Linkmeister

Adventures with Jenn-Air

I was cooking a small roast on our Jenn-Air rotisserie Sunday night when Tigger wandered into the room and suddenly began to bark, for no discernible reason. I looked at her eyes, and I realized she was looking at the tied roast rotating on the spit above the grill (this thing is stovetop, not oven-contained). It took several minutes to explain to her that this unusual sight wasn't dangerous, but I finally succeeded. I'm thinking of renaming her "She Who Barks at Meat."

This episode reminded me of my sister's birthday four or five years ago, when I bought a couple of lamb racks and cut them into chops. Each chop was about an inch thick, and we cooked them on the indoor grill. Now, this thing sits in a cutout on the stovetop; you put "rock" elements into it, plug the heating element in, place grates over the top and cook away. Any juices drip down through the elements, into the cutout bin, and down a little drain into screwtop jars located under the stovetop. With fourteen lamb chops for six people, there was an awful lot of grease that drained off. The following day, when reaching for my stash of paper plates, I discovered that both jars had filled to overflowing. You never saw such a mess in your life.