Barbecue fans blog

Paul Yates


Many friends and work colleagues have phoned in sick because of food poisoning and followed it up with something like “I had a BBQ at the weekend, and I must have eaten something not properly cooked”.

To be honest I think some of them probably just drank too much but clearly there’s enough of a belief out there that food hygiene is a problem at a barbeque for either a genuine day off work or a cast iron excuse.

In many of the BBQ articles that I’ve written I’ve concentrated on the phrase “sizzle is hot, flames are not” which focuses on the need to be patient and control the barbecue flames. If however you still haven’t mastered this point then maybe it’s time to resign yourself to buying a barbecue thermometer?

Why do I need a BBQ thermometer? Take this barbecue hamburger example:

Many folks assume that when barbecued hamburger is brown in the middle, it is well done but according to USDA research, 1 out of every 4 hamburgers turns brown before it reaches a safe internal temperature. The internal temperature must be 160°F before its safe to eat.

The bacterium we’re trying to protect ourselves against is e-coli, and bacterium that live on the surface of meat. This is an important point and essential to understand because we can happily eat a rare steak without any chance of food poisoning. Provided the steak is cooked well on the outside, the bacteria are killed.

This is not the case with a hamburger however because the burger is made from ground meat so surface bacteria could be anywhere inside the hamburger.

The signs and symptoms of food borne illness range from upset stomach, diarrhoea, fever, vomiting, abdominal cramps, and dehydration, to more severe illness-even death, but having said all this, please don’t be put off having some hamburgers at your next BBQ cookout. With a few simple precautions that follow the rules of basic food hygiene and barbecue food poisoning will be a thing of the past.

Use a food thermometer. Instant-read food thermometers are good for checking the internal temperature toward the end of the cooking time.

1. The food thermometer should be placed in the thickest part of the food and should not be touching bone, fat, or gristle.

2. Make sure to clean your food thermometer with hot, soapy water before and after each use!

The other option is to use a large-dial oven-safe or oven-probe thermometer and these can be inserted in the meat and used for the duration of cooking.

There are many types of food thermometers, so it is important to follow the instructions for your food thermometer to ensure the correct reading. When happy with the method of use you can refer to the USDA Recommended Safe Minimum Internal Temperatures to ensure a safe barbeque cookout.

· Steaks & Roasts – 145 °F

· Fish – 145 °F

· Pork – 160 °F

· Ground Beef – 160 °F

· Egg Dishes – 160 °F

· Chicken Breasts – 165 °F

· Whole Poultry – 165 °F

That’s the main one, but to finish off here are a few more tips to help you avoid food poisoning at your next BBQ:-

1. Wash hands and surfaces often. Use warm, soapy water for 20 seconds before and after handling food and wash you’re cutting boards after each food item is prepared

2. Don’t cross-contaminate, always keep raw and cooked food separate. Never place cooked food on a plate which previously held raw meat, poultry, or seafood.

3. Refrigerate promptly – but do not cover (e.g. with stretch wrap) if the food is still hot
Refrigerate or freeze perishables, prepared foods, and leftovers within 2 hours or sooner.

Be Food Safe! Prepare With Care

Know how to prepare, handle, and store food safely to keep you and your family safe. Bacteria can grow on meat, poultry, seafood, eggs, and dairy products, as well as cut-up or cooked vegetables and fruits.

Follow the above and food poisoning should be a thing of the past. Why not pass this onto your employees? You may see a marked improvement in Monday morning attendance – or maybe just a different excuse.

Jeff Slankard

Let’s talk only about vinegar based barbecue sauce. How’s that?

You might think that this really narrows down the choice of sauces. Yes and no. We have eliminated tomato based sauces, sure, but that still leaves us with everything east of the Mississippi river. Let’s get out of Kansas City and head toward the east coast.

Lots of sauces have a combination of vinegar and tomato as a base. If we cut out everything but the vinegar, that takes us all the way to North Carolina (actually eastern North Carolina). This is the home of the vinegar based barbecue sauce. From there, BBQ sauce recipes have less vinegar and more additional ingredients the farther away you travel (all the way to back to Kansas City, where they use very little or no vinegar).Global Products, Global Manufacturers, Global Suppliers, Global Exporters, Global Importers

If we tried to create a map of the United States showing the location of all the styles of BBQ sauce, with all of the regional and local variations, it would look like a 1600s map of Indian tribes with all their associated bands. There would be hundreds of them (maybe more).

