How to Correctly Light a Barbecue

Ah, the lure of the cookout. My Father, a wonderful man who in the middle of preparations for an indoor meal involving some form of meat, would pop up out of nowhere and suggest grilling outside and eating outside instead. By the time the move from inside to outside had taken place, it was practically dark, so cooking was not exactly precise. My mother generally cringed at this suggestion to cook outside, most likely due to the echoing voice of my father bellowing "Let's burn some meat!" as he exited the house with the fate of our dinner in his hands. I was at least 19 before I thought hot dogs were not supposed to be burnt, kind of crunchy and too curly to stay in the bun. Even years later, when cooked correctly, they still seem wrong to me.

Here in New England, today was the first official day warm enough to open the windows to air out the house, so in honor of the looming spring and summer cookouts, here are the actual directions for how to light a barbeque correctly, just in case you do not share my enthusiasm for over-done hot dogs.

With the exception of the first mandate or two, the following are several steps my Father would term "optional" and "unnecessary if you know what you are doing". Consider the remaining steps necessary unless you like to cook your meat so long that you make "meat potato chips" out of steaks and London broil.

First, clean off the grill. A stainless steel pad or one of those grill cleaners that looks like a tiny steel broom will get any gunk off there. Just because there will be fire does not mean it will burn off anything that could hurt you. The grill is outside, there will be undesirable elements. You also do not want anything to make the meat stick or cause excess smoke.

Use paper towels to clean your hands after handling raw meats like chicken, fish and pork so that you do not re-handle bacteria laden towels and get sick or get others sick with raw juices on cooked food. Arrange your utensils and serving plate before touching the meat so that you do not transfer raw juices onto anything else.

Spread the coals at the grill base to form a 10 inch by 10 inch square, about one coal longer than the span of a man's hand (when spreading your hand out, extend your thumb all the way out and your pinky all the way out, that is about 8 ½ inches on the typical adult male and long fingered females). This is about right for grilling for a standard family or a few friends so add or subtract accordingly. Now build a pyramid of coals, keeping the sides as even as possible while building your coal pyramid. Light the base on each side.

Wait until the fire has burned down and the coals are starting to get gray on their edges. Spread them out a bit in a relatively even surface and you are ready to start grilling.

Know the difference between grilling and barbecuing. Grilling is fast cooking directly over the heat, whereas barbecuing is a low temperature and not directly over the heat, which usually allows for the extra basting that occurs with ribs and similar barbecued items. But grilling requires hot grilling grates so that you know when to turn the meat and keep it from sticking. For hot grates, keep the fire at maximum temperatures for 10 minutes to pre-heat. This makes for more attractive meat and you will know the meat is ready to be turned when it does not stick to the grates.

I know a meat thermometer seems like something that interrupts the manly meat burning process, but it also interrupts the uncooked meat diseases process. Also, you can ruin good meat like ribs if you are cooking too high like 350 - 375 degrees, but it will take forever at 200 degrees. The meat will also not be cooking evenly if it is a big piece, so check a few places, it is much more difficult to gauge when meat is done on a grill.

The Martha Stewart type recipe have some reasonably simple ideas for doing corn and vegetables on the grill, as well as the inclusion of herbs to place on the grill to flavor the meat and bastes to keep the meat very tender. They are very easy to do and add a lot of flavor.

Enjoy your summer grilling!