Wild Oak BBQ Planked Steak in Wales

There aren't many foodie gadgets that you can easily take on holiday with you that won't break on the trip or be too cumbersome to pack but that is why I love my BBQ Planks. I have just been for my holidays in Wales with my family, we went camping in two fantastic campsites. The first was right next to the sea and we managed to get quite a lot of surfing done and then we went into the Brecon Beacons for a quieter, more rustic holiday and we found just that.

We put up our tent right in front of some woods and just five metres away was a beautiful Welsh river full of boulders and waterfalls. A perfect spot for getting away from it all and making lots of fire and having fantastic BBQs. We managed to find a Farmer's Shop (not easy as it sounds in the Brecon Beacons) and bought some steaks and we finally got our chance to use our Oak BBQ Planks.

The secret of cooking with wood is soaking the wood in water (mixed with beer, cider, herbs etc - whatever your taste) and our first question in the morning was how to soak our BBQ Planks, we could either collect some water in bottles and soak the plank in a plastic bag all day but we didn't fancy that. So the next idea was to put the planks in the river under a large enough stone so it wouldn't wash away and hope they would still be there when we get back with the food. 'What's dinner without a bit of risk' said my ten-year-old - so that is what we did.

I'm not sure I would put my BBQ Planks into just any river but this was a fast flowing river straight from the Welsh Mountains and water doesn't get much better or cleaner than that. We had fun finding a heavy enough stone to keep the plank in place but not so heavy that we couldn't actually move it and then crossed our fingers that they would still be there when we got back from our day's events.

We really shouldn't have worried and when we got back they were fine. Next step is to build a charcoal BBQ (kids are great at finding sticks for kindling)and prepare the rump steak with pasta. I won't talk about the pasta recipe (it was more functional than culinary)but here is how to cook:

An Oak BBQ Planked Steak

You really don't need to mess around with a steak when you cook on an Oak BBQ Plank because when it cooks the steak is steamed and smoked at the same time but it also gets an infusion of the oak flavour. It is simply the best way to cook a steak because the meat becomes incredible tender and moist and will melt in the mouth. So season your steak with some salt and pepper and put onto your soaked Oak BBQ Plank and put onto your BBQ grill and cook to taste.

You can use your BBQ Plank more than ten times if you don't have too much flame on your charcoal BBQ and longer if you have gas. If you look at the picture you can see the plank is slowly turning to charcoal (this was its fifteenth time)and when it is more charcoal than wood then just crumble it onto your BBQ or fire.

When I have my stall at Food Festivals or Country Fairs selling my Roasting Planks, BBQ Planks and Wood Paper, I always do a demonstration on my little portable BBQ of an Oak BBQ Planked Steak. The reaction is incredible, nearly everyone who tastes it buys a plank because they simply can't believe how moist and tender it is. A real winner so I challenge anyone to try it and find a better way to cook a steak.

Take a look at my website if you want to learn more: www.theroastingplankcompany.co.uk