Today being the unofficial start of summer according to all the local news folk, let’s talk cook-outs. As a kid, I loved when we cooked out, but then all I had to do was help carry stuff from the kitchen to the deck, then back again. I didn’t have to do any prep work or serious clean-up. The novelty of eating outside instead of around the dining room table just added to the fun.
Apparently, I’ve grown out of that. Our last propane grill gave up the ghost and went to the dump at least 6 years ago. We have a small charcoal grill which is on a shelf in the basement, but no charcoal on hand, should we suddenly get a yen for burgers outdoors. And even tho the walk from the kitchen to the deck is a few steps, it’s more hassle than I want to deal with. Or maybe I’m just an old grouch.
Should I buy a bag of Kingsford and give it a go again? Not today, of course - it’s been raining on and off all night, and that’s to continue, but maybe another day? Dunno if the nostalgia is worth it.
We oldsters gave up grilling too, just this year. But that’s because the shared-fence neighbors acquired a couple of pit bulls, and the dogs rave and bark on their side of the fence, just eight feet away from where we’re trying to grill. It has become no fun to cook out anymore, so we gave away our Weber kettle. Once we move, maybe we’ll take up the pastime again.
Morning, mumpers! It’s a breezy 14c/57f with a predicted high of 17c/63f and partly cloudy. Weather app says “Finally. A day without fucking swamp ass.” I’m sure they don’t mean our beloved Swampy!
It’s cloudy which means it’s also sunny, not too warm and there’s a good breeze blowing. I have been out to the gym this morning, and was intending to come home via the car wash as Keith needs a bit of a clean, but said car wash was closed. How dare they?! Not a massive problem, I’ll do it another time.
Today is a bank holiday here, I’m sure that means a lot of folks cooking out but we don’t do that kind of thing. Just never appealed to either of us, far too much faff before and after, when we could just chuck stuff in the oven, air fryer or slow-cooker instead.
Exercise has been achieved, slothage was achieved yesterday, and today I must carry on with the t-shirt tidying project. That’s my plan for after lunch. Thanks for the pop-up tent idea, JtC, sadly Shadow doesn’t like to sleep in anything - we had pop-up tents for the cats before and he wouldn’t go near them. Must be something to do with his past, he shows no interest in bags, boxes, cat beds etc and confines his sleeping places to the sofa, laps or his favourite spot in the shower room doorway.
I’m up at 5 a.m. to start the Weber Smoky Mountain for a couple of pork butts. Using oak & pecan for the smoking wood, and some Royal Oak briquettes for the base. Just about to throw the pork on after this post.
I will say, with two kids in the house, I somehow don’t end up firing up the charcoal grill as often as I used to. I got my first propane grill, somewhat begrudgingly, when we moved into this house six years ago and I’m using the hell out of my “outdoor oven” way more than I would ever have expected. The convenience is unquestionable, and it’s nice to cook outdoors in the summer and not heat and stink the house up.
That said, I would totally recommend you buying that bag of Kingsford and lighting it up one day fpr nostalgia. Truly, grilled food tastes different, especially when you get something a little fatty and have some of that fat drip into the fire and kick out some flavorful smoke.
We will also have some Bosnian chevapi on the fire later on, but that will be at my parents’ house which only has propane. Those especially benefit from charcoal. My recipe is about half ground lamb, half beef chuck, garlic, salt, pepper,. a little bit of baking soda. Served with ajvar (a red pepper-and-eggplant condiment), raw onions, and usually some type of flat bread (lepinja or somun or pita), but we’re skipping the extra carbs today, as there will be plenty.
Good Mornin’ Y’all! Up and caffeinatin’. YAWN ‘Tis 59 Amurrkin out and clear with a predicted high of 86 and mostly N.O.S. for the day. We shall celebrate the unofficial start of Summer by loungin’ around the cee-mint pond, grillin’ burgers and makin’ merry. Lookin’ forward to a fun day with folks.
OK, since I just mentioned grillin’ burgers I guess the answer is, yes we grill. Duh. We actually grill all year long as even when it’s cold out, it’s easy enough to throw stuff on the grill, come back inside, go out to turn it and take it off the grill. We have a propane grill that lives on a small covered deck that’s just off the back porch.
Now I need more caffeine and to feed rumbly tummy. Then I suppose I should purtify so as to be presentable for company. A host must look his best, after all.
Happy Moanday Y’all! Happy Memorial Day to all who celebrate!
I grill pretty often. I have a Weber Performer charcoal grill and an Oklahoma Joe Longhorn offset smoker. I cooked on the Weber three times in the last week and I have a couple of lovely pork loin chops to grill for tonight’s dinner. Just my opinion, but burgers grilled over charcoal is what summer tastes like.
Good morning everyone. 68F and dry right now, s’posed to reach 88 or so later.
We were enthusiastic grillers, using our propane Holland grill 4-5 nights/week. It lasted 15 years, which probably explains why the company went out of business. Now I have a giant stainless-steel CharBroil inherited from a relative.
But sadly, progress marches on, and once we acquired an air-fryer the grill became a home for spiders. We even bought one for the RV and no longer take our portable grill camping. We’re now a rest home for retired grills (portable for boat, portable for RV, and big one on the deck).
