CraBlogged

I am a failure of a bbq chef, I realize and accept that now. The first time was a fluke, a rare fluke where charcoal met fire and fire met meat and meat met mouth. It was a rare blessing and I took it for granted, to the max.

We're trying to do a weekly thing where I take care of dinner in the form of grilling. And really all that means is Maryl prepares something for 40 minutes and then I attempt to burn it for 5 minutes. Yesterday was the second of this "weekly phenomenon", and it was mostly a repeat of what happened last week. So get this.

Take a bunch of charcoal. Put it up in a big pyramid. Douse it with half a bottle of lighter fluid. Strike a match and toss it in as you jump backwards. Explosion of flame! It's great, it's a big roaring fire, and all is well in the bbq world. But then the sadness comes in. It slowly dies down, as to be expected. Slowly, slowly, slowly, then out. Gone. Where'd the fire go? The coals aren't ashen like the back of the bag says. They're barely ashen at all. So what do I do? Pour more lighter fluid in and strike another match. But the lighter fluid hits the hot coals and this thick gray fog sudden permeates the whole environment. I lost some finger hairs to gain the knowledge that this gas is very flammable. It's not smoke, people. We are beyond the looking glass now.

But it lights up all the same and big boom of explosion and flame and then wowhn wowhn wowhn, the flame peters out and dies. And the coals are hot! Hot hot, so maybe I can cook with them, so I stick some meat on and 5 minutes later the coals are dead cold. And around this time Maryl comes out and looks things over and asks politely how things are, and I point sourly at the coals that by this time are half ashen and half nothin', and they're sort of hot some places and really hot others and not hot on the gripping hand.

Last week it was sausages of some sort. They were thrice-cooked. Once in the pot to boil. One on the grill to sort of heat up a little, and get stinky with charcoal-smells. And then once in the oven, for 15 minutes, to actually cook.

Yesterday, I thought I had it figured out - I just needed more coals and a bigger pyramid, and of course more lighter fluid. And yes, let it sit for a minute then light. And it roared and roared and looked beautiful. And it slowly died down but that's to be expected. And just when I thought all would be right in the world, plop, it died out completely. I checked over the coals - only 60% ashen. What is the deal!!!, cried I to the world. So I used up the rest of the lighter fluid - and I'm not joking, this was a new bottle, and after just two sessions it's already out. And the flames came back in after the vaporous gasses mitigated slightly. And the fire burned happily for 5 minutes. And then, like a man gasping for viagra; disappointment.

The coals this time were at least sort of hot for a while, so I was able to actually cook the chicken to a point where it wouldn't kill us, but it barely toasted the buns and had nothing left for the corn. So a mild success I suppose but the kind of success one would claim if they got a punch or two off in a fight against a coliseum lion.

So is the trick to just wave the white flag and get a gas grill, or do I suck it up and adjust my charcoal tactics?