Barbecue Tips
Blam, it’s barbecue season! Actually, it started a while ago, but it took me awhile to pass my barbecue license test. Now I’m grilling for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Also dessert and afternoon snack… and late night snack… and even later night snack. I’m pretty much constantly barbecuing.
During all that sleepless practice, I learned a buttload of barbecue tips. And, guess what? That’s right; I’m passing them along to you! Grab your tongs, because here we go:
- Only barbecue outdoors in a grill. Never fill your kitchen sink with charcoal and light it, even though that seems to make perfect sense.
- Brush the grate with cooking oil. Otherwise, food will stick to it like a goddamn, stupid sonofabitch.
- Never use more than four bottles of lighter fluid. In fact, probably just stick to using part of one bottle.
- Give your charcoal about 30 minutes to heat up/cool down. Do not watch it while it’s trying to heat up; it gets nervous when people are watching.
- Add aromatic hardwood to the charcoals to give the food a smoky flavor, you yuppie.
- You can marinate chicken in almost anything. I like Caesar salad dressing, but you could try teriyaki sauce or lemon juice or Legos or zippers. (Be sure to remove any Lego pieces before grilling.)
- Some people grill fish instead. No skin off my nose.
- Have a spray bottle of water handy in case your grill flares up. Or, in case a wet t-shirt contest flares up. Fingers crossed.
- Always have a barbecue buddy watch to make sure you don’t get too obsessed with grilling.
- You can grill tater tots on a sheet of tin foil. Yeah, that’s right—I just blew your fucking minds.
- Use a pair of tongs to flip your food. If you do it with your bare hands, the ER doctor will lecture you for like an hour while he wraps the bandages.
- That lecture is almost always about being drunk, by the way. Super boring.
- Avoid loose, flammable clothing while grilling. Like, say, a cheap Halloween wizard’s costume with an awesome pointy cap.
- Use a meat thermometer to test if the meat is cooked enough. Unless you’re manly enough to just know. Are you manly enough?
- Allow the meat to rest before serving. It’s been through a lot.
- Serve meat with some token vegetables so that you can pretend barbecuing is healthy.
- Have your teenage son clean the grill afterward. It’ll teach him a good lesson in resentment.
- Repeat and enjoy.
