Any bbq gone wrong stories out there?


 
Came home one night from work late and decided to fire up my gasser and make a steak. Fire up the grill and go inside to rub the steak down and toss a tater in the microwave.

I go outside and to my surprise there are one foot flames coming out of one of the sides of the grill. I rush over and turn the gas off. After reviewing the situation once the flames went out I realized the hose on my gasser was rotted out.

I was very lucky because the grill was very close to the house siding and there was not any damage to the house. The grill on the other hand was messed up.

My Dad actually gave me this grill when they moved out of state and bought himself a new one. When I call him up to tell him what happened he felt really bad. So the next time he was in town he took me out to get me a new grill/christmas present. I was like cool right!

We go to the local sears here and he wants to get me the same one he had got that is currently on sale. I'm like cool that is a pretty nice grill. We pay for it and then go to the pick up area only to find out that the $299 grill is out of stock and the floor model was missing some stuff.

Back updstairs we go to talk the sales lady. She turns us over to the store manager. This guy is clueless as to what to do and we want to take a grill home tonight. He offers us to pick one up at another store but we are like well then why did you sell us one in the first place if it was out of stock.

The manager then offers a better grill for the same price only to find out that they we out of stock on the model as well. Guess what I walked out of there with a $650 grill for the $299 price 2 grills later! SCORE!
 
A couple of years ago I made 32 slabs of St. Louis style ribs for my dad's retirement from a quarry. Nothing fancy, just ribs, good seasoning, good sauce, 50 hungry guys, and a nice big rotisserie grill! Everything turned out so well, they invited us back for an employee appreciation lunch.

28 slabs this time. After a couple hours, I got cute and wanted to wrap the ribs in foil with some honey butter and appple juice. I underestimated the temp down by the coals and did not add enough apple juice. When I went to unwrap the first rack was very dark with burned honey-butter and jerkey texture on the outside.

With over an hour till service, I piled all the ribs into some containers and added some sauce. Luckily most of the ribs were better than the first one I unwrapped, but what a mistake. I came 10 minutes away from having to throw away about 8-10 slabs.

Everybody ate a ton of ribs, but they would have done the same if I made hot dogs. Free bbq at work.
 
One time I was doing an overnight pork butt. I got to bed around 1, and got up at 4 to go to the bathroom. Figured since I was already up, I might as well check the smoker. I go out to my back porch and decide the temp is a bit too low.

Now, I never adjust the vents on my WSM without gloves. I did it once, brushed up against the smoker and got a good burn on my index finger. Well, I'd left my gloves in the garage, so back inside I go to get them so I can open the vents up a bit. This was close to the end of summer, so we just had the windows open, no AC or heat going. Since it's so nice outside, I don't close my sliding glass door, I just close the screen to keep bugs from coming inside.

I get my gloves from the garage and head back to the back porch. Seeing as how I woke up less than 5 minutes ago, I'm still groggy and I forget I've closed the screen door. I walk right through it, and the entire thing collapses underneath me. To this day, the door to my back porch has no screen door.
 
This is such a great topic as I am sure there are many of us who have had things go wrong.

Here was one for me. A few months back it was my daughters birthday and family was coming over for dinner. I had to feed 10 so I figured Puled Pork would be a hit. Lets just say I thought I had done everything right but couldnt get the 2 butts past 170 Degrees. Thank God I made meatballs as well.

What I learned from this was you really need to use the right amount of fuel & have the time to let this cook.

My Family said this pork was delicous as well, my wife just sliced it down and sauced it. She called it Pork Roast. However I was very mad as I knew what this should have been like.

I am going to get over my demon of the pulled pork experience this up coming weekend since all I have to do is decorate for christmas I am going to do pulled pork again. Wish me luck.
 
A few years ago I lived in a house with a gas grill that was plumbed into the natural gas line. I cooked a steak on it, then turned the burner to High to burn off the grease - and forgot it. The next morning I glanced out onto the deck and saw those shimmering waves of heat (like you see above highways in the summer) above the grill, and remembered. Fortunately it didn't set fire to the deck railing, or melt the aluminum body of the grill. The inside of the grill was really clean, though.
 
This was over a year ago, and it still haunts me, and I still get razzed over it.

Had about 6 guys over for some Q before a minor league ballgame. 6 racks of BB's had just come off the WSM, took them inside and sliced into 2-bone portions, into a foil pan to be taken outside.. the other 3 racks were left behind. As I was exiting my back door, I slipped, and the pan with the 3 racks' worth of ribs went flying.. well you can see where this is going.. gasps from all around.. luckily I still had 3 more racks to serve, and everyone had plenty of food. Still, waste of 3 good racks, and they were definitely some of my best ribs to date.
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One more, more recent.. about 3 months ago, I had 4 butts on the WSM .. 2 tiny 5 lb'ers on the bottom and 2 monster 9lb'ers on the top. 4AM or so I get up and go check the fuel and such .. temps good, open the WSM door to check the fuel .. give the coals a stir .. door back on, go to bed .. toss, turn, get up go to the bathroom, toss turn .. hmm.. what's that smell? Look through the kitchen window into the backyard, hmm why are there flames shooting out of where the door should be?

