Kiss the Cook

When we first moved into our house in 2007, one of the first items that didn’t make the cut was our $30 charcoal grill that Jason quite enjoyed when he was unemployed and we were living in an apartment near Baltimore. I’d come home from work to find him reclining out on the balcony in one of our hideous blue camping chairs, the grill smoking beside him, the dogs looking plump and happy. He’d mainly grill hot dogs and the occasional hamburger and would always share with the pups, but we eventually got a “cease and desist” letter from management informing us that it was a fire hazard. And thus, Jason’s apartment grilling days came to an end.

The first place I checked when we moved into our house was Freecycle, a service that helped me learn the concept that “free” things usually don’t come for free, per se. Basically, users post messages with items that they are either giving away for free or are in search of. I did a quick search for “grill” and found a woman giving away a free grill just 20 minutes away. We were thrilled. We had so much to spend money on the interior of our house, it was hard to justify spending hundreds on a nice grill at the time.

I grabbed the directions and we set off. When we pulled up to the house, I was impressed. It was huge, the kind of household that would have a really nice grill to give away. I rang the doorbell. A man in a business suit with a loosened tie answered the door and I said, “Hi, I’m here from Freecycle to pick up your grill.” The man stared at me. I stared back at him. It didn’t seem that my message was registering. The man excused himself and called for his wife. They spoke briefly. The man returned to the door and informed me that no, they had not posted anything online giving their grill away. I walked away sheepishly and realized I had the wrong address.

Fast forward 5 minutes and we arrive at the correct house, a much less… impressive establishment. A man wearing cutoff shorts and a stained t-shirt was working on his car outside. He called for his wife, a plump woman who dragged a charred and rusty relic behind her on squeaky wheels, the off-brand nameplate hanging from one screw. We managed to squeeze the grill into our trunk and it remained in our backyard, an eyesore among eyesores, until now.

We actually grill quite a bit—usually more than once a week during the summer, and have friends over for cookouts about once a month. And no, we didn’t bother buying new grates for the thing or even sterilizing it once we got it home. Really gross. We decided, after three years, it was time for a new grill. Thanks to the generosity of some family friends who gave us a belated housewarming gift towards the purchase of a new grill, we set off to find a new outdoor cooking machine.

After scouring grill reviews online for weeks, we finally settled on this beast of a machine, the Master Forge Four-Burner Split-Lid Gas Grill, on sale for $299 at Lowes.

With 60,000 BTUs, a split lid, a side burner and a separate sear burner, and cute little perks like an attached bottle opener and condiment shelves, it’s perfect for us. Hopefully, this should be around for years to come. We’ll be christening it this Sunday, when we’ll be cooking for friends.

Now I just need to get around to posting about our old grill on Freecycle so I can pass it on to another couple of suckers.

Advertisement