Down to the Basics

The most pure form of vinegar based barbecue sauce would be straight vinegar (preferably apple cider vinegar), with maybe a touch of salt and pepper. Quite often it is flavored with some red pepper flakes or a little cayenne pepper.

Unlike tomato based sauces, vinegar based BBQ recipes are used at all stages of the cooking process. Tomato based sauces have sugars that can burn. They are normally used as a finishing sauce and added during the last minutes of smoking. Usually those tomato sauces have a few more ingredients and are also thicker.

Vinegar is powerful stuff. It is acidic and will penetrate meat. It aids with tenderization and helps to allow the pork to be pulled apart (vinegar based barbecue sauce is most often used with pulled pork). Because of this characteristic, if the vinegar is flavored, it will also get flavor deep into the meat. By using it early and often during smoking, the flavors will intensify.

A Simple Sample Recipe

Here is a basic vinegar based BBQ sauce recipe. It can be used as a marinade (before smoking), a mop sauce (used during smoking), a finishing sauce (applied at the end of smoking), or a dipping sauce (at the table). This helps the meat stay moist, tenderizes it, and flavors it. It’s no wonder people keep using it.

1 1/3 C cider vinegar

2/3 C water

1 Tbl salt

1 tsp chili powder

Something like this, or any other form of vinegar based barbecue sauce, should be made a day in advance, if possible. That gives the vinegar time to break down the seasonings and absorb them.

Remember that you control the flavors. Add your favorite spices, change the type of vinegar, use more or less water… it’s entirely up to you. You can even add things like tomato sauce, ketchup or mustard. Just don’t go overboard or you will end up back in Kansas City, with no vinegar, looking for a different article.

Peter Finch


There are a number of varieties of tools available for the grilling of barbecues. They may be basic or complex. Some of the tools are expensive too. Based upon the basic steps in barbecuing the tools which are essential for barbecuing are categorized. Those tools include:

1) The first tool being the barbecue grill which is the basic essential without which the barbecuing can not be done.

2) Barbecue spatula is very essential to flip the food stuff. It is especially of help in preparing burgers and meat. This prevents the meat from falling apart while flipping them over.

3) Barbecue tongs are very helpful to grab the food stuff like sausages and hot dogs which tend to roll around over the grill. This helps to keep control over the food stuff and also ensures even cooking.

4) Barbecue forks have two tines and are about a foot long. They are helpful for flipping chicken or beef.

5) For applying the barbecue sauces etc a barbecue basting brush will be used. It will have a long handle which helps to apply sauces when the meat is on the grill.

6) Barbecue cleaning brush or wire brush is essential for cleaning the grills making it free from the residue coal.

7) Spray on grill cleaner helps to remove residues after extinguishing the coal.

There are other miscellaneous tools which are needed for barbecuing. They are:

1) Matches or butane lighter with a long neck is needed if the grill does not have an automatic igniter.

2) Bottle opener for opening the bottle tops.

3) Cooks Apron made of sturdy cotton guards the wearer from the hazards of barbecuing like flying sparks, splattering foods etc.

4) Fuels are indispensable for using the barbecue. The fuels may be wood, briquettes, charcoal, newspaper or gas.

5) Grill scraper is needed to scrape off any residue of cooked food crumbs from the grill.

6) Spray bottle is of help to spray the cleaning liquid to the different parts of the grill. It is better if the spray bottle has an adjustable nozzle which is able to shoot nearly 10 feet.

7) Fire extinguisher is handy in case of emergency even though it is not an essential tool to turn off the fire on the grill

Meat thermometer is very helpful to check whether the meat is done. The instant read thermometer will be a fork like device which can be inserted into the meat and it will give the internal temperature.

9) Oven mitts are resistant to heat and fire, so it helps to protect the hands while cooking and also making emergency adjustments in the grill.

10) Cooking oil and clean cotton cloth is used to grease the grill which helps in easier cleaning up of the grills.

11) Carving board can be made of plastic, metal or wood. There should not be pores in the board since it will harbor harmful organisms.

12) Charcoal container should be air tight and moisture tight.

13)Side table gives extra space for working.

