Practice Run

Given the solemnity of Memorial Day, I never want to bill it as the kick-off weekend for summer, grilling season. Losing loved ones to war isn’t cause for a jovial afternoon of partying. But you know what is?

Fathers Day. Consider it a practice run for Independence Day.

There’s a good reason to buy the new grill now instead of later. Have you ever planned a big picnic only to find there’s a crack in your brand new Big Green Egg during the assembly. Just figuring out where to put one of those things alone is an afternoon of logistics.

Learning how the heat is distributed on a new grill could take several sessions with different types of food. You wouldn’t grill vegetables the same way you do brisket. Even different types of charcoals reach optimal temperatures and burn down to ash at different rates. Nothing is worse than running out of charcoal before dinner is done cooking. For a purist working with wood, are the pieces of your cured hickory and oak going to fit? Important questions to ask and answer.

When it came to getting a grill started, my dad preferred turning on a bottle and lighting his gas grill. So comfortable with his unit, when one wore out after years of regular use it was replaced with the exact same brand and model. Woe to those still using briquettes soaked in chemicals that tend to make whatever is cooked over them taste like the tailpipe of a tractor. Anyone cooking food from the farmers market like that didn’t pass Grilling 101.

Here's the fun thing about grilling in the twenty first century—you could buy your dad a different style of grill every year and he wouldn’t get the same grill twice.

Going shopping for specialized outdoor cooking today is like taking a trip around the world, with one of the hottest trends being reproductions of street food carts. Personal pizza ovens, massive woks, paella pans, Argentine grills, iron crosses, and don’t even get me started on the smokers. Those little portable Mexican rocket stoves are my favorite these days, bonus points for the ones with a rebar handle welded to the chimney. A few dry sticks and you’ve got a smoking hot griddle in no time. A customer picked up one for his Indian grandmother to make naan.

If you’re going to get Dad any type of outdoor grilling equipment, now is the time to do it as Father’s Day tends to be a family affair. There’s never a better time for dads to teach their kids (or learn themselves) the difference between a Phillips, flat-head, and hex key or where is the closest purveyor of propane. Adulthood is when your parents ask you to get their propane bottle filled for them. That’s often when we begin to realize they’re mere mortals.

Maybe I was conditioned to consider Father’s Day always a cause for celebration because it coincided with Dad (and his sister’s) birthday. Everything got rolled into one big family cookout at someone’s house. I can’t remember anymore if I bought Dad the smoker first or he bought one for me. We both liked to smoke fish. He liked my Farber ware griddle to frying up sunfish filets, but when I went to get one for him they were no longer manufactured.

After you get your dad a grill or other cooking gadgets for Father’s Day, take him first thing to the farmers market for him to pick out what to cook for his Father’s Day present’s maiden voyage.