Fireball Fryers

I made an important discovery, the first time I grilled chicken. Grilled chicken meat produces a great deal of grease, and chicken grease burns.

I call the phenomenon "fireball fryers." Here's how it was done. Once.

Following directions, I had made an aluminum foil tray on the grill, and laid the chicken pieces on it. Chicken fat melted and gathered in the tray. Soon, enough had collected to bend the aluminum foil and spill most of the grease onto hot metal and briquettes below.

With a small but insistent roar, a grease fire flared under the chicken. And around the chicken. Then flaming grease dripped into the grease trap, and a merry little blaze sprang up in that little dangling soup can under the grill.

Happily, I was standing at the grill. It took several minutes, but finally I had some of the grease drained off, and some of it burned off, with not enough around the now very well done chicken to cause more trouble. That chicken came out a little crisper than we usually like, but it was quite edible.

That was the last time I let grease accumulate. I still grill chicken, but now the chicken gets wrapped in foil, rather than put on a foil tray. I still get a few flare-ups, but not anything like the conflagration that so nearly consumed an entire chicken dinner.

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("Fireball fryers" is part of Easy Griller, a non-chef's approach to outdoor grilling.)