The Gas Grill Review and Gas Grill Rating Guide - Helping you choose the Best Gas Grill

Interview With Mike Fincham

The BBQGeek

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My interview with Mike Fincham (aka BBQGeek) came about as I continued my search for interesting grilling and barbecue bloggers. The cool thing for me is that he's based here in Atlanta, not too far down the road from me actually. So, hopefully I'll get to see him in competitive action this summer.

The other thing about Mike's blog, www.bbqgeek.com, is that he has an obvious interest in combining traditional barbecue with some more contemporary (or at least non-medieval) dishes. He and I both have a distaste for potato salad and cole slaw. Anyway, you'll get a nice assortment of culinary information here. It's a great read.

But maybe the most interesting thing is that he's a fan of Chargriller grills. So anyone wondering if they're worth it, just read on....

Gas Grill Review: Tell me more about the Atlanta BBQ Club and your involvement. I haven't really heard of anything like this before, but I may have to look into it.

BBQGeek: My involvement in the BBQ club is pretty minimal at this point and that's a shame. I've only attended two "meatings" and I'm not a card carrying member yet. I really need to be more involved.

For this past meating, I worked on the line with my friends at Sam and Dave's BBQ2 serving the attendees. I've been working with Sam and Dave for several years now on the side. If you are interested in learning more about the BBQ club, you should definitely reach out to Bob Herndon.

They recently had a very nice write up in the AJC and I've got it linked on my blog as well as pictures from the last meating. The bottom line is that a meating is just folks who enjoy BBQ, getting together at a different restaurant around ATL once a month. Attendees compare recipes, network, talk shop, and really just enjoy being around other BBQ heads. It's fun.

Gas Grill Review: A while back, you promoted the Atlanta Journal Constitution vote for the best BBQ (among other things). Where is your favorite place for BBQ here in GA and is there one you have heard about but havne't been to yet? I've heard Bub Ba Q's up in Jasper is really good.

BBQGeek: It's no secret that my favorite BBQ in Atlanta is Sam and Dave's BBQ2. Those folks are good friends and I'm frequently found working catering events with them.

One other restaurant that I really enjoy visiting is the Old Brick Pit on Peachtree. You'll never see it on a best of ATL list, but it's a great, nostalgic spot run by really nice people. Their BBQ is old school and very unique. It reminds me of some of the BBQ I grew up eating in Virginia.

On my to do list is the Hickory Pig up in Gainesville, Fresh Air in Macon, and I would very much like to run up and visit BubbaQ. He asked me to pay him a visit some time ago, but I haven't been able to put the time together for a day trip. Bubba has been winning quite a few competitions lately and I'd really like to see what he has going on.

Gas Grill Review: How often does the Lost Mountain BBQ Team compete, is there one thing your best at and what's your schedule look like this summer. Being new to the Atlanta area, I'm looking for something interesting to do. I used to go to some over-hyped rib cook-offs in Ohio 20 years ago but I feel that I may be missing something special down here.

BBQGeek: Lost Mountain's schedule varies from year to year. The 2009 schedule has 8 events lined up. Click here to view the schedule.

In my best year with Lost Mountain, I attended only 3 contests. In total, I think I've done 7 including the Pig Jig, Richland, Hawkinsville, and Dillard. With two small children like I have, it's difficult to get 3 days away from the family.

This year I'm considering changing it up and getting involved in the backyard division of some competitions that are closer to Atlanta like the Kennesaw, Canton, and Cartersville events. It will cut down on the travel and it will put my own BBQ into the judging process, instead of my team's BBQ. I'm really interested to see how my stuff will stack up.

Gas Grill Review: I get the feeling from your blog that you appreciate more than fine barbecue. It's obvious with links to Mike Ruhlman's blog (btw, I went to high school with him up in Cleveland). Is there anything that you especially like to prepare that may turn off the pork butt crowd? I thought that apple and fennel slaw you posted today was pretty tasty looking.

BBQGeek: I started my blog to pull together my two culinary passions - BBQ and classical French cooking. It sounds a little crazy, but I think that the two disciplines have a lot to share with each other and they don't really do that today.

I've always had a restaurant concept in my mind that I call upscale BBQ. BBQ is too frequently associated with joints, and understandably so. BBQ came from joints. But, I can't understand why we don't see more high end restaurants using smoked meats as a big part of their menu.

I recently spent a year (one day a week) working on the line in a high-end, creative American restaurant to learn the business and to really hammer home the basic skills I had learned in cooking school. Along the way, I had the opportunity to speak with a lot of really talented chefs. To these chefs, BBQ is almost a foreign language. Similarly, many of the people I've met in BBQ didn't understand how classical techniques could improve their product.

Interestingly, when I started working with Sam and Dave's, two of their key employees had recently departed the fine dining world having worked under what many regard as the best chef to have worked for in Atlanta (Guenther Seeger). So, Sam and Dave's had two bona fide white coat chefs working BBQ at the time.

You mentioned my green apple fennel slaw recipe. I see it as a perfect example of how I could see BBQ being played with and elevated. Instead of throwing a traditional cabbage based cole slaw on the pulled pork plate, why not put a green apple slaw down? I think it adds a lot more to the overall equation.

Gas Grill Review: I really enjoyed your post where you teed off on griddles being called grills. Were you serious about your praise for a Chargriller (I think that's what the post was actually about)? I too have seen them in my local Kroger and thought nothing that cheap could work well. Tell me why this would be such a good grill / smoker for a cheapskate like me. How much work is it. Is it efficient? Or am I totally missing the point?

BBQGeek: My praise for the Chargriller is unending. I've spent a lot of time looking at cookers and I've cooked on cookers ranging from $49 to $30,000. The reason I love the Chargriller is the value that you get for the money. For under $200, you get almost 900 sq. inches of cooking space in a traditional texas-offset smoker configuration.

As well, the Chargriller works very well as a grill. So, you essentially double your money. I've looked at other similar smokers from Charbroil and Brinkman at that price point, and they are not usable as grills. The Chargriller also is a fantastic grill. It has high quality cast iron grates and an adjustable height charcoal tray. I've catered for groups as large as 75 people off a single Chargriller.

For someone just entering the world of smoking and grilling, they would be hard pressed to find a better tool for their dollar. The only downside to the Chargriller is that it is made from pretty light weight materials. Here in GA, that's really not that big of an issue. But, I'm not sure that I would want to use one in Ohio unless I made a few modifications.

It's worth pointing out that there is a huge community of Chargriller users that congregate over on Steven Raichlen's discussion boards. They have come up with some really interesting and useful modifications to the Chargriller.

I currently own two Chargrillers and about 5 other grills. I'm ready to move up to something a little larger and showy (maybe a Stump and a Bubba Keg). But, I'll never say a bad word about the Chargriller. Everything I've learned at home about BBQ, I tested out on the Chargriller and it has never let me down.