Cooking Outdoors

Cooking Outdoors

Summer brings warm weather and family festivities and with that comes cooking outdoors.

Hello, my name is Robert St. Peter and I grew up in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. I have always had a passion for the great outdoors and cooking for as long as I can remember. I recall waking up in the early morning hours to head out into the unbearable cold Michigan weather hunting whitetail deer with my father not to mention the world class fishing on the great Menominee river for walleye with my childhood friends.

My love of cooking came from my grandmother hands down. I can recall going to grandma’s house on almost any occasion and you would find her in the kitchen cooking something, whether for dinner or just baking some fresh banana bread or rhubarb pie for the joy. I  remember to this day as if it had just happened, grandma showed me how to use the meat grinder to make her famous potato pancakes and I was not only hooked on cooking but those potato pancakes were exceptional, I'll share the recipe in the future.

As you can see by the above photo I personally prefer to use an open campfire or charcoal when cooking outdoors. Keep in mind gas grills work, however does not provide the same kind of robust flavors in my opinion. First we need a fire. There are primarily two types of fires, a heat fire and a cooking fire and with that comes our post “How to build a fire for Cooking”

  

Alright let’s build a fire for cooking.  I like to build my fires in ground campfire style, built up like a teepee. I actually lay small pieces of sticks & twigs with paper or bark (ideally Birch) in a small square at the base and then build up into a teepee while continuing to add smaller sticks and paper/bark as you build up from the inside out while adding larger logs to the outside. What if I don’t have a cooking pit? Well you could build one which is pretty easy, dig yourself a hole in ground 12-18 inches deep and about 3 feet around make sure to place larger rocks around the outside rim of your pit, fire safety especially if you’re in the woods. If you do not have a cooking pit or care to build one you could simply use your grill. Ok back to the fire if you are cooking something like hotdogs you won’t need a large bed of coals which means less wood, however on the other hand if you are cooking a tenderloin you are going to need a larger bed of coals requiring more wood.

see photos

Once the fire is going you will want it to burn down until you have hot coals or embers that you can spread or flatten out to give you a larger cooking area. This is important or you will have a small hot spot on your griddle not to mention many people make the mistake of cooking with the fire and not the heat. This is important, if you do not let the fire “burn down” so you can cook with the ambient heat chances are whatever you put on the grill is going to burn! No one wants burnt food.

                                                                                                   Incorrect

                                                                       

                                                                          Correct

Again what you want to do is let the wood burn down to hot embers or coals like above right hand photo, After you have started your fire and its burning down set your grill over the fire to get the griddle hot, you don’t want to put a nice steak on a cold grill, you want to sear the outside and lock in all that wonderful flavor. Here are some photos from cooking outdoors enjoy.

                                                                  Notice NO fire just a hot bed of embers/coals

Steak with Smoked Salt, Fresh Garlic, Black Pepper, Soy Sauce and Coke

Marinade

1/4 cup of soy sauce

1/4 cup of coke (Soda)

2 cloves of fresh garlic (crushed)

1/8 teaspoon smoked salt (or to taste)

1/8 teaspoon black pepper (or to taste)

In a resealable Ziploc bag add the soy sauce, coke, and black pepper. Crush your garlic add to Ziploc bag and shake for a few seconds to mix everything up, from here add your steaks and let marinate for at least an hour. I personally like to let them marinate for a day the soda will aid in tenderizing the meat. Add your smoked salt before you get the grill going.

Remember to have your griddle or grill HOT before you add your steaks. Cook time will vary depending on the cut of meat you are using. Typically 1 ½ inch rib eye will cook 7 minutes per side.

Marinade will be enough for 2-3 steaks depending on size.

If you want more from me you can find me here Cooking Outdoors  where we’ll continue to share tips and tricks for your adventures. I hope you learned something that will help you next time cooking outdoors!