People brought chairs to sit in, and a side dish to share. I grilled an entire Costco-sized package of giant hot dogs, plus two packs of Hebrew Nationals, and about 12 lbs of burgers. We had surprisingly little left. I got lots of compliments on the burgers, but even though I have perfected my burger seasoning through trial and error, I think the Treager has to take most of the credit. I cooked everything on a mixture of oak and mesquite. I also discovered that I can put about 4 1/2 lbs of beef patties on the grill at the same time, which is awesome. It is a grilling machine, I tell you.
I think I turned another poor sap into a Traeger fan. He was looking at it speculatively, and was asking me lots of questions. I’m more than happy to tell people how much I love that grill. I bet Traeger gets a TON of free word of mouth with every grill they sell.
After dinner, it was time to set off the pyrotechnics. We had a good-sized crowd, and let some of the older kids set off the really small stuff. Then the wife and I started setting off the bigger fountains and things. We finished up with the ‘finale’ display, and everyone pitched in to clean up. It’s astonishing how fast everything gets tidied up and put away when everyone is lending a hand. In less than fifteen minutes, other than the scorch marks on the street, there was no sign anything had even happened there.
Well, after running around all night, cooking and lighting fuses, I was whupped and my feet were killing me. Still, it’s nice to do something for the neighborhood, and it has become something of a tradition for our family to put on a fireworks show every year on the Fourth. I like it that way.