Sunday

Pine, spruce, or other evergreen wood should never be used for barbequing. These woods, when burning or smoking, can add harmful tar and resins to the food. Only hardwoods should be used for smoking and grilling, such as oak, pecan, hickory, maple, cherry, alder, apple, or mesquite, depending on the type of meat being cooked.

Barbequing is not easy... First of all, let's establish our terminology. Technically speaking, barbequing refers to a slow and smoky cooking over indirect heat. Cooking directly over the coals (or gas, as it were), is grilling. Granted, this is a distinction that is well defended in the U.S.A, where barbeque usually involves things like pulled pork and the like, but in Canada they tend to refer to anything involving the outdoor grill as barbequing.

Recently, after an exhaustive search, we finally bought a barbeque/grill. It's a fancy-looking stainless steel rig with a lot of dials, four independent burners, and at first glance it could be mistaken for one of those very fancy tools that can run upwards of a thousand dollars. No, we paid significantly less than that (but more than for a $149 cheapo at Canuck Tire).

The first weekend with the Q yielded results that were delicious but tended towards being overcooked. So I did more research.

This weekend, Martine and I decided to try barbecuing some poultry. We thawed a couple of Rock Cornish hens -- which is to say, small chickens -- that have been sitting in the freezer for a few months waiting for spring. Research indicated that one hour and 15 minutes at 375°F would do the job. So after brining them in rock salt and brown sugar for a few hours I made up a batch of blork's special basting sauce (olive oil, butter, paprika, and pepper) and set them on the grill -- using indirect heat -- when the barbeque's thermostat registered 400° (close enough).

As they cooked (basting every 10 minutes or so) I prepared a nice tomato salad. Fresh market tomatoes, sliced red onion, curls of Italian parmesano reggiano a liberal dose of fresh herbs from the garden (two kinds of basil, Italian oregano, and ciboulette), a few good slugs of the insanely expensive olive oil that we only bring out when no one's around, a shake and scratch of fleur de sel and black pepper, and a few drops of balsamic vinegar. At least I didn't have to worry about it being over-cooked.

About 45 minutes before the projected time of completion I put a couple of foil pouches of potatoes, onions, butter, oil, and herbs in there with the chicken. That too is the kind of thing that's hard to over-do, because onions simply get better with over-cooking, and too-soft potatoes are forgivable under those circumstances.

After the prescribed time the chickens -- I mean Cornish hens -- didn't seem quite done, so I gave them an extra ten minutes. Finally, I pulled everything off the grill, presented it nicely, and then Martine cut into her bird. She saw some very pink flesh and cloudy juices. It was like that scene in Wallace Stegner's Crossing to Safety where the know-it-all spouse nearly ruins the cookout by insisting that the chicken is done -- and it isn't. Grumbling, I fired the Q up to 500 and put them back in for another 20 minutes while we ate the vegetables (which included some peppers I had grilled).

Finally, eating Italian style (course after course instead of all dishes at once) we tucked into some properly cooked birds. The lesson, of course, is that oven rules to not apply to outdoor barbeques. Not two nights earlier I had seen a guy on License to Grill cook beer-can chickens at 500°F, but that just seemed too extreme.

No, barbeques are not ovens. They loose their heat much faster and easier, so higher temperatures are normal.

Lesson learned and bellies full, we were satisfied. After all those potatoes, however, we couldn't finish the birds. Hence the excellent chicken salad sandwiches we're having for lunch today...