It happened. This year it’s your turn to have the whole family over for a festive dinner. Turkey, ham and all the trimmings. And there’s the pie too! You forgot about the pie! You’ve been plotting, planning and doing some serious calculations about prep and cooking times and you’re still running low on oven and hob space to feed the masses from your small kitchen. What can you do? You could pre-cook and reheat items but if you want everyone to have a truly delicious and enjoyable holiday meal, cooking up fresh is always better. You could install an extra oven, wouldn’t that be great?! But hey, chances are you have one of the many outdoor fireplaces in Tulsa and it just might save the day! Read on to find out how you can use your outdoor fireplace to create a scrumptious holiday meal.

Choose the Right Wood

As with most outdoor fireplaces in Tulsa, you will need enough wood to make a reasonable bed over which to cook your food. This can be made up of a quick burning wood like pine and a decent amount of kindling to keep it burning. Choosing the right wood to cook with is the most important step as the wood will flavor the food. Apple wood, oak and hickory all give great flavors. You’ll place your flavoring wood on top of the bed of burning wood. Remember you’ll need some tools to move the coals around with, a small shovel and rake should do the trick.

Don’t forget a Grate

Most outdoor fireplaces in Tulsa will have only, until now, been used for decorative and warming purposes so you’ll probably need to buy or make a grate over which to cook your food. You can go to a local blacksmith for a custom made cooking grate or better yet a camping or outdoors store will have them and legged cooking pots to match. You can always DIY a grate by using bricks or concrete blocks to create a platform on which to place your pots and pans. Remember to keep the coals raked up around the pans when cooking and turn them to cook the food evenly. You’ll also need some oven gloves or mits on hand to handle the hot pots safely.

Cook Meat by Grill or Rotisserie

You need a special fireplace grill but it allows you to cook grilled foods just like you would on your barbecue. Just use the hot embers of your wood fire to cook up your meat. If you invest in a rotisserie spit you can wow your holiday guests with rotisserie, slow roasted meat.

If you don’t want to buy any special equipment for outdoor fireplaces in Tulsa, then you can do some more DIY by screwing a hook into the fireplace mantle, ensuring it’s strong enough to hold some weight. You can then add some kitchen twine and attach it to your meat at the other end. Make sure it’s long enough that your meat dangles in front of the fire and coals. The weight of the meat itself will cause it to turn slowly and you’ll have some delicious, evenly cooked meat.

Veggies in the Coals

Cooking veggies in outdoor fireplaces in Tulsa is the easiest part. You can cut and season your veggies, wrap the in tin foil and pop them straight into the embers of wood. Simple and delicious! You can also cook apples or any fruit for pies this way too.

So there you have it! If you have a big family too cook for but not a lot of kitchen cooking space, you can improvise and use your outdoor fireplace to cook up a delectable festive fea