OT: Secrets of grilling and/or preparing of your favorite meats

• I find that front searing is much better than reverse searing since the front searing process pushes moisture into the meat which helps with remainder of the cook.

This is a myth and has been proven to be inaccurate by science. Applying heat to the exterior does not "push" moisture to the interior. It simply gets rid of the moisture in the outer layer

https://amazingribs.com/more-technique-and-science/more-cooking-science/myth-searing-steaks-seals-juices/

FoodNetwork personality Alton Brown attempted to get the truth out in 2008. He took two steaks of about the same size, seared one in a pan, and left the other alone. He then put them both in the oven on a wire rack and cooked them to his target temperature. When he removed them he weighed them again. The unseared steak lost 13% of its weight, but the seared steak lost 19%!

J. Kenji Lopez-Alt of SeriousEats.com did pretty much the same experiment except that he seared a roast before putting it in the oven and another after removing it from the oven. “The meat that was seared first then roasted lost 1.68% more juices than the one that was roasted first then seared.” Why?

Cook’s Illustrated came to the same conclusion after doing experiments with eight ribeyes “The notion of sealing in juices is thus nothing but an old wives’ tale.”

With that, if you use salt to season your steak (which I highly recommend), do so right before the searing step.  Salt will draw moisture to the surface, so if you let the salt sit too long, the steak will get wet and ruin the searing step

You want to either salt immediately before searing, or 45 mins to an hour before. If you salt well in advance, the steak will eventually reabsorb the brine formed by the salt drawing moisture out, because that brine will break down the muscle fibers and the meat will become more adsorptive  

I beat the shit out of my meat 

Beef stew: Toss the meat with 2 Tbs flour, salt and pepper, then sear it in fat in a dutch oven. Remove and set aside. In the same pot, saute onions, celery and carrots, scraping the bottom with a spatula. Add some chopped garlic and saute for a minute or two more. Here's the secret to great tasting beef in the stew: add one anchovy, a sprig of rosemary, and a small dried chile, like chile de arbol. It's a secret I learned from a chef in LA. She adds this trio to a lot of her meat preparations, especially the braises, and it gives the whole thing a great depth of flavor. If you're doing a large batch, you could probably double the anchovy and chile. I wouldn't double the rosemary since it's such a strong flavor. Then add a bit of tomato paste, stir for a minute or two, dump the beef back in, stir it well, and add some stock to just cover the meat. I use chicken, beef would probably be better. Bring to a boil, then put the lid on and transfer to a 275 - 300 degree oven for at least 4 hours. I usually make it the day before I'm planning on serving it, or even two days before. The flavor really develops over that period. Sometimes I add a bit of mustard in the saute stage, or a bit of alcohol like red wine or beer right after adding the tomato paste. It's probably my favorite preparation because you can really improvise with the flavors, but the anchovy/rosemary/chile trio is something I always do. 

letting cuts sit for 5-10 minutes to reabsorb juices.  same with burgers - pull off several minutes early.  no rush.  not really a tip since its standard practice - key step nonetheless.  

a nice crust makes a huge difference too.  if youre cooking in a skillet make sure to get all 4 ends

Steaks cooked sous vide with garlic, butter, and herbs in the vacuum sealed bag at about 95F for a couple hours.  Sear it in a ripping hot cast iron for a minute or two on each side and it's a perfectly cooked steak with a nice crust.  I prefer sous vide because you can leave it alone for a long time and the actual cooking time is just a few minutes.  

For anyone seriously interested in barbecuing, I'd highly recommend Amazing Ribs and the companion book, Meathead: The Science of Great Barbecue and Grilling. It directly addresses a lot of the myths and misinformation surrounding grilling with a collaboration between a champion pitmaster and a physicist/food science PhD, which includes your comment on salt timing above. 

The author also has a knack for explaining complex topics simply, and covers everything from "choosing a grill" to "the chemistry of the maillard reaction" to "building your own bbq rub".

Touching on the front versus reverse sear: front searing doesn't 'push' moisture into the meat, and searing meat doesn't lock in the juices (source; which is from Amazing Ribs, but references multiple experiments done by Alton Brown and others). Not saying either method is wrong, though, and I prefer using the front sear for thinner steaks anyways.

My biggest tip is to pull your meat when you hit the internal temp you're looking for, not time on the grill/in the smoker...temp, not time

Sorry but I completely disagree with some of this. For example, almost all pork cuts should only go to 145, unless we’re talking ribs, shoulder and other “smoker” cuts, and those are cooked until tender, and not to temp. Ribs will probably end up  around 195, and shoulder 190-205. I combine a rub and a sauce on all my ribs and some other cuts, just sauce towards the end so the sugars don’t burn.