Short lived

Scott has this amazing grilling bible by Weber's. We found it years ago while browsing through Barnes & Noble and truly, the introduction had us doubled over laughing. We figured any book which combined meat, fire, and laughter had to be in our home. The recipes inside are remarkably easy and oh-so-delicious. This cookbook is to the grill what Julia Child is to French cooking. Simply perfection.

Our first grill was a miniscule hibachi we kept in the apartment next to the water heater when not in use. Of course, as the family size began to expand, that little grilling surface was a bit of an underachiever. Our next grill was a modest Weber charcoal picked up on the side of the road during big trash day. Our grill du jour on this bad boy was hot dogs and more hot dogs. We loved the fact that it was completely affordable and within our budget -- it is hard to argue with "free" after all --  but that was really the only quality our Weber had going for it.

Then we stumbled upon the grilling bible. It's ironic that a book on grilling by Weber is what pushed our Weber to the side of the road with a big "FREE" sign taped to it. We upgraded to a three-burner Kenmore from Sears purchased for Father's Day the year after we moved into the townhouse. Scott insisted on three burners because it would allow for indirect cooking. I had no idea what he was talking about, but I figured he was the grill guy, so who was I to argue?

The food this man concocted on that Kenmore was amazing! He would chose a recipe or two out of his Weber's Big Book of Grilling, I would do some shopping, and then the kids and I would sit back and wait for the magic. Marinated salmon, garlic shrimp, corn on the cob, whole chickens, steaks rubbed & then cooked to crusty perfection. And the hamburgers -- famous. We were so far beyond hotdogs that it took children begging for a weenie on a bun for us to throw a package of the great American summer time food on the cast-iron grate. We went through three propane tanks a summer, but was it ever worth it!

When you use something this hard and then store it outside in the elements, it seems inevitable that it will officially die. But we were stunned. How could our grill have deserted us? We had just had the twins, so the idea of handing over money for a new grill was not really palatable. But the grilling gods saw fit to bless our fiscal responsibility and we stumbled upon a reconditioned grill while on our way to the library one morning. Completely restored by a retired gentleman who tinkered for fun and sold his repaired projects in the front yard, a four burner Charbroil grill reasonably priced at $50 was absolutely was this family of (then) 8 needed.

At the beginning of this summer, our Charbroil decided it, too, was joining the Kenmore in the great grill heaven reserved only for those grills which have been truly adored and generously used. And now, as a family of 10 with commitments on time and money, we decided we would not purchase another grill indefinitely. It was not a decision made because we enjoyed grilling any less; rather, it seemed the pragmatic thing to do. And so we went through most of our summer smelling other family's amazing grilling-meat-smells while we continued to use the crock pot, stove, and oven.

As August was drawing to a close, we made a decision based on the 30% off end-of-season sale at Target: it was time to replace our grill. In our quest for healthier living, we finally decided on a charcoal grill because we had read something about it being healthier than propane. And it appealed to Scott's southern roots, this idea of cooking over molten hot bricks of fire. So we bought a Barrel Grill & Smoker and dove head first into the world of charcoal cooking. We congratulated ourselves on our shopping savvy because we loaded down on the grill and clearanced grill accessories for just under the price of one of those gas grills plus we were going to be providing our family with healthy grilled meals.  I dashed into Giant and bought an organic chicken and nitrate/nitrite free hotdogs before we headed home to assemble the grill and cook us some weenies.

Ahh, if only it were as easy as we always think it will be.

Scott and Dawson assembled the grill in an agonizing two hours. The grill had some signs of having been dropped and it definitely didn't look like it lined up to me, but we weren't sure it would really matter. I mean, we are talking about heaps of burning coal here! I figured the heat generated might melt some metal. For the record - it sooooo matters that your Barrel Grill & Smoker line up. Nothing we have cooked on this grill has been cooked easily, and most would not win any awards in the taste category, either. The weenies roasted that first night weren't the sizzling hot, perfectly grill scored hotdogs we have some to expect from Scott. That right there should have been a clue - hotdogs only okay? How exactly do you cook a hotdog badly? The chicken had raw legs. Ew. And hard, smoky potatoes did not seem appealing to me in any way whatsoever.  The temperature guage didn't work, so I would go outside and see how long I could hold my arm in the heat 1850s-style to determine the temperatures. Seriously.

I missed Scott's uber-confident "I can grill anything" attitude. Now he was a fusser, "Do you think we put in enough bricks? I counted out exactly what they recommend in the book. Huh - I think I should add more bricks. What do you think? Perhaps I should raise the rack a little. Or maybe lower it. What do you think?"

We did try contacting the company about our temperature gauge and misaligned barrel using their "Wait! Please don't return this item to the store! We can help you!" contacts. Emails got returned and phone calls were not returned. Great. Target, being Target, said they will take it back so we figured we would go look at other charcoal grills at Home Depot or Lowes sometime this next weekend.

Today, I was at Target with Tucker picking up some essentials - tissues, toothbrushes, doggie-poo bags. Tuck asked if we could check out the grill section again, so we meandered over. And there I saw it. The Stainless Steel Brinkman Scott had been drooling over. Four burner with an extra side burner, perfect for Pennsylvania sweet corn. Cast iron, porcelain dipped grill racks. 652 square inches of grilling space plus warming rack. 75% off. That was enough for me. Within minutes I had this grill-for-a-king on a flat bed being wheeled to the checkout counter.

Scott glimpsed it in the box on his way out the door for a double shift at the hospital this afternoon. His initial response had me second guessing my decision just a little. "If you didn't like my charcoal grilling, you could have just said so." Truly - I blamed the grill, not the charcoal. But I am ready for my grill master to return. I'm so over the pansy-"What do you think?"-grilling nonsense. There was some of the expected "You saved me money by spending money" ribbing that I get during every end-of-season Target sale, and then he was dashing out the door. Minutes after he got to work, Scott sent a text saying that he is actually excited about the grill and that the one thing he missed the most about propane was just going outside and turning it on. Preach it, brother.

So our experiment with charcoal grilling was short-lived. For those of you who love it, we tip our ball-caps to you & your patience with those dratted little bricks. As for us, we are big fans of push button ignition and non-renewable propane.

Let the grilling commence.