I spent yesterday productively laying on the sofa watching the Indy and other stuff. I will try to be more productive today and use the recliner. One should have goals in retirement, I say.
This just goes to show how screwed up the kiss being out of school and a holiday weekend makes me. I saw the new thread and thought, “Isn’t that supposed to be tomor… oh yeah. I guess it is Monday, innit?”
I’ve never been much of a griller. I don’t remember doing much grilling when I was growing up in New York. There were a few years when I was in high school that involved lots of grilling thanks to my stepmom. But after that, I’ve always lived in apartments where there’s a strict no grills policy. That’s not to say I won’t happily go when friends do the grilling. But it’s not worth it for me to try and work it out.
pilot , it always seems like you meet people from close by whenever you’re both further away, doesn’t it? Small world indeed! Nice story, though, and glad you made it home safe.
doggio, thanks for the hugs. Definitely appreciated.
No weirder than my Pepsi allergy.
Thank you, and . It is very comfy. Though if I hadn’t been trying to find a specific style of dress, I’d definitely gone for something with pockets!
That sounds like a very relaxing day. Especially the outdoor time. I keep wanting to bring my tarot deck outside to practice some readings, but until I get more than an old coffee table out there, it’s just not going to be comfortable. I do enjoy my reading and tableting time though.
That has always seemed to happen to me with past Diablos. I’ve never been as excited to play nightmare mode - not sure why, just not my thing. I’ve never really done any guild stuff either. The most interaction I seem to have is when Hubby and I decide to play together. I think that is becoming an itch worth scratching.
And thanks for the compliment on the dress.
shoe, sorry that irk was so irksome. The only big of brightness to the cloud I can find is that at least it wasn’t dull.
Just lying here in bed, listening to Hubby breath through his CPAP as he sleeps next to me. It’s very calming. In a little bit, I’m gonna get up, put on some clothing and start my day. Still debating on whether I feel like baking anything this morning for the family or whether I’m just going to make myself a smoothie. Ah, the difficult choices I have!
Have a great holiday for those who get to holiday today and an easy Monday for anyone who doesn’t.
Mornin. We’ve been having a lot of rain up here at elevation. But it looks like it’s going to be a sunny day today.
That should make it warm enough to sit on the deck. We may go out and play chess.
I may have to think about grilling. There is a small (very small) store about 5 miles away. But they stock the best steaks I’ve ever had in my life. Seriously, Hi-end steak houses don’t even come close. We are completely hooked (very expensive though, over $2 an ounce).
Being a holiday weekend, they may be sold out though. Hmmm…
This little store has no veggies. We usually do a baked potato and asparagus. Getting that is another 10 miles away. I do need beer though…
Mornin’ all. Balconating in the warm sunshine as the coffee slowly infuses into my soon-to-be-jiggly eyeballs.
Grilling:
As a house owner or house-renter I’d always had a grill, mostly propane. Great for burgers, steaks, brats, ribs, etc. The occasional chicken major sub-assemblies (sub-disassemblies actually ), but I never got into anything more elaborate than that. Slab-o-critter is about it.
When I moved to the condo here in FL I bought an electric grill for the balcony. Not as hot, so not as fast, but still decent. The building had propane grills downstairs in the rec area by the pool, but schlepping food down there to cook always seemed like too much work for me. For various holiday building parties we’d all bring down some stuff to share and our individual hunks-o-critter to cook on the communal grills. That was fun, and not too logistically daunting.
At my new apartment I don’t have an electric grill and don’t intend to get one. We do have communal propane grills (and a communal pizza oven!) down by the pool, but the back and forth from apartment to there is about triple the distance / hassle of it was at the condo. Not likely I’ll bother.
Her Ladyship is much more likely to want to make an elaborate production out of a grilling expedition, complete with a carefully curated picnic basket large wheeled cart of matching unbreakable dishes, serving ware, tablecloths, etc. Totally Hostess with the mostes’. I (and my late first wife) ran to a much more casual style, where minimum effort and folderol was the Prime Directive.
Up, caffeinated, and sheveled. Off today… It’s raining, and spot is playing with his toy mice. We’re not allowed to have grills in the complex because of fire codes. There’s a propane grill at the pool area, but I ain’t walking 100 yards to cook with fire, when I could just use m ygas stove.
Tthat means you can wear the white gogo boots and seersucker miniskirt when you go to buy that bag of Kingsford.
I’ve been struggling with exactly that thought though all of tater’s post about the trip. A musical ska-fest sounds like a lot of fun.
So just guess. Recipes are not detailed chemistry; they’re records of earlier guesswork that came out OK. If “one can” of mushrooms is 4 or 6 ounces does. Not. Matter. Maybe you like mushrooms more or less than Aunt Sadie did. If you’re really worried about it, simply use 1-1/4 containers of [whatever] whenever the recipe calls for "1 container of [whatever]. That’ll be close enough to offset cumulative shrinkflation. c.f. 12 oz pound of coffee. Use 1-1/2 containers if you especially enjoy that ingredient.
