At long last, fall has arrived. And in South Texas that comes with blazing fire pits in backyards across the region.
While those flames are plenty of fun to cozy up to, they are also a powerful culinary tool to help prepare your next meal as well. This week we’ll explore the ways you can harness that open fire to cook for you and your family or guests in four recipes including an appetizer, salad, main course and dessert.
In many ways, cooking in a fire pit is similar to grilling over charcoal. And just like a grill, understanding how heat works with a live fire is the key to making your meal a success. With too much heat, you’ve got charred embers for dinner. Too little, and you’ll be waiting for hours for the meal to finish.
As a general rule, if you see flames — be them from charcoal on a grill or logs on a fire pit — the situation is too hot to handle from a cooking standpoint. The goal is a thick and toasty bed of embers that comes after the flames have died down. In a fire pit (or a camp fire, for that matter), that means lighting the flames an hour or two before you plan to start cooking to allow those coals to accumulate.
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As for the fire itself, you’ll want to work with hard woods such as oak or mesquite. Steer away from sappy woods such as pine and starter logs treated with lighter fluid, as those will affect the flavor of your food. Lump charcoal can also be used to create the bed of embers to cook on.
Some basic equipment will make the experience of cooking in a fire pit easier and more enjoyable, not to mention safer.
A couple of bricks and the grate from a grill are the simplest place to start. Simply place the bricks inside the pit around the hot embers and drop the grate on top. If you’re craving burgers, a steak or anything you’d normally cook over a grill, the cooking experience will be very similar to grilling. Campfire grill grates with folding legs that can be placed in the fire pit over hot coals can be purchased online for about $40 if you don’t have a grill with grates that can be placed over a fire pit.
A must-have is long-handled tongs. The embers of a fire pit, even if the flames have died down, can remain dangerously hot to tender skin and will cause burns without proper caution taken. Look for metal tongs around 15 inches long with handles measuring at least 12 inches for the best protection. You can find them for as little as $4 at restaurant supply stores across San Antonio.
A good stash of cast-iron cookware will also make the process easier. You don’t need the kind of Dutch oven designed for campfires with a lid that you can pile coals on top of. A basic, large cast-iron skillet and pot will enable you to prepare all of the dishes we’re created this week including a peach and berry cobbler that cooks in a skillet, and chorizo-laced queso prepared in a cast-iron pot.
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Sturdy aluminum foil is the last tool you’ll need for our quartet of recipes. It’s the key to preparing our chicken and bean packets that are bundled in foil and roasted directly next to the embers of a fire. In our dish, chicken breasts are slowly cooked over a melange of black beans and bell peppers, although you could just as easily wrap up links of sausage and diced potatoes into packages to cook in the coals.
Of course, some food can be prepared without any tools at all. We’ve made a corn and poblano salad that simply requires placing ears of corn with the husks still on and fresh peppers directly in a fire pit next to hot coals. The husks will protect the tender corn underneath and the flames will give the peppers a toasty char with an unmistakable smoky bite once chopped and tossed in a simple dressing of lime and hot sauce.
Recipe: Fire Pit Chicken and Bean Foil Packets
Recipe: Fire-Roasted Corn and Poblano Chile Salad
Recipe: Fire Pit Fruit Cobbler
Paul Stephen is a food and drink reporter and restaurant critic in the San Antonio and Bexar County area. To read more from Paul, become a subscriber. pstephen@express-news.net | Twitter: @pjbites | Instagram: @pjstephen
https://www.expressnews.com/food/recipes-cooking/article/How-to-cook-over-your-fire-pit-because-it-s-15591214.php
2020-09-23 16:50:00Z
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