Home 101 - Barbecues
In trendy outdoor kitchens, the barbecue still reigns. From hot dogs on a tabletop grill to spit-roasted poultry—nothing beats the smell and taste of food cooked over an open fire. Best of all, outdoor cooking keeps the heat out of the kitchen.
Flavor
Outdoor cooks at Tanque Verde Guest Ranch marinate meats for three days, using a mixture of Worcestershire sauce, liquid smoke, lemon juice, salt, pepper, and garlic. Many ready-made seasonings are available, but if you want to do your own flavoring, Kulon has these suggestions:
• While marinades need an acid, use it sparingly and avoid vinegar for tender cuts, as it breaks down meat fiber.
• A lot of acid quickens the marinating time.
• Rely on only the marinade to flavor the food while cooking.
• Marinades cannot transform a tough cut of meat into a tenderloin. The only way to get tender bites is to buy tender cuts of meat. But using wine, lemon juice, or vinegar-based marinades can help soften the cut a bit.
Barbecues
While electric barbecues exist, the most popular still burn wood, charcoal, natural gas, or propane. Cart barbecues allow cooking anywhere in the backyard, whereas built-ins provide an upscale look, says Cheryle Lund, owner of Earth Energy's Hearth & Patio.
Popular wood or charcoal barbecues include the porcelain Weber kettles and the ceramic Big Green Egg, according to Doug Minder, assistant manager at Barbecue World.
Barbecues fueled by propane or natural gas fire up the fastest. Stainless steel finishes conduct heat most quickly and evenly, porcelain is the easiest to clean, and cast iron holds heat longer, Lund points out.
Accessories
Experts say the first barbecue accessory should be a good cleaning brush. A thorough watery, not soapy, brushing of the cooking surface keeps flare-ups down without corrosion.
Stainless steel tongs and a spatula are the cooking utensils of choice at Tanque Verde Guest Ranch, where barbecue is a daily specialty. "Piercing meat with a fork is just wrong," admonishes Food and Beverage Director John Kulon. "You're basically draining the juice out."
Kulon also suggests buying a meat thermometer. A basting brush is handy, but will likely burn up with frequent use. Many stores sell barbecue toolkits, sometimes in storage cases. The $69.99 basic set at Barbecue World includes items such as tongs, knife, fork, spatula, and basting brushes.
Cast-iron cookware works great for cooking on barbecues. These items last longest with a good cleaning and curing with oil immediately after use, says Kulon. Spits, grill baskets, pizza stones, and a whole host of other cooking accessories will allow you to prepare pretty much anything on the barbecue that you can cook in the kitchen.
Seasoning
Part of the allure of barbecuing is achieving that smoky flavor in food. From there, cooks can season in any way imaginable, from a simple sprinkle of salt and pepper to a several-ingredient mixture that pleases the palate.
With marinades, the food soaks in flavorings for several hours before cooking. Once marinated, the food can be quickly grilled or roasted. Injectable marinades put flavor directly inside meat. Any marinade can be injected with a food syringe, says Minder. Strain the pulp from the marinade, inject the liquid, and apply the pulp to the outside of the meat for additional flavoring.
Rubs flavor meat when the dry seasonings mix with liquids from cooking food. They're traditionally used for slow-cooking meats such as Kansas City-style ribs, says Kulon. They also work on quickly grilled food such as New Orleans-style blackened fish and meats. Minder suggests rubbing meat with seasonings, tightly wrapping it in plastic wrap, and allowing it to sit overnight.
Barbecue sauces should not touch heat or flames. Their high sugar content means they only burn before they can flavor anything. Add sauce only after the meat is removed from the grill, says Kulon. "The way we do it is that your meat is done when you put the barbecue sauce on it."
Outdoor Service
If you're careful enough, any kind of tableware you have in the house works outdoors. But who wants to stress over breaking dishes? Melamine, that seemingly indestructible material, has come back in dishes in a big way. A wide variety of colors and patterns give the tableware a variety of looks. From afar it can look like lacquered solids, earthy stoneware, colorful Fiestaware, or textured bamboo, to name a few styles. To the touch, melamine is smooth, cool, and lightweight. Several companies make complete sets, including serving pieces.
Flames & Heat
High-heat barbecuing adds a tasty crust to food, but charring unleashes cancercausing chemicals.
"You want to choose a grill that's going to give you the least amount of flame flare-ups and the least amount of charring," says Lund. She suggests using a gas barbecue built of stainless steel, which helps eliminate flare-ups.
She also advises keeping flames from touching food and separating the fire from the cooking surface as much as possible. Some cooks feel that true barbecuing entails the slow smoking of food in low heat. That method works well with large pieces of meat, says Minder. High-temperature grilling quickly cooks small pieces of meat and fish.
Where to Buy
• Barbecue World, 5068 N. Oracle Rd., 887-0378, and 5616 E. Broadway Blvd., 790-0660, bbqworldtucson.com
• Earth Energy’s Hearth & Patio, 3948 W. Costco Dr., 888-8867, eehpatio.com
• Flame Connection, 2736 N. Campbell Ave., 623-0626, flameconnection.com
• Patio Connection, 3210 N. Oracle Rd., 293-5110, patioconnectionaz.com
• Table Talk, 6842 E. Tanque Verde Rd., 886-8433; 7876 N. Oracle Rd., 219-8232, and 7707 E. Broadway Blvd., 733-6052, tabletalk.com