PHILOMATH -
Christmas at the WIlliams house means a trip to
"Camp David" for barbecued prime rib.
Thanksgiving
means smoked turkey, and usually crab.
In fact, just about every day is a
Camp David barbecue day for
David and Maree (pronounced
"Mary") Williams of Philomath.
David 46, owns eight barbecue grills and is
thinking longingly of buying a ninth, one big
enough to cook 250 half-chickens at once.
He keeps his favorite
Traeger wood-pellet grill
on the partially enclosed porch of his home,
along with an extra refrigerator, a beer tap,
and a tall, gas smoker.
Under the "Camp David" sign on the porch's back
wall, the couple can make everything from
barbecued ribs to apple-raspberry pie. Guests -
including a hungry reporter and photographer on
this particular Sunday -
are welcomed and sent home stuffed with food.
Prime rib is on today's menu.
David studs the
meat with cloves of garlic that have been soaked
overnight in apple juice, while Maree puts
together the ingredients for grilled vegetables,
twice-baked potatoes, rolls and the
aforementioned pie. The
Traeger will cook it
all.
"I love to experiment," says Maree, who
acknowledges wil be her first stab at
apple-raspberry. "I come up with wild
concoctions- 'Oh, this recipe and that recipe
look good together; I'll try that.'"
Today's pie, she adds, will feature grilled
apples basted using butter melted with brown
sugar, honey and lemon juice. She'll use more
honey butter over the top, to keep the crust
from drying out.
David works for
the Lock Doctor in
Philomath and Maree manages a
Dari-Mart in
Corvallis. But their hobbies all
revolve around food.
Maree collects recipes and cookbooks and loves
to watch cooking shows, and each week David
pores over the meat department ads for the best
deals.
The cooking takes planning. It's not uncommon
for
David to be at the
Traeger at 6 a.m.,
putting a turkey on. But once it's going, he can
walk away for several hours and let the wood
smoke and indirect heat do their work.
"Whenever we have dinner, we bring it out here.
I put it in the
barbecue. Weather doesn't
matter," David says. "I'm getting ready to put a
TV out here."
An inch of snow covered the porch on Christmas
Day, but it didn't delay the prime rib - just
prompted David to contract a roofing crew.
"The beer was cold, too" he says.
The Williamses usually cook outdoors three or
four times a week, then nibble on the leftovers.
At least once a month they pile everything in
their motor home and set up a Camp David cookery
somewhere else in the Northwest.
"We like the outdoors,"
David says. "Basically,
we have the motor home to haul our stuff and to
sleep in."
When he's not making meaty meals of his own,
David often critiques others. He obtained
official status last summer as a judge for the
Kansas City Barbecue Association and spent this
past weekend in Lincoln City for "Smokin' at the
Ocean."
Someday, he says, it would be fun to compete in
a huge barbecue contest himself, maybe even in
Kansas City. But it's not necessarily on his
list of must-do activities.
Barbecuing, he says, "is more of just a
full-time hobby thing."
The big grill he has his eye on - the one that
requires its own trailer for hauling around - is
a definite goal. With it,
David says, he might
get into the catering business.
"To tell you the truth, my wife thinks I'm
crazy," he confides, as Maree, across the porch,
rolls her eyes with a sigh. She's put together
200-plus chicken halves for barbecues before and
knows just how much work is involved.
David has used charcoal grills in the past but
says he'll never go back.
"I walk up, the wood is always in there, I turn
the switch to "on" and go in and watch TV," he
says. "It's easy, and you still have that wood
taste."
He keeps an eye on the thermometer, though,
which registers the inner temperature of the
meat and relays it to the wireless remote he
brings inside.
