Barbecue grill with sear section

Various embodiments of a gas valve and a sear-zone gas burner are described and claimed herein. One embodiment described herein relates to a control valve for regulating the flow of gas to a burner tube for a barbecue grill, wherein the control valve includes multiple flow settings, including a sear setting. At the sear setting, the valve is capable of providing additional gas flow to the gas burner to provide the intense heat needed to sear food. At the remaining settings, the valve is capable of providing an appropriate amount of gas flow for conventional cooking of food. Another embodiment of the gas valve is adapted to reduce the rotational offset between the off position and the maximum flow position as compared to the valves of the prior art. In that embodiment, the angular offset between the off position and the maximum flow position is approximately 45°. Another embodiment described herein relates to a burner tube configuration comprising a plurality of standard burner tubes and at least one supplementary sear-zone burner tube which is operable independently from the standard burner tubes. The sear-zone burner tube supplements the heat generated by the adjacent standard burner tubes to supply the intense heat needed to sear food. When the sear- zone burner tube is off, the portion of the cooking surface above the sear-zone burner tube can be used for conventional cooking of food.