Updated Sep. 16, 2024
Discover the best of the best—our testing team ranked the RecTeq Flagship 1100 as our overall favorite pellet grill after in-depth testing and cooking many pounds of meat
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We’ll get straight to the meat of it. Of the 11 pellet grills we tested and reviewed, the RecTeq pellet grill was the best overall. The Flagship 1100 is large in both cooking space and hopper capacity, it has very precise temperate controls and what ends up on your plate is worth writing home about. Even when compared to Traeger, we were impressed.
Our Product Testing team reviewed this grill for over a week, with testing overseen by our grilling expert, Catherine Ward. Here’s what we learned.
The RecTeq Flagship 1100 pellet grill is the newest version of the company’s RT-700, amping up the latter’s cooking space, hopper size and temperature capabilities. Like all pellet grills, it’s popular for the smoky flavors it gives food and the wide versatility in terms of cooking styles—especially compared to charcoal or gas grills.Â
This bad boy is made for crowd cooking, with a massive 1,109-square-inch cooking area. According to the website, that means you can fit 60 burgers or 138 chicken wings, although we didn’t test this . The hopper is huge—it can hold about 40 pounds of pellets (most pellet grills hold about 20). Not big enough? Look into the Flagship XL 1400, which has a 1,437-square-inch cooking space.
The grill can heat up to 700 degrees Fahrenheit, and its PID tech keeps your temperature within 5 degrees Fahrenheit of what you specify. We found this to be true, although the grill gets very hot to the touch, even externally.
You’ll find one giant lower grate and one narrower upper grate. Under the unit is a roomy, wide shelf. There’s also an electrical outlet on the backside, which we think is great for plugging in your blender for margaritas. Personally, we weren’t huge fans of the design (notably, the two horns on either side), but it definitely evokes a masculine vibe.
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RecTeq deserves props for its delivery. The grill came on a pallet in a box that easily comes apart, so you can start assembling the grill immediately without having to lift it out. Assembly itself was fairly smooth compared to other grills we tested. Finding the online manuals and assembly video wasn’t as straightforward as we hoped, but when you get there, the assembly video is the way to go. Note that setting the Flagship 1100 up is a two-person job, so make sure you have support on hand.
Seasoning was also notably easy. It requires removing all of the cooking components before adding 1/4 cup of pellets to the fire pot and then reinstalling the cooking components, but nothing too arduous. It took a full 60 minutes to burn off rather than the typical 30 to 45 minutes (you can use that time to go shop for some gifts for grillers to go with your new RecTeq). The grill was quite hot at this point, but it shut down easily.
There was no better way to see if the RecTeq Flagship 1100 could live up to its promise than by getting to grilling. We tested salmon, chicken breasts, pork chops, pork shoulder and corn. For all of our tests, we used Pit Boss apple blend hardwood pellets.
We smoked the salmon for an hour at 190 degrees Fahrenheit, before brushing it with honey and sprinkling with peppercorns. We bumped up the temperature to 225 degrees Fahrenheit and added corn cobs brushed with herbed butter. The salmon came out smoky and very moist, with some dark edges. The corn was smoky and brown on the top and the bottom. The chicken was equally successful—we smoked three breasts at 225 degrees Fahrenheit for three hours, and the meat was juicy and moist with caramelization on the bottom.
Our pork chops—coated in a simple mixture of salt, garlic salt and black pepper—were seared at 500 degrees Fahrenheit for 10 minutes, rotating and flipping them throughout. The sear wasn’t super pronounced, and we thought the Pit Boss did a better job, but it was still a solid outcome.
The standout by far was the pork shoulder, which was dry rubbed with mustard and spice. It took 10 hours, but as Catherine pointed out, faster times and hotter temps can mean tough and dry meat. And it was worth it. The pork was tender, moist and easy to shred. Our Product Testing team raved that it “was the best pork shoulder.”
We topped off the pellets at the beginning of the day before we began cooking. By the end, it was still about half full; there is certainly value in being able to cook so much without needing to worry about refills.
Then came the cleanup. Since there’s no way to empty the pellet hopper, you’ll have to remove excess pellets with a vacuum. The biggest downside to the RecTeq is that the grills are too large to soak and wash in the sink, so we had to resort to scraping debris off with a metal scraper, which didn’t feel as sanitary as getting it soaped up. But as far as hassles go, this was minor compared to the quality of the grill and the food it produced.
The final assembly of RecTeq pellet grills takes place at their factory in Augusta, Georgia, although they manufacture and source their parts from China.
To help you find the next best grill for your backyard, our Product Testing Team dove into thorough testing for 11 pellet grills, including models from Yoder, Pit Boss, Cuisinart and Weber. We, of course, also tested four Traeger models: the Ironwood XL, Tailgater, Pro 575 and Timberline.
For each grill, we analyzed the assembly, tried out the key features and conducted multiple food tests to see how well each product performed. All tests were overseen by grilling expert Catherine Ward. As a team, we bring decades of experience testing products and evaluating them for the home cook based on quality, affordability and accessibility.
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The RecTeq Flagship 1110 Pellet Grill will run you $1,299 and is available through RecTeq and Amazon. It comes with a six-year warranty.
Originally Published: September 16, 2024
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