03. Radiant Heat

Radiation is harder to understand than conduction or convection, because this type of heat never touches the food, yet it is the principal form of heat transference in grilling. The best way to grasp the process of radiant heat is to think of the sun. The sun’s heat radiates through space to the earth, warming the planet. Along the way, it doesn’t heat up the void of outer space, as it would if convection were taking place, and there are no metal wires traveling from the sun to the earth, conducting the heat to us. In radiation, energy is passed from one atom to another in the form of pure energy, until it comes in contact with a convecting fluid (like our atmosphere, in the case of solar energy) or a conducting solid (like a hamburger, in the case of grilling), where its energy manifests itself as heat.