Oh, yes! Those charcoal lighters work like a champ.
What we do is burn the crap out of the charcoal and then we add to the fire fresh mesquite wood that we cut every year in Texas, so by the time we put the beast on the grill, the lighter fluid is history, and we smoke the meat. I know what you mean about the taste, but we burn it so long and then smoke our stuff, so there isn’t any lighter fluid taste.
You know what you’re doing.
On my last trip to Phoenix the resort had a mesquite fire outside. Being an east coast guy, I’ve never smelled a real mesquite fire. It was like a perfume to the air; just amazing.