Yup, door fell off (must not have secured it well enough in my sleepy daze) .. bottom butts were toast, but luckily the big boys on teh top were fine .. got the temps back down to normal and ended up staying up from that point on..
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My first real smoke was a tiny off set smoker made by Charbroil $99 CND and a great 'starter' rig. First smoke I unknowingly got insta light briquettes. Oh my god is that gross.... Smoked pork marinated in lighter fluid was the nights feast PUKE.

The next smoke I got the proper briquettes but I didn't clear the *** from the last smoke. Needless to say the ash reached the bottom of the coals dropping the temp to 180 ish. Being a car guy I decided to TURBOCHARGE my intake with a small but powerful fan. We cheered at our stroke of forced induction brilliance and drooled thinking about the two rack of ribs inside. About an hour later I opened to baste only to discover the ribs coated head to toe in ashes.

The neighboors discovered a few new swear words that night I am sure
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BTW really enjoying reading about everyone's misfortune LOL keep em comin'!
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">BTW really enjoying reading about everyone's misfortune LOL keep em comin'! </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

See It's not just me. I found it very amusing as well to hear everynes horror stories.

;-)
 
No horror stories (yet) and I just did my first overnight pork butt. Reading about the doors not being secured makes me a bit more hesitant now
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<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Larry D.:
A few years ago I lived in a house with a gas grill that was plumbed into the natural gas line. I cooked a steak on it, then turned the burner to High to burn off the grease - and forgot it. The next morning I glanced out onto the deck and saw those shimmering waves of heat (like you see above highways in the summer) above the grill, and remembered. Fortunately it didn't set fire to the deck railing, or melt the aluminum body of the grill. The inside of the grill was really clean, though. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

I did the same thing on vacation but not as good a job. I used the condo's gas grill for dinner (pork chops, I think), turned it up for cleaning, and remembered about halfway through the meal. I went back and shut off the gas, but when I opened the lid the flames were still roaring from the pork fat. Fortunately they died down fairly soon and there wasn't any damage to anything.

Brad
 
My first stuffed pork loin was a disaster. The recipe I was using called for 6 garlic "cloves." I assumed the entire garlic bulb was a "clove." Yeah, with 6 WHOLE garlic bulbs in my pork loin, it was inedible. I tried to eat it, but I had garlic oozing out of my pores and eventually had to pitch it. At least I know what a garlic clove is now.

In an unrelated event, I was cooking for about 40 people at a relative's house. He only had a gas grill, and had obviously never cleaned it in 10 years. While all my food was on the grill, the grease in the bottom of the grill caught fire and I had a raging inferno. I am sure people thought I was a BBQ newbie, but it was really just my first time cooking on a gas grill. One of my "smart" relatives suggested I put out the grease fire by spraying it with a water bottle. Hmmmmm. ;-)
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Nathan Sleyster:
My first stuffed pork loin was a disaster. The recipe I was using called for 6 garlic "cloves." I assumed the entire garlic bulb was a "clove." Yeah, with 6 WHOLE garlic bulbs in my pork loin, it was inedible. I tried to eat it, but I had garlic oozing out of my pores and eventually had to pitch it. At least I know what a garlic clove is now.
</div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Wow, I cant even imagine what that tasted like
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A few years ago, I was cooking a Raichlen dessert recipe on the WSM and the recipe said to be careful of not oversmoking because the fruit would be inedible. Well I put it on added the smoke wood and it looked great. I brought it inside and served it to my wife and I. She took a couple of bites and said that the dish is horrible because there is way too much smoke flavor. I looked at her like you are crazy and I am determined to eat it all to show her! Well the next bite I get has blueberries, which had really sucked up the smoke flavor. I stopped eating the crisp and had to throw it all away. It tasted horrible. To this day I have never tried to do another fruit crisp on the smoker.
Lance
 
My first smoker was a ECB I used it to make a turkey that turned out ok. Then I thought I while I'm at it I would smoke a block of cheese. I put the cheese on the smoker went out to check on it later opened the lid and thought hey who took my cheese then noticed something floating in the water pan. Duh I guess you can't smoke cheese at 200 deg. Rob
 
I remember this one time quite a few years ago. My mom had just gotten divorced from her second husband and my older sister wanted burgers on the grill for her birthday. No one knew how to grill because my stepdad always grilled. I decided to give it a shot. My mom had an old Kenmore gasser, which I eventually inherited from her. I had the thing going and had the burgers on it. I kept going out to check the burgers, but it seemed they were not cooking. I decided to give it more time before checking again. The next time I went out there, the burgers were all black and hard as hockey pucks. Needless to say, we ate them. My family would not let me live that down for a while. I think that I have graduated into a pretty good griller since then. We all have to learn somehow. Plus, I now know that the Kenmore with the lava rocks was not the best grill. Thank you Weber!
 
Wanted to start up the smoker at 5:00AM for a brisket smoke. My power went out the evening before and I reset my clock at the wrong time. It was actually 2:00AM when I woke up and started my chimney for the smoke. Thank god I realize the time was wrong before the meat was put on. Put out the coals and went to a 24hr place for breakfast with the wife & came back later to restart the smoker.
 

 

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