There are many interpretations of the term ‘barbecue’ in the world. Some people use it to describe a social gathering and cooking outdoors. Others use it to describe grilling food. For our purpose here, we are using the term to describe vegetables or meat, slow-cooked using wood smoke and/or charcoal.
Barbecuing is not grilling. Grilling is cooking over direct heat, Barbecuing is cooking by using indirect heat at lower temperatures and longer cooking times. It is the smoke from the wood gives barbecue its unique and delicious flavours.
A so called {gas BBQ} is not a BBQ, it is technically a grill. It cooks food but imparts very little flavour.
BBQ or {Bee Bee Cue}or just {Q} can mean many different things to many different people in different parts of the world.
A fire is a primary means of cooking food to feed your family in some parts of the world.
To some, it is a large offset smoker running on large logs cooking huge joints of meat over 24hrs, to some it means a social gathering, to some it means a disposable BBQ in the park with a pack of rubbish sausages, burnt on the outside and barely cooked in the middle.
A BBQ can be what you want it to be.
You will be eating the food or serving it to guests so the smake from whatever you are cooking on will end up in the food.Use good quality charcoal from sustainable and managed woodland.
This can be from the UK or from managed woodland abroad such as Spain where excellent charcoal is produced as a by-product of the cork industry.
Use dried wood such as oak, beech, ash, any fruit wood such as apple or cherry. Avoid using any pine and so called green wood. You can cook on pine and green wood when the flames and smoke have all but gone and you are just left with embers.
Avoid self lighting charcoal and lighting fluids, this will not only take an age to get going but will produce loads of smoke and taint whatever you are eating.