Nonnymus wrote:
> I'm curious about how and when you all got started grilling and barbecuing?

My first experience with outdoor cooking was when I was very small. My
Aunt and Uncle owned 5 acres up near Clear Lake in N. California, and my
Grandparents owned an adjoining 5. It was a wonderful place to grow up,
about 10 miles from the lake out in the mountains. A really rough and
rustic one bedroom cabin, and tall pines and oak for as far as you could
see, and I will always remember the red volcanic dust that usually
coated me so heavily that Mom used to call me her little Indian.

Whatever indoor cooking was done was womans work, on a white oil stove
and the fireplace. Outside was where you found the men (and at 4 or 5
years old, I was one too, right?). Lot's of food was prepared on a
beeeooootiful porcelain coated wood burner that was kept in front, but
the majority was prepared over an open pit burning oak. We carried a lot
of the food up there with us but we always had local venison that we
would preserve by simply packing it in rock salt and burying it in the
ground.

As a youngster in the USMC I continued the outdoor cooking but it was
usually quick and hot. The only fuel I had was C-4, but if I rationed it
well I could get a water buffalo steak seared.

Throughout my adulthood I continued grilling, always easy stuff. Didn't
get the Q bug until I had a pork sandwich at the fairgrounds in
Pleasanton during a big car show. That convinced me to get a little toy
bullet (Char griller) early last year. I only used it 4 or 5 times and I
knew what I had to do. My WSM and I have been very happy ever since.
Haven't got to cook but a few times this year so far, as We have been
very busy Tending to the Old Folks who live 2 hours from here up in
Paradise, CA. My last cook was a butt about 4 weeks ago, and I'm still
eating off that one.

--
Dave T.


"Your attitude serves as a lens through which you see life, and it's
best when that lens is focused on the positive possibilities." - Ralph
Marston