Grill

Three people in Annapolis were sent to Maryland Shock Trauma Center with carbon monoxide poisoning after heating their home with a charcoal grill, a city fire official said yesterday. Firefighters responding to the apartment in the 300 block of Center St. at 7:30 p.m. Thursday found a 37-year-old woman who was losing consciousness and two men, ages 22 and 48, who also showed signs of poisoning, said Lt. John Bowes, a Fire Department spokesman. Their identities and conditions were not available last night.

MY FAVORITE WAY to cook onions has been to burn them over a hot fire on the barbecue grill. I have become very good at this. As the onions blacken, they sweeten. But, recently, I widened my repertoire and tried a new onion-cooking technique. I sliced them with a distinctive cut, cooked them on the grill and topped them off with a sauce made with tarragon and mustard.For me, the hardest part about cooking onions has been remembering to put them on the grill in time. It takes about 45 minutes to cook a whole onion.

The other night I melted the meat thermometer. It began as many household disasters do, with the best of intentions. I wanted to make sure the hamburgers I was grilling had an internal temperature of at least 160 degrees Fahrenheit.That's the temperature health authorities have said kills bacterium E. coli 0157:H7 -- the culprit linked to death and illness of people who ate tainted Jack-in-the-Box burgers in Washington state.Washington state is on the other side of the country. And there have been no reports of tainted meat here.

Boog Powell's menu for a small grilling party is marinated leg of lamb, marinated mushrooms, Greek-style salad (lettuce, sliced onion, cucumber, black olives, peppers, crumbled feta cheese in an oil and wine-vinegar dressing) and orzo with mint. The same marinade (this one is from his cookbook "Mesquite Cookery") would work for both the lamb and the mushrooms (make two batches). The orzo, a tiny Greek pasta, can be cooked according to package directions; drop a sprig of mint in the boiling water and snip a couple of tablespoons' worth to toss in after the pasta has drained.

Now that we've had a stretch of sizzling weather, it's time to sizzle some shrimp -- or, as we say in Baltimore, "shrimps" -- on the grill. Even though you can cook them in almost any season, I prefer to wait until it is "barefoot weather" to start grilling my "shrimps." That is because I associate grilled shrimp with spending a week at the beach; a stretch of time when footwear and most outwear is minimal. I won't be bound for the beach for several weeks, but the recent stretch of hot weather got me thinking about the ocean, kicking off my shoes and grilling some shrimps.

I grew up believing that you ate brisket to honor St. Patrick. On St. Patrick's Day, supper was either corned beef brisket or its cousin, roast beef brisket. I preferred the cousin, a brisket that had been dusted with seasoned flour, seared in a little oil, sprinkled with a package of dry onion soup and cooked in a heavy lidded pot in about 3/4 cup of water over low heat on the stove top. In keeping with Irish tradition, this brisket was cooked to death, bubbling on the burner for an entire afternoon.

WHEN STEVEN Raichlen envisions America, he sees one big glowing grill. Out on the western edge, lamb chops and salmon are sizzling. Beef brisket, cooking low and slow, dominates the middle, with pork shoulders and whole chickens smoking on the southern rim. Along the eastern boundary, mussels, clams and soft crabs bubble over a glowing fire. Grilled vegetables and other "sides" appear hodgepodge throughout the landscape. What a country. As Memorial Day weekend approaches, and lots of folks wheel the kettle grill out of winter storage (although some of us never put it away)

THE OLD SAYING is that size doesn't matter, but it does and everyone knows it does. Standing next to him on this hot Saturday afternoon, I felt painfully inadequate. His grill was one of those big, gleaming gas-burners, 27 knobs, a cooking surface the size of Wyoming, enough glass to qualify as a sun room, side trays, utensil racks, extra storage space, you name it. Mine was a puny little Weber. The black kettle type. Bells and whistles? Ha, that's a good one. The only extra mine had was an ash-catcher.

One night recently my husband and I were invited to dinner at a local restaurant by three of his freshmen students at Amherst College. From the start of the evening, I was impressed with the courtesy and generosity of the young men who were our hosts, but they really won me over when they told me they were interested in food. Their tastes -- which ran from vegetarian to fish and chicken selections -- were not a surprise to me. Among the guests we invite to our house, I have discovered that I frequently need to plan just such vegetarian entrees.

I love grilled onions on hamburgers and steaks, but whenever I cook them on the grill, the rings separate and often fall through the grates. This may sound like a silly question, but is there a way to keep onions from falling apart while they are grilling? Silly question? Absolutely not! Onions around the world are trained to escape when put on a grill, and the most common escape measure is to squeeze through the grates and onto the coals. Now I know that doesn't sound like a smart escape, but we're talking about onions here -- which aren't nearly as smart as celery.