Grilling Pet Peeves

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
You think with the all the grilling that happened yesterday, boy,
there's a whole bunch of different ways you can kind
of slice up how you should grill. I mean, there's
all these grilling pet peeves and so on that exist.
I will agree with one of these on this list

(00:20):
is squishing the burger. You're pushing all the juices out.
That is a novice mistake. I see people do that,
especially on a grill when you've got burgers on there,
and you know, depending on how thick you make them
and so on, they can almost kind of shrink up
to what looks like a meat, like a ball almost

(00:41):
because you might be having it going too hot or
something along those lines, and people will go, oh, I
don't want to hit I need it a little more flat,
and as a result they start pushing on it. Well,
then you get to flat, you know, the flame goes
flying because well, if you're using eighty twenty or seventy
thirty and that's a ton of fat dripping down in there,
it's going to get that the fire up. I do uh,

(01:04):
I do agree with that. You should not be squishing
the burger. That's it's a novice miss.

Speaker 2 (01:10):
Are you's strictly a propaning guy, or you occasionally a
charcoal guy.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
I haven't used charcoal and so long, really so long.
I'm not against it. If you're a guy doing that.
The thing is you got to keep it going because
it can taste like that. I've had them where you
get the lighter fluid.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
Oh yes, if you overdo a lighter fluid, that's the yeah,
big mistake.

Speaker 1 (01:33):
Yeah, it's gross.

Speaker 2 (01:34):
You have to have a lot of patience for the
charcoal because it's not a gas grill. It's not going
to uh not going to be ready to serve as quickly. Yeah,
but there there is. There's a degree of patients and
almost artwork to a charcoal grill. If you're good on
a charcoal grill, you're good. So you have a charcoal grill.
I've had charcoal grills. I've got two gas grills right now. Yeah,

(01:55):
one for the big stuff and one generally I'll put
the smaller things on, whether you know, the kids, hot dogs, whatever.

Speaker 1 (02:00):
He knows a master our boss. He is a master griller,
and I mean that like he does charcoal. He's got
all kinds of different grills and set it like his
whole setup. He is a mad scientist with this. He smokes,
he does, he does all of that stuff.

Speaker 2 (02:17):
My buddy Ray's big on smoking stuff, but he's so dead.
I mean, he'll be out there if he's got something
happening on a Saturday night. He's out there at one
o'clock in the morning Friday night, going into Saturday, getting
the smoker going and doing and he'll babysit it for
fifteen hours or whatever. But I do not have that
kind of patience.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
I like you hear about people doing that that will
set where it they get going, But I there's a limit.
I have a smoker, but mine's it's digital. And some
people are like, that's not real smoke. Well it's like, well,
yeah it is, because I'm I'm using I'm using the chips,

(02:55):
the woods. I'm actually smoking, but I'm not monitoring the temperature,
babying it and then keeping it around the two and
a quarter two thirty two thirty five, depending on where
you want to run your smoker, and then sitting there
and monitoring it. There's an art to maintaining that. If

(03:16):
you're doing it without any digital help, there's an art
to that.

Speaker 2 (03:19):
Yeah, he'll do the temperature thing. And he'll use different
woods depending on what whether it's a hog or a
big brisket or whatever, at cherry wood or walnut or
he's very, very into it. I just no way i'd
have that kind of patience.

Speaker 1 (03:32):
One thing I learned when I first started smoking, you
can oversmoke something and then it gets gross. It literally
ruins the meat. You can oversmoke it because I used
to think, oh, you can't get enough smoke, and it
depends on hickory is the one that it's overwhelming. It
literally tastes like you're eating the smoke and oh, yeah,

(03:53):
there's some sort of texture in there that's meat. It's disgusting. Man,
you can oversmoke it, but I can tell you there
is an art to that, maintaining that and all of that.
But these are just some of the grilling pet peeves
that This was in the what was it in, I
don't know. It was published, and so they went across

(04:15):
the United States and said, you know, let's hear about
the grilling pet peeves. These were some of the common denominators.
Squishing the burger. Now, I did yesterday on the on
the Blackstone, but I did smash burgers well, you're supposed
to smash those, so you smash the crap out of them,
and then they get a crust on them, and you

(04:35):
use about a golf ball size meat and then start
with that. You smash it out and I do doubles
because it's then g d Ritzie style. If you will
remember that, Oh yes, you got PRIs Oh yeah, and
then the cheese will get could get crisp on the
edges and stuff when it melts. I mean, man, it

(04:56):
was good. They were really good. I got the smash burger.
I got that. I got it down. I got that
figured out.

