My family is confusing. I have steps, ex steps, a full sister, half siblings, ex step steps, you name it, I’ve got it. I come by my love of outdoor cooking through my family in some ways though.
My dad used to do all the grilling when I was in junior high and high school, he actually had a Weber kettle grill, and made a redwood cart for it. He did some great stuff on the grill. My favorite memory of my dad grilling, though, has to do with doing burgers on the Weber…
My dad went out to check on things, and lifted the lid to the Weber. He got hit with a ball of flame from flair ups. I know this doesn’t sound funny, but he didn’t get hurt or burned. He just lost his eye brows and it singed the hair near his face. Just one of those weird things that got funny after things were ok.
The thing Dad has the most trouble living down, though, is his ribs from about 10-15 years ago. He thought ribs were done by grilling, and he’d usually forget to check on things to the 
point that the ribs had nothing but carbonized flesh left on them. He would tell us that they weren’t burned; they were ‘crystallized’! If I remember right, there was almsot flavor on them. Fortunately, he liked my competition ribs so much he’s learning how to do ribs much better now.
The picture above is my ex-step mother’s new husband, Phillip. He’s from the South, and knows good barbecue. They had a party about a year and a half ago, and he used his lodge’s smoker to do a boatload of butts. He does them a bit differently than I do in that he does them to something like 185, then puts them in a buffalo chopper. But he does share my love of using pecan for smoke!
Helping him out is my younger sister, Heather. And adding wood in the pic below is my older sister Kim. As much as she’s a PITA, she supports my barbecue habit by showing up at our comps.
Then to push the family thing a bit more, my brother, Robert, lives in Chicago, and he’s been getting into outdoor cooking more and more. He’s got my copy of "How To Grill" and a new chile grill to use.
Barbecue isn’t just food; it’s tradition and time with people and events and a way to show love.
Nothing like keeping it all in the family!