Her Ladyship cooks by rote recipe, measuring out the 1/8tsp of Spice X into a 2 gallon stockpot of soup. I just pour some of Spice X in until it feels right. When I want to try a new dish I hit the internet, read 5 or 6 recipes for variations on the idea, then pick one that seems best, and make that, but with some adjustments for what I like better, or have on hand, or incorporate a feature from another of those recipes that was also interesting. Her Ladyship downloads a single recipe from one of a very few trusted sources and follows it the absolute letter. An extra 1/4 tsp of e.g. oregano would Totally. Ruin. It.
We do not ever help one another cook. He or She, but not both. Much happier that way. We both enjoy eating each other’s cooking, but how we get there is not compatible. Not at all.
My bottom line: For those of you who think family recipes must be treated Her Ladyship’s way, you’re waaay overthinking this.
Admittedly baking is much more proportion-dependent than any other sort of cooking. That’s also the sort of recipe where actual measurements are almost always used.
Have you talked with him about this in plain English? What does he say? Do you think he honestly believes it came that way from the dealership, or has he derived that idea because he’s certain he didn’t do it so it had to have been them, or is he simply saving face by blaming the dealer to you while wondering inwardly how the heck that happened? Or knowing exactly how the heck it happened, but not wanting to admit his mistake?
Memory problems are real. And are a bear for both the sufferer and the spouse. But unawareness about, or denial of, the problem make it far far worse.
In my industry we totally accept the fact that forgetting and misremembering occurs continuously. There’s too much going on too fast for it to be otherwise. Humans are fallible. So then we do things to offset that. Like physical reminders for pending tasks, etc. But the big jump is attitudinal. We accept that every thought we have is to some degree tentative and contains the seeds of a mistake. Armed with that “I’m mostly sure” attitude, we’re open to correction from somebody else or from external events as they unfold.
People who carry the attitude “My thinking is always flawless and my memory is exact, perfect, and total” are both objectively wrong about that, and make more uncaught mistakes than people of a more self-questioning mindset.
Changing the habits of a lifetime won’t be easy. But if Hubs can start to recognize what’s happening and work consciously against / around it, I predict you’ll both have an easier time. I sure hope you can talk about this. Good luck!
I hate those days. You really earned your post-work bake with this one.
Morning all. Watching a freight train climb the Big 10 curve west of Denver (I love Virtual Railfan) among other things, up at 6am again so guess that is my designated time per my body, we’ll see how the rest of the week goes. Shopping-n-Sammich in a couple of hours then mowage and we’ll see if swimming can be worked into that (gym closes at 4pm today for the holiday). Otherwise a nice (78F and no rain forecast) day here in N. Ali-bama.
I don’t grill, we never did it much when I was growing up and being on my own it seemed more effort and trouble than it was worth. Just me.
By 9AM, I’d finally showered and dressed, started a load of unders in the washer, loaded and started the dishwasher, unloaded the tea cart* from the truck and brought it inside, cleaned the cat box, started tidying the counter that collects crap, started a pile of stuff to go to the basement, gathered and put away assorted Tobias toys that suddenly revealed themselves, and I think that’s all so far.
.* Many years ago, we gave FCD’s folks a tea cart that we got from IKEA. We couldn’t afford one of our own at the time and I’d always coveted theirs. Well, there’s not enough room in the apartment, so the tea cart is now in my living room. Unless MIL decides she wants it back, it’s mine - ALL MINE!!! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Anyway, I’m using it for assorted babby stuff - wipes, diapers, little blankets, bibs… Not so long ago, it was covered in bottles of assorted meds. Circle of life and all that.
FCD is in his shop welding. I need to head downstairs and clean the leather recliner. Eventually. I also need to run to Food Lion of 'nanners, lest Tobias not get his fix tomorrow.
It’s currently 48 degrees and cloudy outside. The sky will be cloudy to partly cloudy until around 2:00 pm, and then the sun will bust out for a bit. The high temperature will be approximately 72 degrees.
I often grilled both growing up and as an adult. However, during my last purge, I got rid of the giant-assed barrel grill and smoker. I have had charcoal and propane grills, and I can’t say that I strongly prefer one over the other. I want another grill, only smaller, and have been eyeing one of those Green Egg or Kamado grills. It’s more than likely that I’ll end up with a simple Weber Kettle grill. It’s nice to throw something on the grill when it’s hot and not heat up the house.
I must finish my coffee and head to the store to buy snacks for the grandkids and dinner ingredients. I managed to get most all my chores done yesterday. I need to run the roll-suck around the downstairs this morning, but that’s all I have to do.
This was me last weekend, same time waking, pork butt, Weber Smoky Mountain. But I used my usual apple and hickory for smoking wood. Oak & pecan is interesting. I’ve used oak before but I don’t think I’ve ever tried pecan.
Yesterday I made up a big batch of jerk chicken on the grill which turned out really well. So if I grill again today it will likely be something simple like burgers.
. It is very comfy. Though if I hadn’t been trying to find a specific style of dress, I’d definitely gone for something with pockets!
), but I never got into anything more elaborate than that. Slab-o-critter is about it.