Speaker 2 (05:01):
There is a degree of burn or singe or things
on food that can It's almost essential, especially grilled stuff.
You know, you like that little singe on those burgers,
or that darkness on the hot dogs or whatever. If
they're too plain, there's just something missing.

Speaker 1 (05:19):
Yeah. Guessing when your meat is done was another one
on this list that said use a thermometer.

Speaker 2 (05:25):
I don't use the thermometer when I'm doing.

Speaker 1 (05:27):
Yeah, you know, you do after you've done it enough,
you really do know. Certainly, there have been times in
my life where I've pulled it too early and then
you go, oh man, look at that it's still nasty
in the center or whatever. But some people like it.
How do you like your steak?

Speaker 3 (05:43):
Steak?

Speaker 2 (05:44):
I'm a rare guy, rad Yeah, chicken is where I have.

Speaker 1 (05:48):
You can't do that. That has to be done.

Speaker 2 (05:50):
Chicken must be right, because if I bite into any
kind of poultry and it's not completely all the way done,
all we're done for the day.

Speaker 1 (05:57):
Yeah. I can't eat anything rare like that bloody where
it's barely warm, not even I mean it's still cool.

Speaker 2 (06:04):
I just dark on the outsides. Give me my singe
marks from the grill on the outside. But yeah, plenty
red inside is fine for me.

Speaker 1 (06:12):
I gotta have medium on mine, even flat or whatever.
But some people say that is that's just wrong, you know,
like they're like, and look, I'm not a well done guy.
And don't get me wrong, there are people who have
to have it well done. I don't. I stopped short
of calling him a terrorist when they do that.

Speaker 2 (06:29):
But like he's putting ketchups.

Speaker 1 (06:31):
Yeah, oh, come on grabbing whatever the Hamburger mixes the
grocery store again. This is some of the pet peeves
go for the freshly ground meat with the thirty percent
fat if you can get that, get it, because it
is flavor ful. A lot of flavor in that, especially
when there's thirty percent fat and grilling your hot dogs

(06:51):
in the wrong direction. They they on here, they say
they should go lengthwise in between the greats. I one
thousand percent disagree with that.

Speaker 2 (07:00):
Them across the more organized, but that kills the aesthetic
effect of having them awful grill to begin with.

Speaker 1 (07:05):
Well, you need the grill marks on this. And I
like the hot dogs cook. I like them almost burnt.
I like that that's kind of the blackness that gets
on those and h.

Speaker 2 (07:18):
Juicy. Are you the same way with your brots? I
don't even like bron really American. Really.

Speaker 1 (07:24):
I like Italian sausage now, we just did those two
weeks ago, but I don't like an actual brot. The
fennel there's I don't know what it is, chuck, but
I can't eat though. I don't like the snap some
people like that. I don't like tearing the skin that like.
I'm like, for whatever reason, I'm man. I've tried over
and over, I promise, because I don't know. Some people

(07:46):
will claim, like man, I brought because I boil the
Italian sausage. I'll boil the hell out of those then
put them on the flat top. And I've got fresh
vidalia that I've chopped up, and also green red, green
and red pepper, and I come all and all that
on flat top, I'll lah, And then I use I'll
use marinera. Then I use mozzarella, shredded mozzarella like the fair.

(08:09):
That's what they do at the Ohio State Fair.

Speaker 2 (08:11):
You might as want to throw some spaghetti noodles on
top of that.

Speaker 1 (08:14):
Well, it's man, you got the big Italian sausage in there.

Speaker 2 (08:17):
Then, yeah, man.

Speaker 1 (08:19):
It's good, It is really good. Oh hey, Aaron, welcome
to the show.

Speaker 3 (08:23):
Hey, what's going on, guys, great show? A man?

Speaker 2 (08:26):
Thanks?

