My husband has awesome parents. They recently moved near me after years of living several hours away. As luck would have it, it’s more expensive here than where they lived and they moved to a small apartment that doesn’t have an outdoor grilling space. It’s a bummer because my father-in-law is an amazing griller and smoker. He has never met a raw cut of meat or fish that he can’t masterfully infuse with flavor, a skill he thankfully passed down to my husband.
He and my husband are both Big Green Egg fanatics. In fact, I’m anticipating the inevitable October day when we drive to Atlanta pulling our Egg and a freezer full of meat on a trailer for Eggtoberfest, which is a weekend-long meat-smoking and eating experience with thousands of other Egg fans.
Our backyard set up with the Egg on the left and the gas grill on the right.
So now that they live in Dallas, my father-in-law no longer has a grill or a Big Green Egg at his disposal. But we do. On a recent Saturday morning, he called.
“Do you all have plans for the evening?” he asked.
We are kind of boring and very poor planners, so the answer was no.
“Good,” he said. “I have a recipe I want to try on the Egg. Can we come and cook you dinner?”
Did I even need to think about that? “Definitely!”
Around 6 p.m. my in-laws showed up with grocery sacks full of several different kinds of cheese and crackers, beautiful lamb chops, romaine lettuce to grill, and, get this…flowers! Who comes to cook you dinner and also brings you flowers?
A week later, the flowers they brought still brightened up my kitchen.
Dinner was excellent. Our two contributions to the meal were wine and dessert (Nothing Bundt Cakes chocolate, chocolate chip). Normally I would have baked something but I couldn’t leave the couch for most of the day because I was reading The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. If you’ve read it, you know why I was completely out of commission until I finished.
I’m really glad my in-laws have moved to Dallas. And I hope they get many more hankerings for meals from the Egg. I just saw a recipe for bacon-wrapped trout in Bon Appétit that I think we they would love.
The Gratitudenist 