I grew up in an outdoor cooking family. BBQ was never a big deal for me growing up. My dads Q was okay. Passable. Restaurant BBQ was better. Pretty much my favorite thing was chopped brisket sandwiches. But we did a ton of outdoor cooking. Steaks, fajitas, plenty of burgers on the grills. Since we lived close to the gulf, outdoor cooked seafood was an even bigger deal. We were always a saltwater fishing family so plenty of fish fries, fish grills (my dads specialty was whole redfish Veracruz), crab grills, crab boils, shrimp grills, etc.
As I go older and went out on my own, I fell in love with cooking. Worked at a high end country club and did some table side cooking. Made a mean Caesar salad. I liked to grill but it was just another method of cooking. My first grill was an Old Smokey. I would buy the “light the bag” charcoal (do they even still sell that?). Then I inherited a junky gas grill from a friend. After I got married my wife bought me a “nice” large gasser from the “at that time” upper tier store, BBQ galore. I thought “ this was it” and I would never need another grill.
I think all of you know how that worked out. Disclaimer: one of my go to’s at that time was parboiled ribs (used Alton Brown’s recipe). From there, that grill imploded and I went the horizontal barrel charcoal grill route for a while. That is he exact grill my dad used for years. I knew this was never going to be good enough long term.
Then one day by chance I learned about the New Braunfels Bandera. God I needed to know more about this grill so I checked in with my good friend Google and the first hit was this site. This was back in 2006. Back in the days when Sako was still Sako.
A lot of you guys probably don’t know this but in the early days, the go to grill around here was the trusty New Braunfels Bandera. Of course that could only last a couple years because the metal was so thin and poor it was not built to last. But God, could it put out some tasty food. Over the years, the cool kids have transitioned to Klose, Stubbs, various Kamados, made their own UDS, learned for the first time what the hell a Traeger was, toyed with the notion of world domination from a small manufacturer just north of Conroe, TX, and a really cool guy in Alabama, then eventually settled into a Mak pellet grill enthusiast site. If it wasn’t for this site, Rey few of us would know what a fatty is, would never reach official certification on moinks, nor would they have a clue on what a “farmer” is.
So, anyway, that is my story and I am sticking to it. A hat tip to all you great members, old school and new