Lighting up north of 60
Glen Vienneau
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (Nov 27/00) - Acompany that specializes in barbecues is promoting the idea of cooking outside.
"It's not totally unrealistic," says Marc Woolridge, store manger for the Holman Northern Store. "It depends how hungry you are for a T-bone streak,"
He has barbecued in winter in Northern Saskatchewan so why not in the NWT.
The same for Holman Eskimo Co-op store manager Bill McManus who barbecued while in Winnipeg.
"The wind conditions cut me down, but yes, we barbecue in winter," said McManus.
There nothing elaborate about wintertime cooking, according to Theresa Stahl.
"You don't have to go back and forth, it's just like in your oven," said the public relations officer for Weber-Stephen Products Co.
By following simple rules like preheating the barbecue, Stahl swears that even large items like a turkey or ham can be cooked outside in the winter.
There is a time, however, when it just gets too cold.
"When it gets much past minus 30, I had propane not flow on me," said McManus.
Insulating the propane lines will solve that problem, according to Ron Wilson, adult educator at Holman's Aurora College campus.
A deck with a partial shelter also makes outdoor winter grilling easier, but it's not a good idea to torch up the barbecue in an enclosed space.
"Not just in Holman, but lots of communities, people will barbecue in pretty horrible weather in the cold porch and they'll leave the door open," said Wilson.
But, at minus 50, Wilson will save his burgers and caribou steaks for another day.
Marian Ferguson, manager of Tununiq Travel and Adventure in Pond Inlet, closes the cover on the barbecue season in September.
"We have a barbecue on our back veranda and right now there's about two feet of snow on top of it," she said.
With the price for propane twice what it is in the south, Ferguson said it will be just too windy and cold to raise the lid on outdoor cooking until sometime next spring.
