• The French barbecue championship is stopping off this weekend at the Paris Fair, Porte de Versailles.

  • On this occasion, we asked for advice from Guillaume Fourcade, French barbecue champion in 2017 in the “vegetables” category.

  • He reveals his tips for sure to succeed in his grilling and avoid eating charred merguez sausages.

The barbecue, everyone does it in their own way.

And everyone has their techniques, sometimes judicious, sometimes less so.

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20 Minutes

felt obliged, as the French barbecue championship made a stopover in Paris for the first time, to flush out misconceptions about grilling.

For this, and as we are neophytes, we called on Guillaume Fourcade, the king of the barbecue.

In the literal sense of the term since in 2015 he won the TV game

Les Rois du barbecue

presented by the hilarious Julien Courbet on D8.

And in 2017, this caterer-restaurateur from Puy-en-Velay also became French champion in the “vegetables” category.

It was at the Weber stand at the Foire de Paris that Guillaume Fourcade demonstrated his talents as an ember tamer, where he collaborated as a demonstrator.

After having cooked financiers in the heart of a coconut, our king of the barbecue gives us his advice.

The wood fire is joy!

Obtaining beautiful embers, with real wooden sticks, is class!

Yes, except that you will seriously damage your barbecue.

“Burning wood can rise to 1,200 degrees and the heat will deform the barbecue and can even cause hard barbecues to burst”, warns Guillaume Fourcade.

So please, for the well-being of your grills, choose charcoal.

And for ignition, the use of a chimney filled with charcoal and heated from below with firelighter cubes is the best solution.

"With that, it's impossible to miss an ignition," confirms our interlocutor.

Without a lid, it's party time!

Admiring the embers while grilling the merguez, is there anything better?

Yes, put a lid on.

Guillaume Fourcade cannot do without it.

And for several reasons.

“The lid allows an even distribution of heat and therefore less uneven cooking, explains the restaurateur.

Thanks to it, there is 20% more humidity so the food is less dry and the oxygen supply is reduced and therefore the risk of seeing flames appear which burn the food in addition to the health risk.

Finally, the lid allows indirect cooking, that is to say that a cold zone is created under the grill, by spreading the embers to one side.

Then we close the lid, and the food is cooked by the general heat of the barbecue and not directly by the embers, a bit like in an oven.

“For example for duck breast,

we cook it on both sides over the embers then in indirect cooking like that, it does not attack the meat, advises Guillaume Fourcade.

But, you can cook cakes or vegetable gratins in this way.

»

For the marinade, put some oil!

Contrary to what the Languedoc reggae band Regg'Lyss sang a long time ago, oil should not be abused!

"When you put too much oil, it falls to the bottom of the barbecue carrying all the condiments with the added risk of flames", denounces Guillaume Fourcade.

On the contrary, he recommends a dry marinade or rubs in the tongue of the burger.

“We mix salt, sugar, in a proportion of 1 and 2, garlic, oregano, in short, all kinds of condiments that you want.

We put a little oil on the meat then we rub it with the rubs and we put the food to grill and that's enough.

»

The taste is charcoal

"Charcoal is burnt wood, so it doesn't give off any taste," says the barbecue king.

The taste comes from the caramelized juices and those that fall to the bottom of the tank where they evaporate and flavor the food.

» Little trick to give a smoked taste to your grilled meats, you must add wood chips to your embers, but moistened so that they do not burn.

The board, we are babas!

The craze for the plancha is strong in France.

"We had to ask Weber to produce planchas for France, because in the United States, they hardly sell any," explains Guillaume Fourcade.

And if the country of the barbecue is not a fan of the plancha, there is a reason.

“In fact, cooking a la plancha is like cooking with a frying pan, lance, a bit provocative, the grilling pro.

I prefer the barbecue, and especially this grilled side.

So forget your plancha and take your old barbecue out of the garage!

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Great grilling this weekend

The French barbecue championships stage on Saturday May 7 and Sunday May 8, at the Paris Fair Porte de Versailles, before the grand finale on September 10 and 11 in Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer.

In total "twenty teams of 5 participants each - 4 cooks and a coach - will compete in three categories "beef", "vegetables" and "dessert"", describes Jean-François Dupont, barbecue enthusiast and founder of the competition.

And if it is a “real competition with a general level which increases over the years”, the organizer ensures that all of this will remain “very friendly”.

  • Paris

  • Barbecue

  • Gastronomy

  • Paris fair

  • Ile-de-France