Unique Serving Platter

My favorite thing about summer is being able to fire up the barbecue and enjoy good food outdoors with family and friends. It’s the best way to have a party and the food always tastes great. For me, BBQ recipes should be cooked on charcoal barbecues. No gas fuel cookers for me. The charcoal should be good quality too, either lumpwood charcoal or briquettes. If you grow fruit trees, the dried cuttings also make an excellent fuel.

A barbecue feast should smell, look and taste good. Be careful not to undercook anything as that can be harmful, but there’s no need to set everything on fire either. Good cooking outside comes with practice. Just do the basics to begin with and then confidence will come with experience. Then you can experiment with different BBQ recipes.

Barbecues don’t have to be just sausages, chicken drumsticks and burgers, although there should always be some of those, as people expect them! Even these can be spiced up with marinades and sauces etc. There are traditional, classic sauces such as aioli sauce. This is the basis of mayonnaise and consists of garlic, egg yolks, olive oil, lemon and seasoning. A tasty barbecue sauce can be made with garlic, salt, paprika, clear honey, tomato puree, orange juice, white or red wine vinegar and soy sauce. You can also make Japanese marinades that use sake and Indian marinades that use cumin and coriander. The use of herbs and butters also adds to the flavor of BBQ recipes. You can have accompanying butters with foods such as lobster, shrimp or anchovy.

There are lots of BBQ ideas for meat dishes to satisfy the carnivores. One of my favorite BBQ recipes is fillet steak with blue cheese. I also like lamb chops with tarragon and pork chops with fennel. Poultry can include less common items such as pheasant, quail or guinea fowl. Fish lovers will also enjoy barbecues and there are certain types of fish that are suited to being grilled. Bass, mackerel, swordfish, cod, bream and sardines are just some examples of tasty BBQ recipes using fish. Vegetarians and lovers of vegetables generally should also enjoy going to barbecues. There’s nothing more full of flavor than grilled sweet corn or aubergines. Mushrooms are also very tasty, cooked in garlic butter.

People tend to forget pudding at barbecues. I have come across some imaginative BBQ recipes for fruit deserts, including caramelized bananas and apple kebabs. If you prefer cheese as a last course, there’s nothing finer than barbecued goat cheeses.

My friend in Australia and I have a pretty nice setup. She mails me a package of Aussie favorites and I in turn mail her something back. It’s my turn now and I am taking my sweet time. She understands and has no problems waiting. The last time I mailed her a package the chocolates inside melted, so this time I mailing something wonderful. I have to remember that when a package goes half way around the world, it is going to go through some temperature changes. One of the most surprising hit items I sent her was BBQ sauce.

She’s a vegetarian, so I didn’t even think about the irony of sending her BBQ sauce. Aussies are know for their love of outdoor cooking, so I thought I would send her some BBQ sauce made in Rochester, NY, which is near where I live. I had never tried it myself, but my husband claims it is the best stuff ever made. Once I realized my mistake, I emailed her with an apology. She told me that she had never tasted anything like it and then she asked me to send more next time.

She doesn’t eat meat, but she used the BBQ sauce on her veggies. She and her family loved it. When they finished the bottle, she said I should definitely include more in my next package. Also she wondered if the same place made any other varieties of BBQ sauce, I’ve been searching ever since. If you ever find yourself in the position of exchanging items with someone in Australia, I strongly suggest sending them some local BBQ sauce in exchange for some Tim Tams. You can’t beat that deal.

If you can’t find any local BBQ sauce you think you would like to send overseas, you might want to look online for something special to send them. Just make sure it is something they have never tried. You may want to order some for yourself so you can try it before you box it up and mail it across the ocean. Though we eat a lot of the same foods as the Aussies do, the taste of the foods is somewhat different. This is why food exchanges are so much fun. Just make sure the items you send have an expiration date of at least a year in advance, or your package may be subject to quarantine and may never arrive.