We’re just past Memorial Day weekend. I have to say that I’m a bit saddened that Memorial Day isn’t really observed for what it’s meant to honor, which is fallen U.S. soldiers. I don’t go out of my way to do a lot for the day, but I do think about the sacrifices made by others. Unfortunately, I saw a lot of other celebrations going on, too, that had nothing to do with that; people are just confused, I guess.

On Saturday, Pat of Patrick’s BBQ held his annual customer appreciation event by cooking anything that he could fit in his smoker (which is a whole lot). While there, I noticed a field of wildflowers, and I had to wander down to get a better look.

It is a long weekend, and it unofficially denotes the start of summer. We had incredible weather for Saturday and Sunday, with Monday not too awful. On Sunday, my dad and stepmother were in Ohio, and they spent the afternoon and evening with us, which was all the excuse I needed to put the XL Big Green Egg through it’s paces, just to see how it did with a variety of tasks.

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We had some really nice weather last week, ending with a gorgeous May Saturday, highs around 70, lots of sun, so it was a perfect time to try out my new toy.

A lot of you reading this will know what a Big Green Egg is, though a lot of you may not. It’s pretty simple; a Big Green Egg is a green ceramic cooker. I can’t call it a grill or a smoker because it’s great at doing both.

Well, I finally have one! There are multiple sizes, from a tabletop ‘mini’, to the original and most popular ‘large’, to what I got, the ‘XL’. Though carefully engineereed, the unit itself is simple; ceramic shell that’s very well insulated, firebox, firering, fire grate, cooking grate, lid and exhaust. What’s so great about that? The cermic allows great insulation, meaning I don’t have to worry much about weather affecting my cooking, the cooker can go for hours and hours and hours with very little interaction, and it can also grill at about 800 degrees F when opened up.

Most will recommend a ‘large’ size, but I wanted the XL for the quantity of food it can hold. The cooking grate is 24″ in diameter, versus 18″ on the large. That’s 452 square inches vs. 254 square inches!

For Mother’s Day, I wanted to do my first cook, and I am a proponent of using smoker’s capacity when I do cook, so I planned on 2 brisket flats, 2 Boston butts and 2 pork tenderloins.

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We’re finally used to being back home from vacation in Maine. We were only gone a few days, but we really fell in love with Maine in general and Kennebunkport in particular! But now we’re back in the country, replacing sights of the Atlantic with sights of farmers.

We had some people over the other night, and I was going to fix flank steak, but I saw this flat iron steak at the market. They were giving out samples, and it was pretty good, so i thought I’d try it.

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When my wife and I were coming back from Maine last Monday, we found out that we could buy live lobsters and check them as luggage on the plane… So we did!

Pre-sunrise, Kennebunkport, ME

Roger at the Portland Lobster Pound was more than happy to help us out, so we got a couple 1 1/2 pounders in a box to go. We were told that these bugs would be fine for about 24 hours in the box… So off to the airport, a couple of hours early for our flight, since it was starting to rain anyway.

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It’s good to be back home now, but not completely. My wife and I just spent a few days in the great state of Maine, specifically in the Kennebunkport area. No, we didn’t dine with the Bush family, but we did drive by George Sr’s compound. The town was gorgeous, and nearby Goose Rocks beach provided some great sunrise photos.

I never thought about Maine and food much, but there are a few things that I will always connect with Maine now… The most obvious is, of course, lobstah! Along with lobstah, and, yes, I’m going to spell it that way throughout this blog entry, is the Lobstah Roll, a sandwich I quickly came to love. Also, Maine produces more blueberries than any other state.  Note:  I was corrected!  Maine produces more WILD blueberries than any other state!

The first question I’ve been asked is - Why would you go to Maine in April??? And that’s easy to answer… I like cooler weather, and the season is just getting under way, so the crowds weren’t there yet. Why choose Kennebunkport? It’s not because George Sr. thinks it’s great; it really got decided because the hotel I found was offering a weekend of ballroom dancing lessons along with 2 nights in Kennebunkport. It turns out that more weddings are done at the Nonantum than any other place in Maine.

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