My Next BBQ Grill

This is Jimmy. Jimmy is an old guy from, well, I'm not sure where he's from. What I do know is that he lived in Gilmer, Texas at one point about 30 years ago, and while there managed to weld two stamped steel bathtubs together with hinges to make a grill. How it found its way to Groesbeck I still don't understand, especially with Jimmy drinking Bud Lights one after the other in a Homer Simpson koozie. "You a fan of The Simpsons?" was a question I had to have answered by 80 year old Jimmy from Gilmer. "Hell, I don't know whatcher talkin' 'bout. I prob'bly found that on the side of the road somewheres" was the answer, which is pretty much what I thought it would be.

Anyway, damn if it wasn't an excellent grill. Now, a bathtub is pretty deep, you see, and Jimmy is a short fella', he explains, so he trimmed the bottom one up so that it was only about 18" deep. Then he welded some stops so he could put some mesh steel in for a grill. And because it would get too hot to make the whole thing a grill, inside off to one side is a truck wheel that he puts his coals and any wood for smoke on, and you can either cook right over it or heat things up off to the side. He welded a pipe over the drain, and a thermometer into the side wall. Weld a chain to allow the lid to hold open without flipping back, re-bar frame to slide it in, a formica front counter and a couple of wheels, and you're in business. Or, as Jimmy says, bid'ness.

We had hamburgers cooked directly over the charcoal covered wheel with pecan thrown in for smoke, hot dogs cooked about a foot off to the right, and heated sausage up in there as well. Then one of the most interesting tips I've ever seen was that he dumped all of the buns into one brown paper bag, inverted another bag over it, and put it on the grill the farthest away from the flame and just left it there. It heated them up perfectly, and although the bags got hot and smoked they never burned.

Rednecks are the mothers of all invention. The only way this grill falls short is that nowhere is bailing wire involved. Other than that, it's perfect. In case you're wondering, and because according to Jimmy the old bathtub plant in Gilmer has been run out of business by the Chinese, you can make one out of tubs that still have enamel on them. You just have to grind the enamel off anywhere you want to make a weld. As a matter of principle, I recommend scrubbing the years of soap scum and tub rings off first too, even if they would cook off eventually.