Charcoal or Gas?

[el Guapo]

The last ten or so days have seen me spending serious quality time with my grill thanks to a cooperative mother nature and a great porch. How about you?

Vegans – We will understand if you decline to participate. But, you vegetarians can make veggie kabobs and tofu burgers on the grill - so join right in.

Post a recipe or comment anyway you feel.

 

[Tranplanner]

I much prefer charcoal...it's nice to sit back and enjoy a beer or two while the coals turn. I'm also somewhat nervous around appliances that can blow me up.

Seeing as I live in condo with no balcony, I don't BBQ much these days. Maybe I'll get a Foreman grill...

As for the vegetarian thing - I've been meat-free (but not seafood-free) for about two weeks now...just trying it out for a bit. It's driving my fiancee nuts, but I had to get her back for the "maybe we should save ourselves from now 'till the wedding night" spiel I got the other night. NH Planner, I feel your pain!!!!!!

 

[Dan]

Since I'm not at the conference, I could use a good BBQ to distract me. Can I choose liquid oxygen?

Seriously ... charcoal, please. Vital elements of the manly barbecue ritual include starting the fire, and imparting the characteristic smoke-filled flavor. Gas only wussifies it.

 

[Downtown]

Jane, you grill ignorant slut....

I hate this, but I am sooooo not grill knowledgable. My knowledge of cooking over flames involves marshmallows and hot dogs. I'm a little scared of our grill, to be honest. She (our gas grill) is kind of like that rugby chick I very narrowly avoided a drunken fight in a bar with - we had a single encounter that involved me almost being set on fire and I've avoided her ever since (the grill and the scary rugby chick). So I am just in charge of all the prep work, which is the boring and sucky part of out door cooking.

 

[Habanero]

Gas all the way

Although I must admit, I leave it up to my wonderful boyfriend to actually do the grilling. I just look cute and open beer as needed. I can make a mean salad though while the steaks are cooking!!

I'll have to go home and find the name of the steak seasoning we used last night, it rocked!! I'll let ya'll know tomorrow-

 

[adaptor]

proto-charcoal

I use wood. Grilling for 2 and more likely to roast chicken & vegies than steaks and potatoes I find I can scrounge up enough dead wood in the park (or my back yard) for a rustic outdoor experience. I hate the aroma of burning lighter fluid wafting into my house from the neighbor's grills.

I was impressed with a friend's high end gas grill. He uses it for breakfast, lunch and dinner. He cooks pizza in his grill! Of course he built the deck to complete the experience.

 

[Jen]

deck monkeys

Wood!?!?!? Well I'll be damned is that some newfangled kind of fuel?

My husband would love a gas grill - some montrosity that would require frequent trips to the propane farm to fill it up. And of course being so anal about putting stuff away it would probably be shoved against the house while hot and start a house fire - no thanks hon; lets grill over apple wood instead!

When I grill I hate to have to use the stove or oven too, so everything has to fit on the Weber - so we often do shish kabobs with meat veggies and fruit all on one stick!

Then there is major paranoia with the lil girls running amok on the deck and slamming into the hot grill (never happened) or waving their shishkabob sticks at one another - then the misplaced beers where's my beer? is that my beer?are you drinking my beer? Hon how about another beer? Weekends are too short!

 

[Downtown]

My parents live in Oswego, NY (home of the 10' snow drifts), and my dad grills year 'round. Until I went to college, I'd never had a steak or porkchops that weren't done on the grill - even in January. He'd just put on his parka, sweep out a path to the grill on the deck and do his job.

On weekends, my in-laws grill breakfast - egg/bacon/ham and cheese on english muffins, all done on the grill. Being the breakfast girl that I am, normally this would put me into fits of ecstacy, but sadly, his whole family has acquired a taste for char. Blargh.

 

[Richi]

WOOD!!!

Wood is the way to go. I tried it about a year or so ago and have been wuth it ever since. I picked up a bag of hickory chunks to try out and found that it does a much better flavor and smoke smell across the yard than does charcoal.

I agree with Rustbest. Lighter fluid fumes are not where it's at. I found that if you chainsaw a log, limb, whatever into 2-3 inch rounds you can pop them into the right size chunks with little effort. i use a dull hatchet. In areas where hardwoods are abundant you can most often get plenty to cook with for free execpt for some exercise and a few spoonfuls of fuel.

Tuff luck for you guys out in the pineywoods.

 

[NHPlanner]

Sorry Tranplanner...

Tranplanner wrote:
It's driving my fiancee nuts, but I had to get her back for the "maybe we should save ourselves from now 'till the wedding night" spiel I got the other night. NH Planner, I feel your pain!!!!!!

Ummm....that issue didn't last long....she decided that one month prior would be enough....sorry!

 

[Tranplanner]

That's okay - I've been repreived too. While I remained master of my own domain, my fiancee cracked and asked for reconsideration.

Granted

 

[giff57]

Gas baby!!!!

Sometime I'll share the story about my war with the infamous Plains Pocket Gopher. I LOVE propane....