Grilling

Since the weather didn't cooperate and I had to do steaks in the oven rather than on the grill I thought, Why not give some thought to grilling? So here goes...

What is the appeal of grilling? There are a lot of things that I love about it. I think the biggest part is just the getting back to basics feel of it- meat and veggies over flame, what's more basic than that??? The flavors that the fire imparts, too, makes a big difference to me. I like making perfect char marks on steaks, fish or burgers and ensuring that everyone's comes out how they like it. For me, medium- I don't like all the juices cooked out, to me that kills a lot of the flavor. For Viv, medium well to well, she's not big on pink meat. Fish, of course, gets cooked all the way, as does pork. I love pig but I respect it too; if the extra couple minutes or two saves anyone being sick I'm all for it. Anywhere I go it seems I'm always handed plates of raw food, pointed to fire and told to go- I would do this in Maine, here, wherever, and I enjoy it, a good Tim the Tool Man grunt and I'm off.

Grilling is a good place to bring people together too. When we have parties there's always a group gathered around the grill, discussing what's being cooked, how it's being done, stories about past parties and things that have been done on the grill. It's a great place for new acquaintances to become friends and food secrets and tips to be shared. The grill is a place where people will drift back and forth, often with requests, but there's always a core of a few that stay the whole time and share in this companionship. I think this may be because the grill is a neutral ground of sorts- never bad feelings around the odor of cooking.

Grilling is also a fun thing to experiment with. I'll be doing more of that this summer- we finally have a smoker box and several types of chips so I'm looking forward to trying that out. I tried doing cedar plank cooking once last year but didn't read the directions as well as I should have, there was a ton of smoke and a good bit of flame, which wasn't supposed to happen. I also want to see about playing with and finding a good homemade barbecue sauce too. It seems like we've tried a ton of different sauces but there's not one that we've really locked onto and fallen in love with. Smoked ribs are definitely on the agenda to try, I want to see if I can get that falling-off-the-bone tender and deep flavor that the good ones have down south. If I'm able to get the basics smoked well consistently I may venture into sausage and seafood, but that may have to wait for next year.

I do need to build a permanent spot for the grill. Right now it sits at the top of the driveway, in a moderately uneven spot. I'll probably end up putting down some pavers right by where the grill is now so there's a good, solid, even platform for me to play on and have the grill in a more or less permanent spot. If I feel really ambitious next year maybe a permanent cover over it so we can do true any weather grilling, but that's WAY in the future. One thing I love about this house- I can do all kinds of experimenting so when we do our next house, maybe building, I'll know what I can do and what I'll want for extras like this. Ideally I'd love to do a permanent island with the grill built in but that's not going to happen here, not looking to invest that much time and energy if I'm only going to use it for a short time- plus we really don't have a good place to do that here. The patio I saw on DIY that Trace Adkins did...wow...awesome...and WAY past what I can do here. That channel's evil, gives me too many ideas!!!

Okay, obviously I'm drifting from the central concept of grilling here so I think it's time to close this one off. Grilling is fun and something I love to do- it's simple, basic, and leaves people with smiles on their faces and full stomachs. Maybe if our world leaders did some of their negotiating over a few burgers or steaks it would calm things down and get some real work done towards peace. Who knows, crazier things have worked...