National BBQ week 2020: a perfect fit to your SUP life.

The weather’s glorious, the temperatures are on the rise and it’s perfect for getting on the water. But wait! You need a pit stop for eats and drinks. Or, maybe, it’s a warm evening, the sun is setting, and a full blown nosh up’s required. So with the fact Mother Nature’s in a good mood AND you’re enjoying that SUP life, what could be better than busting out the Barbie – especially as it’s National BBQ Week? It’d be rude not to really.

National BBQ Week launched in 1997 and 2020 marks the 24^th year of making people better BBQers. It doesn’t matter what type of foody fayre floats your boat board, having it barbequed, with that fired grilled taste (and just a light touch of smoky), makes your scran all the more delectable.

2020’s National BBQ Week’s organisers are also looking for your help with their ‘BARBI for BRITAIN’ campaign. They’re asking you to post your BBQ pics on their Facebook page and donate to either the NHS Together appeal or FareShare Covid 19 to say thank you to carers and frontline staff who’ve been invaluable during the current pandemic. Plus, pics of your SUP barbies will give a different slant to proceedings.

Your McConks inflatable stand up paddle board, we should add, is the perfect BBQ accessory. It makes a great BBQ picnic table for your sizzling delights. And for carting your barbeque gear to where you plan on igniting the fun it’s more than fit for purpose. Just remember not to put hot things near or on your iSUP as it’ll come a cropper!

For anybody wanting even more BBQ goodness in their life why not hit up Fire Masters: BBQ Wars, which airs every night at 20:00 on Blaze TV (Freeview 63, Freesat 162, Sky 164, Virgin Media 216).

And of course, don’t forget to post your SUP BBQ pics to the McConks SUP FB page, in the McConks SUP Community FB group and SUP Hacks FB group to let us see what you’ve been getting up.

McConks SUP BBQ hacks:

If you’re paddling on rivers then crayfish are something you could be lucky to catch (if you’re happy to ‘forage’ for your own food). Where McConks ourselves paddle (River Thames) there’s an abundance of Signal Crayfish which aren’t indigenous. If you catch them, you’re required to dispose of them (or eat them) to give our native white clawed Crayfish a chance. So, there’s a tasty BBQ meal right off the bat! You’d be doing your bit for conservation as well as enjoying tasty nosh – just make sure you don’t catch the native ones – which are protected!

• If you’re ever at Studland, Dorset, way and fancy foraging for your own food (under the supervision of someone who knows what they’re doing) then check out https://www.foreadventure.co.uk/ who run coastal foraging trips. This is a great way to combine paddling, natural substance and alfresco eating.

The weekend’s inbound, the water beckons and so does the Barbie! Get paddling; get grilling…

Fun BBQ facts:

• The recent UK Bank Holiday Monday saw around 10 million BBQ occasions (source: nationalbbqweek.co.uk).

• This number has risen to 2-3 million since then, of May 2020 (source: nationalbbqweek.co.uk).

• The word barbeque is derived from the West Indian term ‘barbacoa’ which means ‘slow cooking over hot coals’.

• Both Memphis, TN and Kansa City, MO in the United States duke it out with giant tournaments dedicated to the art of hot coal cooking. But it’s Lexington, NC, that lays claim to being the ‘Barbecue Capital of the World’.

• BBQs aren’t just for summer. 60% of aficionados say they cook on hot coals year round (source: HPBA.org). We certainly do at McConks – We get very strange looks cooking sausages on the barbecue on the beach in winter!

• The world’s largest BBQ took place, with 45,000 people, in Nuevo Leon, Mexico (source: guinessworldrecords.com).

• Two out of three UK households own at least one BBQ. (source: outbackdirect.co.uk). We own five!

• The first McDonalds burger restaurant was a barbecue joint.

• If you want to add a smokier flavour to your BBQ sauce then a shot of single malt Scotch whiskey works wonders.

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