It’s Fall. Time to Break Out the Grill

Chris L. Robinson
3 min readSep 30, 2021

Why you’re oh-so-wrong about grilling being solely a summer thing.

Photo by Clint Bustrillos on Unsplash

It’s the time of year when most people are putting their grills away. But I’m just getting started.

Why?

Allow me to take you back more than twenty years.

It’s the late 90s and it’s hot. Maybe not 100 degrees, but not for lack of trying. My ex-girlfriend has decided to have a huge BBQ in her backyard and has roped me into harnessing the fire. There I am, in the middle of summer, simultaneously working not one, not two, but three, charcoal grills.

And I am magnificent.

Rib tips. Hot links. Hamburgers. Chicken. All of it.

I’m getting perfect smoke, my fire maintenance is on point, and the grill marks would have made Mr. Weber shake his head in wonder.*

I’m also sweating like a pig, a towel thrown over my shoulder that I use to frequently mop the sweat from my head like a pitmaster swabbing down a whole sucking pig.

There was far more at this shindig than just my contribution, of course. Lots of people brought dishes. And they brought them in those big roaster pans that you usually reserve for thirty-pound Thanksgiving turkeys.

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Chris L. Robinson

Top Writer in Parenting, and Food. I write about masculinity, fatherhood, family, and relationships.