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Home | Lauren | Sophia | House | Recipes | BGE

Big Green Egg Page
(also known as the Land of Humpty)  

If you’re like 95% or more of the population, you are probably asking yourself “What is this guy talking about?” or “What in the world is a Big Green Egg?” or “Shouldn’t this be on Flintstones page?” or some other such nonsense.   

Whether or not you have heard of the Big Green Egg before stumbling upon this page, you will certainly know of its prowess when you are through reading here.  Before we do anything else here, I thought it best to offer my BGET, that is to say, my Big Green Egg Testimonial. 

I first became aware of the Big Green Egg (forever more to be referred to here as the BGE) about 3 years ago when my brother-in-law got his.  I wasn’t all that interested in it, but I was astounded at some of the stuff he cooked for family dinners:  18 hour Boston butts, leg of lamb, BBQ ribs, wings, and all kinds of other stuff.  I was astounded at the tenderness, juiciness and most of all the variety of smoky flavors that he could make with this “egg thingy.” 

Then, in October of 2003, we moved into the house across the street from my wife’s sister and her family and had the opportunity to try even more food, and found it all to be amazing.  

On New Year’s Eve this past year, a party was hosted at their house across the street.  One of our neighbors (we’ll call him Tim McCarty) agreed to cook everyone lobster tails on the BGE.  At the moment I tasted that amazing and succulent first bite, I knew that I had to have a Big Green Egg. 

Due to its relatively high cost compared to conventional gas grills, I had thought it was a pipe dream to hope for my own BGE, at least until Christmas or possibly our 2004 tax refund check.  Since that night, any time we cooked on the grill we thought about or talked about the egg, and every time anyone we knew cooked on their BGE, we made ourselves available to sample its bounty. 

Then, to my total shock and amazement, my dear sweet wife announced to me that, for my birthday, she wanted to get us a BGE.  It seems that she had spent the last six months researching the various packages available, and we found that a local pool and spa store (oddly enough) had the best price for the most comprehensive BGE setup in town.  She insisted that it was not just a gift for me but also a gift for us.  She does this every time she buys me something really nice to make me feel better about what we spent.  But I know in my heart it was for me. 

Anyway, that first night, I attempted to cook a pork loin and didn’t do it right and it turned out kind of dry.  My brother in law pulled me aside and asked, “you can always do better at figuring out the moisture and doneness thing, but how does it taste?  The taste is why you got the Egg.  You’ll learn how to do the rest,” and he was right.  

Since then, I’ve cooked steaks courtesy of the recipe in the manual that came with the BGE.  I have, at the advice of several experienced Eggers including JSlots, put the manual aside to be used as nothing more than a spare parts reference guide.  Those steaks were the best I’ve ever cooked in just my first try on the BGE, and they have gotten better each time since.  In fact, after eating about half of her ribeye, my mom called my step-dad at home and told him to start saving his money because he HAD to have one of “these things.” 

I have cooked the best tenderloin of my life as well.  I smoked a 12-pound turkey in just over three hours on the second day I owned it, and it was great too.  I’ve made filet mignon, New York strips, T-bones, and I even made some burgers for a couple of guests, and they turned out great as well. 

I have found that owning a BGE grants you admission to a semi-secret club.  When some of my egg-owning neighbors found out that I had gotten a large BGE, I got high-fives all around from the other egg owners.  

Only a month or so into ownership, my brother-in-law, another friend and myself entered into an informal “rib-off” where we each cooked ribs on our Eggs and several other guests acted as the judges.  I was amazed that three people cooking the same piece of meat could get such different results.  Thanks to JSlots and my ability to read his recipe, my ribs were declared the winner, although I felt that there was much room for improvement (not in the recipe, but in my effort at them). 

The bottom line is this:  I don’t think that there is a better grilling / smoking / BBQ-ing / cooking solution in the world than the Big Green Egg.  If I were Bill Gates and was worth tens of billions of dollars, I would still eat food from the BGE.  The only difference is that I’d have a team of private chefs cooking for me on one of my dozens of BGE’s while parading around Lake Lanier on my 185-foot lake yacht.  But I digress… 

This page and it’s sub-pages are dedicated to my new hobby / obsession: