Jeff Conn is not a man who takes his barbecuing lightly.
Listen to him for a moment:
”When I come home with a lamb slung over my shoulder, ready to barbecue- well, it`s easy to imagine what the primitive hunter must have felt like. Yeah! And when our friends come over and we`ve got something on the spit, they know it`s going to be a serious good time.”
Conn, 34, who has a construction company called Conn Structures Inc. and lives on the North Side with wife Kathe and 8-month-old daughter Sarah, grills outside at least two or three times a week-every week-whether it`s 10 below with snow on the ground or 110 in the shade. Why? Because he likes it, that`s all. He likes the primal feeling it arouses, and he likes the way the food tastes.
”My introduction to real barbecuing started when I got out of high school and started working with some very authentic hillbillies outside Washington, D.C. (where he had grown up) who took their barbecuing very seriously.
”They would put a pig in the ground, or a whole loin of beef, serious carnivore action. They`d start the cooking around 3 a.m., it was a pronounced tradition among these people. They weren`t too forthcoming with their cooking secrets, but it didn`t take brain surgery to figure things out.”
Although his job colleagues at that time roasted their hunks in holes dug in the ground, Conn realized when he moved to Chicago in 1983 that using a grill probably would be more socially acceptable.
His first big attempt was at a potluck to which he was invited by a couple at the University of Chicago. ”The husband was a dean, and his wife asked me what I would like to bring. I said, `What if I roast a whole lamb on the back porch?` She sort of liked the idea, so that`s what I did.
”The difference though, between hillbillies and the citified folks at the University of Chicago was that I didn`t really think they would get rhapsodic standing around a hole in the ground that had a lamb in it. They had to actually see it, hypnotically rotating. I mean, it was a fancy party.
”So I got this rental model (grill and spit) and an 80-pound lamb and got it set up. At first everyone was inside, looking out the window. Then they started coming out, I mean it was smelling pretty good. When it was done, I sliced it up, but you can only slice so much and then you`ve got to pick at it. I was watching all these fancy folks, dressed up, standing around picking at the lamb, chewing on lamb bones, grease running down their arms. It was one of the great scenes of my life.”
A Weber grill is just fine for everyday cooking, Conn says-”it`s pretty much state-of-the-art, works well and is cheap”-and he rents a 5-foot-long grill with an adjustable spit when he does major entertaining.
Major means about 50 people, which he describes as the critical mass necessary for a successful, animal-on-the-spit party.
”Five people standing around a carcass is not a party. You`ve got to have a (large group). Not everyone will be into it, if someone comes wearing a white turtleneck, that`s a tip-off that they`ve never been to this kind of party before.
”The ones who really dig it, sort of fight for position around the spit like players in the NBA jockey to get in position for the rebound. They put their shoulders together, keep the others back and stand there to watch the fat dripping, sizzling. It`s a real sensory experience.”
Conn cooks everything from whole lambs to seafood to ribs and hamburgers on the grill. He gets his whole lambs at Chiappetti Lamb and Veal, 3810 S. Halsted St., or Paulina Market, 3501 N. Lincoln Ave.
His basic routine is to clean the lamb, pierce the flesh ”in a million places,” push a little garlic into each pierce point and rub the carcass with a mixture of olive oil, lemon juice, oregano, fresh rosemary, salt and pepper. He also rubs the mixture into the cavity. For the last half hour of cooking, he rubs a combination of mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, olive oil, rosemary and garlic over the skin, which makes a crust. He usually plans 6 or 7 hours for cooking time.
”Definitely not for vegetarians,” he says. ”But if you`re a meat eater, you should know where it comes from. Most people don`t have a feel for what they`re putting into their mouths. When you buy your meat in a little Styrofoam plate covered with Saran wrap, it desensitizes, dehumanizes you.”
