Parrilla Grill – Professional Cooking Over an Open Flame

Wood-Fired Grills at the Heart of the Kitchen

Fire has always played a natural role in cooking. With a parrilla grill, it moves right into the professional kitchen, becoming both a powerful cooking tool and part of the dining experience. The grilling technique has its roots in the South American asado tradition and is based on cooking over embers from wood or charcoal.

What primarily sets a parrilla apart from a traditional charcoal grill is the ability to control the distance between the food and the embers. With height-adjustable grill grates, the chef can quickly regulate the intensity of the heat – close to the embers for intense grilling and further away for slower cooking or resting.

From meat and fish to vegetables

Parrilla grills are often associated with large cuts of meat and steakhouses, but their range of uses is much broader. Fish, seafood, vegetables, cheese and other ingredients can be cooked directly over the embers, while wood and charcoal give the food a distinctive character that is difficult to recreate with electric grilling.

For restaurants with open kitchens, the grill also becomes part of the dining experience. The glowing embers, open flames and cooking process create a natural connection between the kitchen and the dining room.

Custom-built parrilla grills from Perfecta

Perfecta can help create a custom-built grill based on the restaurant’s kitchen, menu, capacity requirements and preferences. The grill can be tailored in size and design, with features such as multiple grilling zones, height-adjustable grates, a brasero for producing embers, work surfaces and storage.

This makes it possible to build the grill station around the way the chefs actually want to work, rather than adapting their workflow to a standard model. Custom-built professional parrilla grills can also be designed with different grilling sections and accessories depending on the type of cooking required over the fire.

Photos show grills we have supplied to Sperling & Co, FYR, Urban Deli and Brasserie Astoria. 

Ventilation when installing a parrilla grill

A parrilla grill places greater demands on ventilation than many other types of professional kitchen equipment. Cooking over wood or charcoal generates large amounts of heat, smoke, grease and combustion gases, which means the ventilation system must be designed specifically for the installation.

At the planning stage, the kitchen extract duct, hood, exhaust airflow, supply air and fire protection must therefore be reviewed together with qualified specialists. Existing kitchen ventilation is not necessarily sufficient when installing a charcoal- or wood-fired grill, and flue systems, filtration and other fire protection measures need to be included in the planning.

Perfecta helps coordinate the design of the grill with the kitchen’s technical requirements and can bring in the right expertise for ventilation and fire protection, helping to prevent problems later in the project.

Hear from one of our customers

We join Jesper Svensson from Stureplansgruppen at Freyja, where he shares his experience of the long-standing collaboration with Perfecta Storkök.