La caja china

Alex got the whole week off last week to prepare his application for residency which is due today!!! So, instead of in addition to finishing his application, he made a "caja china" which is a humongous box to cook a lot of meat. Where did he get this cockamamie idea, you might ask? I have no idea. But, when he sets his mind to something he does it so on Friday morning the box was ready for a trial run in our driveway. He had assembled the caja from a wooden shipping box he found in a dumpster on campus and then cut off to a couple feet tall which he lined with aluminum. The top of the box is made of two sheets of steel welded together (by our bishop - thank you!) with a handle added. That is basically it.

Trial run: little chicken in a big box.

It essentially cooks like an oven with the heat provided by charcoal on top of the box. 

I wonder what our neighbors thought.

Success? It cooked alright, and it was delicious. The top was a wee bit overdone.

The impetus behind the box was to provide many pounds of meat for dinner for our church camp out on Friday night. We had three pig shoulders and four chickens to cook. 

Just started.

 Unfortunately, we got started a little later than we hoped so dinner was delayed somewhat. The chickens cooked first and they were awesome.

The pork took a little while longer so we ended up having it for dessert. Which, as far as I could tell with everyone there, was not a big problem. It is amazing how much food a few hungry campers can eat. It looked like piranhas had been through camp by the time we were done. 

 Alex, how much meat did you have?

It was a fun time besides the little fact of us forgetting our pillows and also that I had to be at work at 7 am the next day. 

Nothing left to say about that, right Ricardo?

A couple other pictures of the summer:

Many pounds of grape. Can you guess how many pints of juice it made? Exactly five. And it took a lot of work. I think I will not make grape juice again unless I get a juicer. 

Alex finally picked up on the hints I was dropping that I wanted popsicle molds and got me a set (thanks, Alex!) I made fudgesicles. Final analysis: ridiculously easy and so good.