get too hot to sit on table.
To heat things up, it’s time for charcoal. Endo uses a special charcoal called Thaan, a brand by chef Andy Ricker of Pok Pok fame, that’s made from fruit wood. Thaan is perfect for grilling indoors because it can produce a very high heat without creating too much smoke. If attempting at home, do not use charcoal briquettes or lump, only low-smoke Japanese-style charcoal and only one piece at a time. Always use in a well-ventilated area and fully extinguish the charcoal before discarding outside. While in use place, grill on top of a heat-resistant surface incase of cracking.
And this homemade grill works for more than just yakitori. Check out the video above to see how Endo adapts his homemade grill to cook up a little Korean barbecue.
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