8 Grilling Tips for The Summer

“I truly believe that 95 Percent of People in the United States don’t know how to grill” – Tom Miale

1. Turn on your grill and walk away, if your grill isn’t hot things will stick to your grill
2. Make sure your grill is well seasoned use High Temp Pam Spray, if you don’t have that you can put vegetable oil on a paper towel and use your tongs to rub them down
3. Don’t keep the temperature on high the entire time. You have to create heat zones on your grill
4. Use your meat thermometer and pull your meat off the grill 5 degrees before they hit their ideal temperature. Tent them in foil and let them cook through in about 5 to 10 minutes
5. Sear steaks on a hot grill, you want to create a crust on the outside. For chicken, you want to sear them quickly and then move it onto a less hot area to cook through
6. When saucing your items, wait until the end when you have about 1 minute left of cooking, brush your bourbon barbecue sauce onto the food and put them back on the high heat
7. You can also add sauce right after you take something off the grill. Salsa Verde slathered on top of a steak and then wrapped up in foil. This allows the steak to absorb the Salsa Verde and mix in with it. You can also take dry rubbed chicken wings off the grill and then just do a quick toss in Buffalo or BBQ Sauce
8. Clean Up: When you’re done cooking, close the lid and turn the heat all the way up to burn whatever is left on the grates. You can brush it down with a wire brush, and next time you grill you’ll be ready to grease down the grates and start up again!

Mike’s Bonus Tips:

You can only grill as good as your surroundings will allow you to. We all know about Mise En Place, but the Memorial Day Weekend Mis En Place is very different. While grilling you have only 2 options for audio. 1 is Jon Sterling and Suzyn Waldman giving you the Yankees Play by Play, 2 is WCBS.FM The NY Oldies Station. Hopefully, they will be playing “Brandy(You’re A Fine Girl)” by The Looking Glass.

Tom’s Famous Bourbon BBQ Sauce

You’ll Need:
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
3/4 cups of bourbon (DO NOT USE EXPENSIVE BOURBON. If you do, I will personally come over and slap you, then take your whiskey. I usually use nothing better than Bulleit)
2 cups of ketchup
3/4 cups of dark molasses
1/2 cup white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup white vinegar
1/4 cup tomato paste
1 tsp of Cholula hot sauce (less if you want it to be less spicy; none if you just want a sweet sauce)
1/4 cup Worcestershire Sauce
pinch of salt (to taste)

Combine the first three ingredients into a saucepan over medium heat. Cook for 5 minutes or until the onions start to soften and turn a bit brown.

Add everything else into the pan. Turn up the heat until you see the sauce bubble (keep stirring so it doesn’t burn).

Once it starts to bubble, turn the heat down and simmer for 15-20 minutes more, making sure to stir often. I use a silicone spatula to make sure the bottom doesn’t burn. There are a lot of sugary elements in the sauce, so keeping it from burning by constantly stirring is extremely important.

Strain the sauce to remove the chunks.

Slather on everything

Eat.