Barbecue Challenged
Just curious: is it really true that you can add briquettes and other good-smelling, smoke-creating agents to the bottom of a gas grill?
I have a very girlie gas grill that I back away from, squealing in terror, whenever the flames shoot too high. I am a Grill Whimp.
BrotherBang, who stands manfully before 4' high flames without flinching, claims that I can put, oh I don't know, chipotle-flavored cedar chips in there under my steak or whatever. I am very surprised to hear this.
Aside from the fact that some loyal readers of this blog strenuously object to my consuming of steaks and other friendly members of the animal kingdom, what are you favorite grilling and barbecuing tricks?
I know this isn't deep. It's JULY. It's A HUNDRIT DEGREES. That's the POINT. Go get some watermelon and let me know what you think.
I have a very girlie gas grill that I back away from, squealing in terror, whenever the flames shoot too high. I am a Grill Whimp.
BrotherBang, who stands manfully before 4' high flames without flinching, claims that I can put, oh I don't know, chipotle-flavored cedar chips in there under my steak or whatever. I am very surprised to hear this.
Aside from the fact that some loyal readers of this blog strenuously object to my consuming of steaks and other friendly members of the animal kingdom, what are you favorite grilling and barbecuing tricks?
I know this isn't deep. It's JULY. It's A HUNDRIT DEGREES. That's the POINT. Go get some watermelon and let me know what you think.
posted by PeaceBang at 9:06 PM
12 Comments:
It's too hot to even grill here, you'd have to stand outside...
it's sandwhiches and salads until this extreme heat is over.
But when we do grill it is still the old fashioned way with charcoal.
Here's a tip: you can do it indoors, in the air conditioning, over the stove! Get your big cast-iron skillet (you DO have one, don't you?), and put the smoke flavor agents in that. In the skillet you put one of those three-legged metal vegetable steamers, the kind that open like a flower- put the food in that. Put a lid over the whole contraption, turn the burner to medium high, and don't forget to turn the fan over the stove on. Viola- indoor mesquite smoked barbecue!
P.S. If you don't have an extraction fan over the stove, take the battery out of your smoke alarm!
As always, the devil's in the details.
Depends on your bbq. Which is to say "Yes, you can."
Results vary depending on your grill and how you do this.
I shifted to a gas grill a couple years ago. I've soaked wood chips and put rosemary (also) into a hand-made aluminum foil container that sat on a part of the grill. It gets hot and smolders and smokes, imparting the flavor you want.
It also blackens the inside of the bbq.
Given where the burners are and the deflectors intended to spread heat and protect them, I wouldn't put anything into the bottom of the grill.
Tips?
Marinate. Like many items of cuisine, planning ahead pays.
When doing shrimp on the grill, remember they cook really quick. Really quick. Put them on, cook until the side that's down turns that cooked pink-orange color, flip, and as soon as the underside gets to that color, pull them off. Even if you have doubts... they continue to cook some after you pull them off, and I've yet to have one that was underdone. If they're underdone... they probably still LOOK underdone.
It's 2 am, and insider the house is now under 80 degrees. The only thing that's being cooked around here is on the bbq.
Ditto on what Ogre said about putting the wood chips in something, like foil, or a clean tuna can.
For fabbbbulous chicken fajitas: marinate chicken breast/thighs in 1 part Italian dressing, 2 parts margarita mix. Grill.
Beast Burgers: Take a beer and reduce it down. Not quite "syrupy," but a step above that. Mix your reduced beer with some ground sirloin, shredded sharp cheddar, minced caramelized onions and crumbled crisp bacon. Yes, mix it all together. Grill. Will make a grown man cry.
Not for the faint of heart, or any other heart condition.
It's not the consumption of burned dead flesh that is the moral outrage.
It's the desecration of said flesh by refusing to char it over a REAL fire.
Would love to give you advice on what to add to the gas grill coals to make your cuisine taste less insipid than gas-broiled meat usually tastes, but gass grilling is against my religion so I never learned how.
If you would only pitch that dangerous gas contraption and go get a real charcoal grill, we could then have a transportingly spiritual conversation, and your back yard could smell like the Temple court at the peak of Solomon's reign.
One tip I can share, however, even with gas-grilling Samaritans: frozen pre-packaged hamburger patties from Hilltop Steak House Market in Braintree.
Also, if you're doing spare ribs, first bake them in the oven (single layer in a covered dish with barbecue sauce over them) at 350 degrees for 1 1/2 to 2 hr. Then slather them with more sauce and finish them off over direct heat on the grill for 5-10 minutes. If you try to do them on the grill from start to finish they will dry out.
Oh, I'm aware. All industrial meat production -- pork, lamb, beef, chicken, fish -- is inhumane in one way or another. But here was PeaceBang's question:
Aside from the fact that some loyal readers of this blog strenuously object to my consuming of steaks and other friendly members of the animal kingdom, what are you favorite grilling and barbecuing tricks?
[emphasis added]
PowderBlue--
Peacebang wrote "Cripes, even a light-hearted comment about what I ATE AT DINNER leaves one reader feeling entitled to leave a condemnatory little comment about why I should come to the path of Vegetarianism" about you. Four people on my blog have told you that lecturing meat eaters the way you do comes off badly. Now two more people here have said it.
I know you think what you're doing is fine, but if seven basically reasonable people are telling you that what you're doing is obnoxious, is it possible they're correct?
CC
I'll let Fausto defend his use of sarcasm and irony.
Don't think I need to. I think it speaks for itself.
In any event, in light of other recent blog conversations about the characteristic traits of UUism and UUs these days, it seems to me that the greatest irony of this discussion does not lie in anything I said, but in powderblue's evident sense that his/her own personal prophetic witness deserve priority over the express wishes of our hostess.
Was anyone here aware that a common commercial fishing technique for swordfish involves baiting "long lines" that can be up to several miles long, setting them to drift for many days at a time, and allowing the hooked fish to asphyxiate on the line before hauling them in? Another common method is to harpoon them in the manner of Famous UU Herman Melville.
The vegan and UU deities thus being equally appeased, here's James Beard's recipe for barbecued swordfish steak. It's delicious, and works equally well en brochette.
1/2 cup soy sauce
2 cloves garlic, chopped
4 tablespoons tomato sauce or catsup
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/4 cup chopped parsley
1 teaspoon finely powdered oregano
1/2 cup orange juice
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Mix the ingredients together and soak the swordfish steak in it for 2 hours before cooking. Brush or baste the fish with the sauce during the broiling. Serve with braised kidney beans, a hearty salad of greens, tomatoes, and onion rings, and a red wine.
[from James Beard's Fish Cookery. Boston: Little, Brown, 1954.]
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;-)
Perhaps once you've mastered Beard you'll be ready to attempt this one!
It's got everything from poached eggs and French toast to barbecued peacock. (Ever tried that? Neither have I, but it's sure to leave a longer-lasting impression than hickory chips and rosemary wrapped in tinfoil.)
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