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June 24, 2004:
Helpful
Bar-B-Q Tips
Interview
with Adam Reid author of the book,The
Best Recipe Grilling and Barbecue
Mike Carruthers:
When you're cooking steaks and burgers on a grill about the worst
thing you can do is press down on them with a spatula.
Andrew
Spielman:
Because you're just going to press all the juices
out of there and that's what you want in the food.
Adam Reid
contributor to the book The
Best Recipe Grilling and Barbecue says you should probably
not use a spatula for anything when cooking outdoors.
We actually
like to flip things using tongs more than spatula because when
you jam a spatula under a piece of fish or under a burger you
stand more of a chance of ripping off that crust.
Adam has
a few good tips to improve anybody's outdoor cooking techniques.
For steaks
or burgers or chicken, anything where you want a good crusty
sear on the outside you want to have a medium hot to hot fire.
That means that you can really only hold your hand about five
inches above the grate for two seconds, that's it.
In their
recipe testing, Adam says that most people preferred foods cooked
over hardwood charcoal rather than charcoal briquettes.
Hardwood
or lump charcoal are natural pieces of wood. The charcoal briquettes
are often even charcoal dust that they use binders to adhere
into those pillow shaped briquettes.
And have
you noticed that when you cook hamburgers on the grill they
tend to puff up like tennis balls?
We actually
put a little dent in the burger patty so that when it did puff
up it puffed up to the point where it was perfectly flat and
all of the condiments would sit right on there.
At somethingyoushouldknow.net,
I'm Mike Carruthers, and that's Something You Should Know.
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