Finding the chase and cutting to it

thousand?

No, ten people, well actually nine, one person RSVPd after I’d done the shopping, so it counts as ten…

Concentrate.

Sorry. I thought I’d share how to “do it all”: cook the buns, make the burgers from scratch, coleslaw, salad, etc. for a home barbecue.

First, and foremost, do not panic.

Each time you do this, somethings will work really well, some won’t. It’s the nature of life. Personally, I had the added joy of a pump cartridge that was failing, raising my blood sugar and randomly dropping it.

Despite the best laid plans, life happens round the edges.

Choose what battles you’re fighting.

I made the buns, with a bit of an experiment on some brown rolls, part-baked from scratch. Worked really well.

I also chose to make the burgers from scratch. And the salad, and the coleslaw. But I bought in sausages for the hotdogs, dips, and reused sauces we had in the fridge.

Make a plan.

What can be done early? In our case, I made the first bit of the part-baked rolls the day before. 24 rolls to cover the 20 burgers and 8 sausages. That may seem a little broken, but 2 people didn’t eat bread (carb avoidance rather than Celiac’s), so it worked out well.

I also did the coleslaw. I prepped the herbs for the burgers, including washing the fresh herbs, and basically made it so it was an easy build day, not figuring out processes on the fly. I even pulled together the recipe sheets so I had one crib sheet for all the burgers on the Sunday.

What we should have done was planned our stow and serving strategies. I put the coleslaw in a container that would have worked really well for the burgers.

The day in question.

Build day for the cooking. The burgers all need “standing”. So before I had my shower, I made first the beef, then the lamb, burgers.

Whizz up the onion and garlic with the herbs, then layer meat and puree in the food mixer. Mix for 20 seconds or so, then wash up the mixer pieces, construct the burgers. and stow in containers to stand in the fridge.

Go and shower.

Again, I should have then started the salad when I got back from my shower. I didn’t.

We also didn’t sort out umbrellas and blankets – after five warm days, it was a bit of a shock sitting outside with it showering and blowing a brisk northerly wind!

Or a spare table for the kitchen – nine round our smaller than average six seater was a bit of a squeeze <lol>.

So how did it all go?

We seemed to have a great time, happy munching sounds ensued once food was served. We all caught up, learnt some new things, swapped stories about holidays, recipes, etc. A party.

So, organised chaos, but not too bad on the catering front. Those learning points for next year will help.

Our son thought it was the best set of rolls and burgers we’d ever done!

We also forget to offer wine with the meal.

Should be better next time! However cold that day might be 🙂