The joy of grilling (Matt's first blog)

Matt here. There have been many occasions on this Taiwan journey when I wanted to blog, but today marks the first such occasion where it was paired with the opportunity (Tara's giving Caitlin a bath and my work calls have ended for the evening. Yes it's a Sunday night so why should I have work calls, don't ask).

I dedicated~5 hours today to grilling and the result was spectacular. Why 5 hours? Shouldn't grilling take 20-40 minutes depending on what you're cooking? Not when you're beginning from scratch and living in a 5th-floor apartment in Taipei! But lets start from the beginning.

Last Sunday Tara, Caitlin and I went to dinner at the home of new friends of ours in Taipei (a new expat couple who just got settled into their apartment). To our delight, they cooked steak! It was amazing... first time we've tasted steak in Taiwan that was worthy of anything we've had in the USA. They had purchased a mini charcoal grille, briquettes and lighter fluid, and some fantastic looking USDA steaks from Costco. When we arrived the charcoal was glowing red and they threw on the steaks. This is all happening on the utility porch of their 4th-floor apartment so the ambiance is air conditioners and washing machine, but that made it all the more special... anyone can grille when you have an acre of land and a propane Weber. The porch saturated with smoke... part smoky charcoal smell, part beef drippings burning on the coals. It about knocked us over but it was such a novelty we wouldn't go indoors until the steaks were done. I even lavished in the smoke smell that my clothes picked up (Tara calls it "grillogne"). I wasn't very hungry before we arrived but it was so good I ate every morsel.

Fast forward to Friday when I needed to make a Costco run on the way home from work to get a key ingredient for our traditional Friday night pizza (you can't get good mozzarella cheese anywhere else in Taiwan). While I was there I spotted the grilles my friends had purchased. I don't recall the price - it didn't matter - I had to have one!!! I grabbed one. But the charcoal only came in huge 6-bag multi-packs and I didn't think I could carry it home, so I passed that up thinking I could get some closer to home. Since I had the grille I also picked up some steaks. It's Costco so steak only comes in jumbo packs I was betting this whole grill thing was going to work out. But I hedged my bets by getting cheaper steaks than the New York Strip steaks I'd get back home. Yet I paid double, but that's a topic for another blog.

Now it's today (Sunday) after lunch and Caitlin's just gone in for her nap. I started with plan A for getting charcoal and lighter fluid. I walked ~10 minutes in the light rain to the grocery store nearest our house (Wellcome) which both Tara and I thought had charcoal. After a thorough search for charcoal and another thorough search (anything to avoid asking for help) I broke down and asked someone. He didn't speak English but he ran off and quickly returned with a lady who also didn't speak English (another topic for another blog). I said "charcoal" a few times, nothing. Then wrote it down and showed it to them. Still nothing. I said "barbecue" and "grill". They both discussed in Chinese and then shook their heads. Either they didn't know what it was or they were telling me they didn't carry it. Either way, a "Xie xie ni" and on to plan B.

Back out to De Xing East Road and another 15 minutes walk in the light rain to Carrefour, the big grocery store that's similar to a Wal-mart in its variety of products. 20 minutes of light rain adds up to being quite wet, but I can handle it. I got pulled into their newly remodeled wine area which was very nice -- I was impressed enough to grab a bottle for our Taiwan collection which is now up to 2 bottles. Oh wait, make that 1... I'm enjoying a glass right now. I didn't spend as much time searching before I asked someone. Again, she didn't speak English or didn't know what the heck charcoal was. But she knew how to say something like "please wait" and she literally ran away zig-zagging around countless, crowded customers (refer to one of Tara's earlier posts on what Carrefour is like on a weekend). A minute later she returned zig-zagging with a lady who looked like a customer (no uniform or name tag) but who spoke really good English, so I didn't ask if she worked there. I showed her my paper where I'd written "charcoal" at the prior store. She said in perfect English "what's that?" I described that it's used for barbecue outdoors, blah blah blah, and then it hit her! She exchanged a few words in chinese with the employee and then they both turned to me and said in unison "upstairs!" "Xie xie ni."

Upstairs I found the camping aisle and voila! Kingsford charcoal. Hallelujah. But right next to the Kingsford (English and Spanish packaging, ahhh) was the Carrefour generic brand (French and Chinese, booo) but it had to be the same thing, right? And at 1/3 the price! And since I'm cheap, I got that. Now where's the lighter fluid? I looked all over that section and no luck, so I asked (my don't-ask-for-help manhood was just about gone by now). She didn't speak English (seeing a trend?). But she quickly returned with someone who did. This lady was the customer relations manager and was from Long Island but was Japanese, so English was her 3rd language. Either way she knew what I was talking about, but not really... she heard what I was describing but she'd never heard of such a thing. She called to another employee who ran down the aisle and returned with a bag of what looked like Hershey's Kisses except the aluminum foil was wax paper. She said to light a couple of these under the charcoal. After she saw the puzzled look on my face she explained that here in Taiwan (and in Japan), where most people live in apartments, they don't use lighter fluid because of the initial high flames (bad combination when there's a roof over your head). Made sense to me. "Xie xie ni."

I exit the Carrefour with a heavy bag on each shoulder and pray to see the 280 bus coming. Instead I see it leaving, which means the next one will be between 5 and 40 minutes away. It's raining whether I stand there hoping or walk so I walked. I walked 15 minutes in the rain with sore shoulders (those shopping bags need shoulder pads) and the 280 bus never passed me, so it was the right call. Got soggy wet again, but who cares - I'm barbecuing tonight, baby!

Now think about the last time you grilled on charcoal... How long did it take for the coals to get ready to cook on? I guessed 30 minutes, so I started setting it up at 5:00 so we could eat at 6:00. Little grille assembled and set up on the non-flammable porch - check. Two wax Hershey kisses in the bottom - Check. Unzip the Carrefour generic store-brand charcoal briquettes - What the heck? Not briquettes. They're chunks of burned wood. It even smelled like burned wood. Maybe that's what Kingsford briquettes are made from in the first place - I never pondered it. Oh well, lets give it a try. I made a pyramid out of the wood pieces, sorta. Then I lit the wax kisses. They burned. 15 minutes later I returned expecting to see red coals but instead I saw nothing... the wax had burned out but the charcoal stuff hadn't caught. OK, lets re-think this.... I grabbed four wax kisses, put them close together, lit them all at once, and put charcoal pieces on top right into the little candle-size flame... thin pieces first (early 1980's campfires weren't wasted on me) then bigger pieces on top of them. I waited until I saw the charcoal turning gray and red. Then I went away for ~15 minutes. Do you think it was burning nice and hot this time? Of course not, but it was burning. A tiny little area had 'caught'. I stoked it, and returned after another 15 minutes. Then another. Then another. Finally after 90 minutes I had enough heat to maybe cook a steak!

From this point forward the night was glorious. Two thick USDA steaks sizzling over red hot coals, 5 minutes per side. Bam! The rest of dinner that Tara had made was keeping warm in the oven and Caitlin had been appeased with back-to-back Elmo DVD's, so everyone was hungry. And it was good. It was amazingly good. We ate every morsel, even Caitlin.

Indeed it was worth all the time I had put into it, from Costco to Wellcome to Carrefour and back. In the rain. On foot. I would do it all again if I had to, but I don't. Next time I think I can get the fire going in under an hour. And maybe next time I'll spring for the Kingsford. And with any luck I'll find some lighter fluid.

Tonight was a turning point in our Taipei lives: We found a way to barbecue. Life in Taipei is great.