The modern age of Melbourne barbecue

• The Age Good Food Guide 2016: Melbourne's hottest new restaurants
• Good Food barbecue recipe collection

Barbecue used to be a simple process. All you needed was a Weber, tongs and a couple of snags. But tell someone you're throwing "a shrimp on the barbie" in 2015 and be prepared for a flurry of questions: "What species of shrimp? Is it from a sustainable producer? By 'barbecue' do you mean a wood grill? Or Japanese charcoal? Or have you gone all-out and invested in a Texan smoker?"

At the centre of this change in the barbecue-scape is a new generation of fire-loving chefs, dedicated to stripping cooking back to its essentials.

Aaron Turner, who made his name at Loam in Drysdale, is set to open his new Geelong restaurant, Igni, in November. At Igni's heart will be a massive wood-fire grill.

"Igni will share the Loam philosophy of finding high-quality produce and not doing a whole lot to it," says Turner. "Fire is the only way to cook it, and we'll be experimenting with different woods and charcoals to create different flavours."

Turner says a big part of barbecue's appeal for chefs is a reaction against the science-driven, clinical cooking of many fine-dining establishments.

"Cooking for me, at that level, lost a lot of soul," says Turner, whose Loam won the Regional Restaurant of the Year in The Age Good Food Guide 2012. "There was all this emphasis on reflecting nature, but it was so manipulated. For me, to get back to what cooking's all about, fire is the way to go. It's so versatile, too, from roaring flames down to glowing coals."

Dave Verheul, from Carlton's Town Mouse restaurant, uses a charcoal-fuelled "little Japanese firebox" called a Konro grill for meat, vegetables and also desserts. "It's pretty much all we can fit in the kitchen and it gets an absolute hiding," he says. "Everything tastes better over a flame or a barbecue if you're cooking it properly."

He agrees with Turner that barbecue is a way to get back in touch with more natural methods of cooking.

"It's hard to look anywhere and not see the [barbecue] influence at most restaurants these days," he says. "I think it's linked to the whole resurgence of people appreciating artisan craftsmanship and workmanship. It's primal, it's natural, it's f---ing delicious."

Out of the kitchen and on to the streets is Burn City Smokers, established in 2014 by Steve Kimonides and Raphael Guthrie – "wine blokes" with a fine-dining background.

At this year's Royal Melbourne Show, Burn City will be slow-cooking beef brisket, pulled pork and Texas hot links (beef sausages) over red-gum wood in an American-style smoker.

"We've always been fascinated with cooking meat over wood," Kimonides says. "It isn't something that's novel to us; it's something that goes back to our childhood."

Texas barbecue can become an obsession for both its pit masters and punters, but Guthrie says they haven't fallen into that brick-lined hole just yet.

"We're obsessed not necessarily with barbecue, but with finding the best-quality meat and veg and cooking them in the best way possible," he says. And that way is the appeal of the primordial flame.

The Age Good Food Guide 2016 will be available for $10 with The Saturday Age on Saturday, September 26, from participating newsagents, 7-Elevens and supermarkets while stocks last. It can also be purchased in selected bookshops and online at theageshop.com.au/agegfg2016 for $24.99.