The Joplin Globe, Joplin, MO

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April 26, 2007

Mike Pound: Opinion on gas vs. charcoal based on sound logic

By Mike Pound

Globe columnist

I now have permission to speak freely.

I no longer am struggling under the yoke of objectivity. I can express my true feelings on the whole gas grill vs. charcoal grill debate. Earlier this week, I wrote a story for this paper’s Let’s Eat section about the gas vs. charcoal question. When I wrote that story, I was operating as a reporter. Granted, I was operating as a food reporter, which probably didn’t actually make me a real reporter. In the newspaper food chain, food reporters come after entertainment reporters but before White House reporters. But still, I was a reporter, and as such I was trapped by that whole reporters-need-to-be-impartial rule.

So I didn’t give my opinion on the gas vs. charcoal subject.

But now I’m operating as a columnist. And since in the newspaper food chain, columnists come after the leftover stuff way in the back of the newsroom refrigerator but before sports reporters (ha), I’m free to express my opinions on all sorts of controversial topics.

Here’s an example: Puppies are good.

Here’s another example: The Kansas City Royals are not.

So on the subject of gas vs. charcoal, I’m proud to proclaim my preference for charcoal. There are a number of reasons why I prefer charcoal grills to gas grills. A number of those reasons are well thought out and based on sound logic. Not a big number, but still.

But, the main reason I prefer charcoal grills to gas grills is not so much well thought out or based on sound logic. It’s based on beer.

As those of you who have charcoal grills are aware, the whole lighting-the-fire process takes a while. That’s because most charcoal is made from substances that are impossible to burn. Some forms of charcoal are so impossible to burn that they are actually used to make children’s pajamas.

So when trying to light a charcoal fire, you need to be patient. Or you need to have a lot of beer. If you have a lot of beer, you don’t have to worry about being patient. You just have to worry about not running out of beer.

Say I go out at 7 p.m., light some charcoal and have a beer while I wait for the coals to get hot enough for cooking. At 8 p.m., when my wife asks me what I’ve been doing for the past hour, I can truthfully say, “I’m working on the fire.”

Well, truthfully if you define “working” as sitting around drinking beer. I do.

This is a true story. One time when I was on one of my float trips with my brother, brothers-in-law, uncle and nephews, my brother, Mark, started a charcoal fire at 6 p.m. At 9 p.m., the fire still wasn’t ready. And no one noticed.

I know a lot of people who prefer gas grills. They tell me that cooking on a gas grill is much more convenient. They tell me it’s quicker since, as I understand it, gas tends to burn better than charcoal does. They tell me it’s easier to control the temperature of a gas grill. They tell me that cooking on a gas grill is just like cooking in an indoor kitchen.

I tell those people that they should just cook in an indoor kitchen then.

See, cooking outdoors isn’t supposed to be easy. Cooking outdoors is supposed to be hard. Or at least that’s what male people want female people to believe. Male people don’t want female people do know that, if we wanted to, we could cook a soufflé on an outdoor grill. If female people find out that cooking outdoors is just like cooking indoors, they would start making male people fix salads instead of hamburgers that have the same taste and consistency of a slightly used hockey puck.

Of course, that’s just my opinion.

Now, the thing I said about the Royals isn’t really my opinion.

It is a fact.

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