Hey guys! Today, we're performing our expert overview on the Napoleon Prestige 500 gas grill.
It's worth noting that the same grills available with a matte black finish.
And it goes by the name Phantom Prestige 500.
Let's get to it with quality. First up, the type of materials used. Our XRF test showed
us that the Prestige 500's exterior hood, control panel, cooking grids, flame tamers,
tube style burners, and drip pan were all constructed from 300 grade stainless steel.
The interior hood liner is galvanized steel and the fire box is cast aluminum. The exterior hood
on the Prestige 500 measured in at 20 gauge. The front control panel is 18 gauge.
Its cooking grids are made of solid seven and a half millimeter stainless steel rods.
The flame tamers came in at 18 gauge. The two burners were an impressive 1.84 millimeters thick,
which is very heavy for a practical class grill. Finally, the fire box is nice and thick at about
three and a half millimeters thick, which should provide many years of quality service.
The last thing we'll look at under quality is the warranty that comes with Napoleon's Prestige.
The reason I'm pointing it out is because it's not very common for practical class grill
to have this solid of a warranty. There's a lifetime warranty on all
main components and a 15 year warranty on all other components. That's pretty solid.
Let's have a look at performance. The low temperature test that we performed with our thermo
couples showed us a 30 minute overall average real temperature of 343 degrees Fahrenheit.
This is a little high, but keep in mind, this test is ran with all burners set to low,
so you can always lower the temperature by turning some or one or two of the burners off,
depending on what you're cooking. During this test, the temperature probe, whose average was
the furthest from the grill's average temperature, was in the right front corner of the grill,
and it was about 70 degrees lower than the average temperature of the grill.
The other five probes were within 36 degrees of the grill's average temperature,
which is pretty good. The 15 minute preheat test with all burners set to high
showed us an average grill preheat temperature of 522 degrees Fahrenheit.
This means that you can get an effective sear with a standard preheat. Our high temperature
test showed us a 20 minute grill average temperature of 578 degrees Fahrenheit. Solid.
The probe with an average the furthest from the grill's average was, again, in the front right
quadrant of the grill, and it was about 150 degrees below the grill's average temperature. The
rest of the probes were within about 50 degrees from the average, which is within a good range.
Now let's see how the Prestige 500 performed during real world testing. Our burger test
showed the grill to be cooler towards the front, which we noted during our thermo couple test,
but not really a deal breaker. It wasn't cool enough in the front to
actually have to shuffle burgers around just to get them cooked or anything.
You just want to cook your front burgers an extra minute or two
compared to the back ones. Other than that, they came out very even. So I found it very acceptable.
When looking at the flame tamers performance, I was pretty impressed at how well the Prestige
500 mitigated major runaway fires. As you can see from the test, there were plenty of flames
broiling our burgers, but there weren't any that completely lost control or had to be extinguished.
That was pretty impressive for a practical class grill, and certainly not something
you see for the majority of them. After that, I loaded the grill with some kabobs and veggies.
Now I like a lot of butter on my shrimp, so I drizzled the butter straight on these guys
while grilling. And I have to say, I was very pleased with the flame tamers performance.
Overall, I would give this grill medium high marks for performance.
And this is an example of how sometimes a thermo couple tests can look somewhat off,
but then the real world testing, where you have fat rendering and all of those things happening
in the system, show a completely different outtake from what you saw with thermo couples.
Now let's talk about the features of Napoleon's Prestige 500. The first thing that really jumped
out at me was the 14,000 BTU ceramic infrared sizzle zone side burner. Pretty slick. This allows
you to get an incredible all over crust on your seared steak, and it's about as easy as one, two,
three. The cooking grate is also adjustable higher for searing steaks, but also can be kept down low
so that you can do walk style cooking, or you could also just use a regular pot or pan.
It's definitely a really cool feature for a practical class grill to have.
This grill also comes with a rear 18,000 BTU burner,
so that to be used with the included rotisserie setup. Again, this is a nice feature to see on a
practical class grill. It's nice to be able to let something cruise on the rotisserie
for gatherings and people don't use them often enough, to be honest. I love rotisseries.
The Prestige 500 comes with jet fire ignition on each bow and has rear crossover channels for
lighting one burner off of another lit burner. Grease management is handled with a full width
slide out drip pan. The grill also comes with stylish lights and safety glow control knobs,
which is pretty cool and a safe feature. When a burner is off the glows with a blue light. And
as you ignite a burner, its knobs then change from blue to glowing red to let you know that
it's on. This helps you to see that from even at a distance, which, again, adds to the safety of it.
If you opt for the freestanding model like this one, you'll enjoy the fully enclosed cart to
keep your propane tank discretely stowed away. The cart also has two side shelves with storage
wells to keep your condiments close. And for a smaller footprint during storage, the right
shelf folds down. Finally, as stated before, I would also include the warranty. The Napoleon's
warranty team on the Prestige is definitely rock solid for a practical class grill.
Overall, I definitely enjoyed testing and grilling on the Prestige.
And for anyone who's been seriously considering this grill versus possibly other grills,
I would say it definitely belongs on the top of your short list. I hope that we've been
able to help you narrow your best grill search, and I'd love it if you'd hit the like button,
as well as if you don't mind, subscribing to our channel. Until next time, thank you for watching.