Sunday Night Family Barbecue

Charlie, do you want to help me barbecue today?”

“Yeah! Can I?”

“Sure. We can work as a team. We can take turns watching the steak grill.”

On Sunday’s, The Old Man was in fine form. There was nothing he loved more than working the family barbecue. 

In our neighborhood, he was known as the ultimate “Grill Master ” as every summer he produced masterpieces, works of art of barbequed perfection. Chicken, ribs hamburgers, and his piece de resistance – London Broil steak!

Unlike some barbecue dabblers my Dad was an artist par excellence when it came to grilling meat.

Part of his success was due to his “secret recipe” which he used as a sauce to baste the meat while barbecuing.

What was in the sauce was a closely guarded secret by the Old Man. But from what I could surmise there was garlic, ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, and large amounts of bourbon in it.  

This heavenly coalition of ingredients was poured into a bowl and used as a marinade and a baste after fermenting with the meat in the refrigerator overnight.

After marinating for over 24 hours, the bowl was removed from our Frigidaire and this divine elixir was applied liberally over the meat my Old Man was planning on grilling.

It was rumored that intoxicating fumes of meat fat and charcoal that emanated from our backyard would cause disturbances in other neighboring households. Women would become moody, men ate their meatloaf in sullen silence and even children refused to eat their Sunday night supper for inexplicable reasons.

So when Dad asked me to help him barbecue – this was a big show of faith, a sign I was morphing into manhood as the Old Man was very particular on who was “allowed” to get near the barbecue when he was grilling. As Dad’s helper, I was promoted from being a pesky kid to “Sous Chef!”

As I exulted in my new status the Old Man went into the house and removed the bowl from the kitchen fridge carrying it like a priest bearing a sacred chalice to the Altar.

Setting the bowl down with a hushed reverence on a small table by the grill, he then applied a small amount of lighter fluid on the charcoal and then removed a wooden diamond head matchstick, which he proceeded to light with a flourish of a true showman.

The charcoal ignited with a “Whump” and proceeded to blaze merrily as my Dad carefully placed the grill over the burning embers.

“Dad, do we put the steak on now?” 

“No, Charlie. We have a wait until the coals are ready.”

“When’s that gonna be?”  

“Your mother is washing potatoes and making a salad – do you want to help her while the coals get ready?”

“Nah…that’s women’s work. I want to help you.”

“Ok, go into the kitchen and ask your Mom for a Coke and then come back…it should take about thirty minutes before we can start grilling the meat. “

Running into the kitchen I loudly informed my mother of my promotion making sure my annoying younger brother, Matty, heard of my new-found status.

“Well just be careful Charlie, ” she said after handing me a Coke out of the refrigerator. 

Matty seemed oblivious to my news as he appeared to be trying to extract with his finger a plastic army man he had managed to shove up his right nostril prior to my entrance.

Much to my parent’s frustration, my kid brother was notorious for inserting his toys into parts of his anatomy that often necessitated him being taken to the local ER for professional “object extraction”

“Matty…For God’s sake…Stop it. Charlie fetch your Dad’s pliers out his tool chest. Your brother has done it again,” my Mom cried.

Not wanting to witness the extraction I ran and got the pliers from Dad’s toolbox, handed them to Mom and beat a hasty retreat outside before the grisly operation ensued.

The Old Man was smoking his pipe and scraping the heated grill with a wire brush.

“Everything all right in there?” he asked taking a break from brushing.

“Yeah, Matty is just… goofing around with one of his toys again.”

The Old Man rolled his eyes, grunted a derisive dismissal and went back to brushing the hot grill.

“Okaaaayyyy, I think we’re ready to go.”

The coals by now had stopped flickering and now looked cherry red as the Old Man took a pair of tongs and lifted the thirty-two ounces London Broil Steak out of the bowl and laid it carefully on the grill.

“Sssss.” Instantly the air was filled with a perfume of grilling meat that could only be described as mouthwatering bliss.

“Now, Charlie I’m going inside for a minute – your job is to watch the steak grill. If the fire from the coals gets to close to the meat – you use this little spray bottle of water to douse the flames. You got that?”

“Yeah, sure Dad.”

The Old Man went back into the house while I watched the steak grill.

As fat hit the coals a few flames licked hungrily at the meat but with a few spritzes from the water bottle they were quickly subdued.

“Awww…this is an easy job, “I thought as I kept on spraying the flames that erupted from the coals.

Abruptly without warning the coals went cold with a hiss and the steak stopped cooking.

“Sonovaofbitch, ” I muttered. “I musta used too much water.”

Remembering the lighter fluid I squirted a liberal dash on the coals. Nothing happened -the coals refused to ignite. So I emptied about half a can of the fluid on the inert coals. Nada, zip. The coals remained inert.

Reaching for the matches to light the coals several things occurred simultaneously – the grill burst into flame with a huge “KABOOM, ” I went ass over tea kettle, and the sudden appearance of the Old Man who started screaming:

“OH MY GOD, NO! THE STEAK! NOT THE STEAK!”

My Dad attempted several times to spear his steak with a long fork but the “towering inferno” had engulfed the entire barbecue grill so completely – he couldn’t get close enough to the actual grill to save the meat without getting badly burned.

Finally, he gave up and used the garden hose to put out the fire. The flames extinguished with a sibilant hiss and my Dad’s pride and joy – his Weber barbecue grill gave a death rattle and leaned sadly to one side completely ruined.

By the time the fire was out, I had picked myself off the ground and stood by the Old Man’s side as we gazed in horror at the charred remains of the steak.

Our dinner, our magnificent dinner – the thirty-two ounces London Broil Steak now resembled a four-ounce blackened strip of charred beef jerky.

With tears in his eyes, my Dad solemnly replaced the lid of the grill, as if lowering the lid of a casket on a departed loved one for the final time.

The Weber Grill gave a groan and crashed to the ground in a loud metallic heap.

Our Sunday Night Family Barbecue Dinner had been officially canceled.