The 4th of July is a time to celebrate America’s independence from Great Britain. It is time to reflect on our forefathers and their dream of freedom. A time to remember our veterans who fought hard to preserve our way of life.
It is also a time to cook meat. To cook it over fire. To cook it like a man.
I recently ran across this picture:
I’m not sure who this is or where it is (although it must be somewhere in the vicinity of Citronelle, AL), but this is the way real men barbeque. No namby pamby gas grill with a little stove knob to start it. No sissy tongs, sauce mops, or thermometers.
This carnivore’s delight started with the phrase “First you dig a hole.” Then you get some iron bars and place them across said hole. The grilling surface is completed with the addition of chicken wire. It’s fencing, y’all. No little, sorry store-bought grill rack here.
Now isn’t that way yonder more manly than “Honey, let me run out on the deck and take the cover off the Big Green Egg?”
There is fire. A wood fire. No part of this equation incorporates anything that ends in -ette. This is a fire that required an axe, not opening a sack.
And you’ll notice that there are no burgers, or brats, or, God forbid, salmon filets on the fencing come grill. There is meat, real meat, with bones sticking out. Meat so immense that you need a pitchfork to turn it. A farm implement, good people, not a kitchen utensil.
This is how it was done back before grills had wheels, before we talked about our “outdoor living spaces,” before Martha Stewart tried to convince us that barbeque sauce should include either maple or chipotle.
This is down-home, shade tree, finger-lickin’ good barbeque. Barbeque for real men…and real women too!