TC McRae


More people should try smoked barbeque turkey and especially smoked barbeque turkey legs. Have you ever had those legs that they sell on vendor carts at Disney World? They’re pretty good and one of my favorite treats at Disney. I liked them so much that I told my wife that we have to duplicate those legs at home. We made a few attempts but we didn’t get it right until we discovered the secret. The secret is brining. You have to marinate the legs in a brine solution before you put them on the smoker.

Achieving juicy turkey legs is almost foolproof if you take the step of brining. It’s also an opportunity to add additional flavors by adding fruit juices, spices, and sweeteners like honey.

The other trick of great barbeque turkey legs is crisp skin. To get crisp skin you must have dry skin (the moisture of the brine will make the skin mushy). The turkey legs must air dry uncovered for at least two hours to evaporate water just below the surface of the skin. Just make sure that you do this in the refrigerator.

Use apple or cherry wood for your smoke. The smoke is milder and imparts a slight sweetness to the turkey legs.

As a precaution remember to wash and disinfect anything that comes in contact with raw poultry. Salmonella poisoning is no joke so be careful.

Follow these steps to cook perfect smoked barbeque turkey legs:

1. Prepare your brine marinade and immerse the legs in the brine. Use one of the brining recipes for poultry and it let stay in the brine for no more than 4 hours.

2. Take the legs out of the brine, wash off and pat dry. Let the legs air dry under refrigeration for at least 2 hours. Rub the legs down with olive oil and season. You can season with simple salt and pepper or you can use a rub. There are several poultry rubs that make a tasty turkey legs.

3. Prepare your smoker with lump charcoal and stabilize the temperature in the range between 230 to 250 degrees. It takes about 35 minutes per pound of turkey legs to cook to an internal temperature of 160 degrees.

4. As stated previously, apple or cherry wood are good smoking choices for turkey. You can also use hickory or oak for a heavier smoke flavor. I would avoid mesquite; it has a very strong flavor leaves a slightly bitter taste.

5. You are going to need a good instant read meat thermometer to determine doneness of your turkey legs Be sure to check several locations and avoid touching bone.

6. When done let the legs rest for 15 minutes before serving.

Enjoy those smoked barbeque turkey legs!

Vinny DiLeo


Barbecue Pizza! Why barbecue a pizza? The simple answer is fast cooking.

To make great pizza your pizza should cook fast and fast cooking is one of the secrets to making a perfect pizza pie.The main reason is that barbecues can reach very high temperatures! Some of the best pizzas that I have tasted were cooked in wood burning ovens. For centuries people around the world have been cooking in wood burning ovens. These ovens and also, professional pizza ovens can reach the high temperatures of 800 to 1200 degrees. At these high temperatures a pizza cooks in only 2- 5 minutes.

Here are three ways that you can make pizza on a barbecue.

First, Heat your barbecue to the highest temperature that it will reach. My barbecue reaches 600 degrees. Stretch your dough out into a small circle that will fit on your barbecue.

1. Use a wooden peel. (This is a shovel like tool used to put pizza or bread in the oven) First spread cornmeal on your peel. The cornmeal acts like tiny ball bearings helping to slide the pizza off the peel on to the barbecue. Put your stretched dough on your peel and place all your toppings on it. When your barbecue is heated to temperature, use a little jerking motion to slide your pizza off of the peel on to the barbecue grill. This method cooks your pizza directly on the grill. Close your barbecue top and check your pizza in a few minutes. It won’t take long before the crust of your pizza begins to char. You want some charring all around your crust. Be sure to take your pizza out before the cheese starts to burn.

2. The second method that I use is less messy. I stretch out a large piece of aluminum foil and lightly spray olive oil on it. After stretching my dough out, I place it on the aluminum foil. Put your pizza sauce, toppings and cheese on it. Now, crimp the ends of the aluminum foil so that you can grab it and pick up the whole pizza on the aluminum foil. Carry the pizza over to your heated barbecue and place it on the grill and close your barbecue. Check your pizza in a few minutes.

3. The third way is to use a pizza stone on your barbecue. I have tried fire bricks, clay tiles and pizza stones. They all work fine. Heat your pizza stone in your barbecue for at least 30 minutes before placing your pizza on it. When your barbecue is up to temperature use the same technique of sliding your pizza off of the wooden peel as described in my first method.