Tips, Tricks & Just Good Advice! > Burn it in the Back Yard with Hub!

What's Your Style?

(1/3) > >>

Hub:
Let's share some memories . . .

Let’s wax nostalgic for a bit.  Let’s think back to the foods that first got us into liking stuff that was grilled or smoked in the back yard.  What are our memories of what our parents cooked on the patio?  When did you get your first morsel of a charcoaled steak or sit at the grown-up’s table and gnaw on a rib?  Did you have an uncle that smoked both turkeys and Camels?  Who in your family was the “grillmaster” and who filled the neighborhood with clouds of steam and smoke from sizzling sausages?  What restaurant made the “cue” that your folks or friends always wound up going out for?  What did it taste like?  What style did it have that you either can’t find now or that you’ve worked hard to duplicate?  What from your past defines your “sense” of barbeque and provides warm memories of flavor, family and fellowship?  In short, what is your “style”?

Barbeque is notorious for being a regional thing.  Chances are pretty high that you were influenced more by the geography of your barbeque “initiation” than any other factor and that you might not have even known that there were other recipes and approaches until later in life.  Every culture has outdoor cooking customs and methods that tend to evolve and come together with others in delicious ways.  These things spread out and combine as people move and mix, creating even more variety and adventure in food.  Polynesians perfected deep earth pit cookery.  The Chinese invented charcoal.  Europeans and Africans learned that smoke not only cured and preserved meat, but also gave it additional flavor.  Caribbean Indians added peppers and sugars made into sauces.   It gets blurry and mixed but we all know the result and how we first were exposed to it.

I grew up in central Oklahoma.  Barbeque there was and still is influenced by both the Kansas City and the Texas recipes and approaches – a blend.  Sauce was tomato based and moderately sweet.  The meat was mostly pork and beef, but “hot link” sausages and smoked turkey and chicken were big, too.  Sides were most often coarse, crunchy slaw, smoked and doctored-up beans, and often fries cut fresh (not frozen, mealy ones). 

As I aged and moved around the country and traveled the world on my job I ate a lot of different barbeque than what I grew up with.  I’ve had Satay lamb in Indonesia, mystery meat at an open air market in Moscow, and smoked octopus in Sydney.  Horse ribs in Poland.  Ground-spit turned over driftwood chicken in the Mediterranean.  Goat grilled on old oil drums in the Midwest. 

I live in the Carolinas now.  Barbeque “style” here is a regional diversity of several vinegar based sauces depending on exact geography, mostly chopped or pulled pork, and always accompanied by mild, fine-grained slaw and hushpuppies (Mustard based sauces in the Low Country of South Carolina).  But, in the cities I can find barbeque more closely aligned with what I grew up on.  I like it all and I eat it all, often.  But, when turned loose to cook for myself I go back to my roots more often than not.  I have memories of those ribs from the 99 Drive-In just off Route 66 that my mother and her friends would bring home some Saturdays and eat by the fireplace.  I remember my dad grilling steaks in the back yard and the first time I tasted one.  I remember the first time I finally made ribs that were as good as the ones I used to get when I was a kid.  Got any memories like that?  The ones about “style” and why some things just can’t be cooked in the house?

Let’s start a thread for sharing those.  Share with the rest of us some tidbits of what first tweaked your taste buds and where.  What was barbeque like where you grew up?  The best places to get it?  What you still get a hankering for when you need wood-fired comfort food.  This could get interesting!

Hub           

tlg4942:
  My first memory of grilling is with my dad. On Sunday he would fire up his Hibachi and cook steaks or pork chops... If other youngsters were around he would gladly through hot dogs or hamburgers on it.
  We would go fishing for Bull Reds at Fort Morgan and Dixie Bar then camp on the beach . We would cook fish (mostly sharks) on the fire that night... Man what great memories !
Dad also had a smoker built out of cement block placed against a milk barn(also cement). I remember he always said put the pork on top so it drips down over the turkey or chicken. Something I do to this very day.
 My Uncle Timmy Whittington from over near MaComb Mississippi did BBQ indoors..Sort of...He would take coons and put them in an over set on high.. turn off the oven and the next morning the meat was falling off the bone. After removing the bones he would make BBQ sauce and mix it in the meat.  That stuff was awesome!
  He was a big coon hunter who Raised Blue Tick Hounds and had his on butcher shop in the back yard where he butchered his own cows and goats along with deer. He made some of the best deer sausage I've ever had. So good that the preacher at his funeral commented on it. The whole crowd agreed so I dont know how much he made every year but it must have been a bunch...
 No one knew the recipe and my cousin is still trying to get it right after all these years. He recently found a recipe and it seems to be "the one" ! There was a third type of meat in it. He said "He ain't given it away yet"  but it is safe for future generations.   
  Then came Boy Scouts... My troop was run by an Army Ranger,a Marine and a helicopter gunner. Talk about  fun troop! No other troop would play war games with us... But those guys made us live hard when we were out in the woods. Find it ,cook it ,eat it. Improvise, adapt and Be Prepared!  We cooked fish, snake, rabbit and other on an open fire. My first hog in the ground was with them... fall off the bone pure awesomeness right there...
 Thanks for starting this thread... Brought up some very fond memories!
 I did pick up so many things from all those folks. I cooked on an open fire until I was in my thirties before I got a production grill and its still the best in my heart.
I have learned and picked up on a lot of great things , styles and new foods on the Char Broil Blog and on here as well.  If I could fish, hunt and grill every day I would be in total bliss.
 

ACW3:
Great idea!!  Time to put my thinking cap on.

Art

Las Vegan Cajun:
My first memory of Dad grilling was him putting hot dogs and hamburgers on cheap little round grill, we were so poor back then that we couldn't even afford to pay attention. The highlight of the grilling day was when we would round up some tiny little frogs, bring them to Dad, he would give them a little thump on then head with his finger to knock them unconcious and toss them on the hot coals and we would watch the little frogs sizzle on the coals.  And that my friends is where all my mental health issues started.
 :P

smokeasaurus:
I remember when Dad would fire up the built in grill on our patio.He would usually grill hamburgers or poke chops and sometimes top sirloin steaks. Yes the food tasted like lighter fluid, but we got to eat outside on the patio and that was all that mattered. We have to sell their house this year and along with it will all those wonderful child hood memories........

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page