Growing up in SA I went to countless braai and learned how to cook from some bbq veterans, people cooking meat over open flame for 30 years etc.
The biggest mistakes that I see with the British when they cook on a BBQ [apart from only cooking burgers
] is that they are too eager to cook and get the meat on. They use the wrong coals and then they put the meat on too early. The temperature of the coals is the key to cooking a good BBQ. Chicken should always go on first because that takes the longest to cook. Before putting the chicken on you should be able to hold your hand at grill level for a few seconds comfortably without having to move it away. If you put the chicken on and it looks too hot, move the chicken to the side of grill until the temperature is right. What you don't want when cooking chicken on a BBQ is for the marinade to go all black and the chicken to be uncooked.
My favourite meats on a BBQ are chicken, steaks, sausages (boerewors especially, but even nice English sausages are good), some pork, like pork chops, if cooked properly can be delicious.
To cook boerewors you put it on the braai still curled up and then let one side cook until it is cooked the one side, it will usually smoke a lot. Then turn it over and cook the other side quite well. Then keep turning it back and forth to cook it right through. Wors should be soft and full with moisture when cooked correctly.
If cooking for many people, 20-30. Put the chicken on first and then once that has been cooking for quite a while, put the wors on and the pork chops and then at the end cook the steaks. It works best if you have a big BBQ that has enough room to move meats around to different temperatures.
My favourite sides for a BBQ are potato salad, jacket potatoes cooked in the braai, normal salad and some cold pasta.
One thing that i have never done is make potato salad or the marinade, usually that is done by the females and the salad, the men just drink beer and cook the meats
We should have an OC UK BBQ and then ill show you how to cook meat without it turning black