Speaker 3 (08:26):
Hey, hey, uh you know that charcoal grill? And I
I was always, you know, I used the gas grill forever.
And then one day I went camping, you know, just
I was just tent camping. I was younger, and I
got me one of them little weber grills, one of
them little it's called it, I think a Smoky Joe
or a Mighty Joe or something like that. And I,

(08:46):
you know, I used just kings for charcoal. First of all,
kings for charcoal is different now than it used to be.
It burns fast, right, kings for charcoal you bought you
buy now is not the same kings for got twenty
years ago.

Speaker 2 (09:01):
It does become dust very quickly, doesn't it.

Speaker 3 (09:03):
Yeah? Yeah, And I'll tell you At Kroger and it,
you know, at like Minards, you can buy these chunks
of like fruit wood charcoal, and you can also buy
chunks of fruit or just dried fruit wood that you know,
you can get those webers going with the Kingsford and

(09:24):
you can just throw a little chunks of on that.

Speaker 1 (09:26):
It's like a smoke almost.

Speaker 2 (09:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (09:28):
Oh man, dispatch cock a chicken on that. I'm telling
you what.

Speaker 1 (09:32):
Bro Hey, let me ask you this aaron with regard
to the going back to your comment like it's not
the same charcoal briquettes from twenty years ago. You think
they've added an accelerant because that way you got to
buy more of it, because think about this, twenty years ago,
a bag of that stuff used to last you two summers.
You know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (09:52):
It seemed like, yeah, you know what I think happened. Okay,
so I've I've actually picked up the load loads of
charcoal up there in that West Virginia town where that
stuff comes from, and is what happened. I think match
Light bought Kingsford, and now all the charcoal for Kingsford
is made in the same plant as match Lights. Okay, interesting,

(10:14):
and I think it's a different like like density.

Speaker 2 (10:19):
Yeah, well, Kingsford you had to work on. Match Light
has the fluid included in the brigette so that you know,
so if they're doing that that any way, No, I don't.

Speaker 1 (10:28):
Okay, you want to add your I.

Speaker 2 (10:29):
Would rather start a fire with some paper or kindling
or something like that and allow that to get the
charcoal going. I would rather not use the fluid at all.

Speaker 1 (10:38):
So you don't if you can get around the light
of fluid, you don't use it at all, now at all?

Speaker 3 (10:41):
Okay, sorry, I'd use one of them things that you
put the charcoal on and forget chimminy or something like that.
You put the charcoal in there and you put the
I don't know whatever you're gonna light it on underneath it,
and it kind of gets the charcoal going.

Speaker 1 (10:55):
So you don't use the fluid either.

Speaker 3 (10:58):
No, don't put a piece of fat wood in there.

Speaker 2 (11:01):
Looks like an old railroad lantern type thing. Did you
put your stuff in and it gets hot, and then
once you've got those coals going, you can put them
in on top of the other coals and.

Speaker 1 (11:09):
Get the whole things continue igniting it.

Speaker 2 (11:11):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay.

Speaker 3 (11:12):
Sometimes you can find fat wood, like where you find
that charcoal. Maybe not at Kroger, but at Minards or
someplace like that. Yeah, you can find sticks of fat wood.
And I'll run a piece of fat wood down through
my charcoal and then started on the bottom, and then
that fat wood will burn up through there, and then
you don't have any fuel.

Speaker 1 (11:32):
Gocha.

Speaker 3 (11:33):
You know who has a lot of something in that?

Speaker 1 (11:35):
You know who has a lot of fat wood? Is
the view. I understand they have a lot of that
sitting around there.

Speaker 2 (11:41):
My younger days, I'm harketing back as he's talking about
the charcoal and everything. Younger days. Living up on campus
on fifteenth Avenue and in our building is like a
community habachi. You can come home at night and you know,
somebody's sitting on the front porch with the habachi going.
They get their stuff done. Amen, you to use it. Yeah,
you bring your hot dogs out or whatever and go

(12:02):
in there. Yeah, it was just it was kind of
everybody's hibachi and for some reason, that vision's in my
head right now and I miss.

Speaker 1 (12:08):
Its preheated if you will. Yeah, this community, it just
kept going. Yeah yeah, minimal effort to.

Speaker 2 (12:15):
Don't know who it belonged to, but as long as
you threw some charcoal in there, you were good.

Speaker 1 (12:19):
That's awesome, man,