Beer Can Chicken, Broccoli Salad, Bean Salad and Potato Salad

A summer is not a summer without a visit to Drew's Mom's summer place. It is a lengthy drive to a remote area - horror of horrors there is no cell phone service and one must rely on conversation, reading and contemplation - but relaxing and idyllic. Despite the dearth of grocery options - the nearest general store that sells more than canned goods, bags of chips and gasoline, is a 20 minute drive - Drew's Mom always manages to pack a hefty cooler and produce a series of spectacular salads. It always amazes Raul, though you'd think he would catch on, that she recycles the salads in different variations and in different bowls. Combining and mixing three basic salads this expedition (broccoli, bean and potato) makes each meal seem like a whole new menu. This evening the various salads are to accompany Raul's bbq'ed Beer Can Chicken.

Drew's Mom's Broccoli Salad actually has an explicit recipe (that she improvises within quite happily).

Dressing:
1/2 cup mayonnaise
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 teaspoon white pepper
Mix the above ingredients and pour over:
1 head of finely cut broccoli
1/2 cup of halved grapes
1 cup of sunflower seeds or sliced almonds
1/2 cup chopped red onions
Combine and refrigerate.

The bean salad is created by slicing an onion, a red pepper and a green pepper into strips. Cans of beans - any combination of french cut, green, red kidney, cut wax, romano, lima, edamame, but ALWAYS garbanzo (they are Drew's favourite only because the name is so much fun to say) - are mixed with the sliced vegetables. A cup of red wine or malt vinegar is mixed with a half cup of corn oil and then brought to a boil. As soon as it begins to boil a cup of white sugar is stirred in. As soon as it melts the resulting sauce is poured over the bean mixture, stirred, shaken and refrigerated.

The potato salad is simplicity itself. Small unpeeled potatoes are boiled in salt water for 20 minutes and then cooled. The potatoes are cubed and then mixed with chopped green onions, white pepper, two chopped boiled eggs and whatever Drew's Mom feels inspired to accentuate with - in the past there has been garlic, more onion, diced pickles or olives, pickled red pepper, etc - and dollops of mayonnaise. Everything is mixed together and then refrigerated.

Once all the salads are in the fridge it is Raul's turn to tackle the chicken. "I just impaled the chicken on a beer can," he shrugs, "And stuck it on the bbq. The little rack is very handy - I've done it before just standing the chicken on the beer can but it sometimes falls over, a little three pound chicken can't handle an entire can of beer."

Much to Drew's chagrin and surprise - the evening before Drew had marinated chicken breasts in white wine, Jack Daniels, sweet chili pepper flakes and mesquite spicing for several hours before they were bbq'ed - Raul doesn't rub the chicken or give it any special treatment and it turns out moist and delicious. An hour and a half standing in the bbq and the skin is brown and crunchy and the meat falls off the bones. Raul has sharpened all of Drew's Mom's cottage knives (including the one brought over by Drew's great-great-grandmother that is still in use and has a mysterious handle made of a mysterious bone) so the chicken is elegantly and easily carved into multiple portions. The bones go in a pot for stock and the platter of meat joins the salads on the table on the deck overlooking the lake. It is a feast.

The only mishap occurs when the beer can, fragrant and rich with drippings and no longer held upright by the nether end of the chicken, falls on its side spewing hot liquid over the deck. The dog's paw is splashed but the flavour outdoes the pain and he has to be restrained from licking up more of the nectar until it cools. "We'll put the leftover beer into the stock," says Drew's Mom.

"Burp," hiccups the dog. Turns out an eight pound dog can't handle much beer either.