How to pass time in the summer

Well friends, it has been awhile since posting. I've had an eventful summer thus far, as you can tell from reading my blog and megan's. Rather than focusing on the car trouble and drama that has lasted through the summer, today I'd like to focus on a calmer, more peacful thread which has woven itself through these last few months. That would be: Barbecue.

Barbecue is something that I've long had a fascination with, probably because its something I really like to eat. I still remember vividly walking through Dollywood with my grandparents and brother. As we walked under the rail road bridge, there is (or at least was) a barbecue place on our right. They always used to have a pig roasting on a spit, and you could smell the charcoal and hickory smoke long before you could see it.

The choir at Middlerbrook Pike United Methodist Church where I grew up hosts an annual barbecue which I had occasion to help out with some.

As Megan and I were dating, we'd go over to her house and have food that her dad cooked on the grill. It was an eye-opening experience. See, my dad (and I don't mean this to be in any way derrogatory) is, like myself, somewhat impatient. Charcoal was always started using half a gallon of lighter fluid. When gas grills became affordable, charcoal was abandoned altogether. Then I get to our first grill-out at Megan's house and her dad got out this thing.. It was a metal chimney, used to light charcoal without lighter fluid. I fell in love with the taste (burgers that didn't taste like propane or lighter fluid).

Last summer, when Megan and I moved to Greeneville and started living in a house instead of an apartment, one of the first things we bought was a 22 1/2" Weber kettle grill, just like her dad's, and a chimney starter, just like her dad's. We had fun grilling steaks, chicken, pork chops, shish kabobs, fish, etc. But something was missing. Late last summer I went out and bought a 6-pound picnic shoulder and did my best to smoke it on our grill. The results were okay, but i kind of abandoned the idea of smoking meat, in favor of straight up grilling.

Since getting my grill, i've signed up for Weber's recipe of the week. Sometime in May I recieved a recipe for a Carolina Red Pulled Porrk Shoulder. I got excited and decided to try it. It was actually not too shabby. I even made my own sauce (the one in the recipe). That did it. On our way to Annual Conference, we stopped by walmart and bought the cheap CharBroil American Gourmet offset smoker. Upon our return we put it together and i smoked 2 of these Carolina Red shoulders (using Boston Butt instead of Picnic) and we had her old vet and all the employees over for a good-bye party. It was so much better on the offset smoker, as it took 12 hours to cook instead of 5.

About two weks ago I smoked some baby back ribs in a similar manner. Not too bad, but I'll remember next time to pull the membrane off of the inside of htem before cooking. It made them awfully hard to cut and eat.

Tonight comes the next installment of the BBQ-ness. I'm going to do a beer can chicken (on the weber, not the smoker). Will let you all know how it turns out.

Grace and Peace,

Jim

P.S.

I've added some links to some bbq sites that I've frequented lately or that pertain to my new BBQ addiction. I also will probably be writing more about my bbq adventures. If you dont like bbq, or you dont want to keep hearing about bbq, thats fine. Just dont read