As you may know, Andrew and I live in a nice-sized but wildly overpriced studio apartment in Arlington, VA. This is our first time living without a bedroom since we were in dorms, and cooking is proving an adventure. It's actually not because our kitchen is small; our place has a pretty normal-sized apartment kitchen. No, our problem is the haze of smoke that fills the apartment whenever we use our grill pan.
Grill pans are great - anyone who loves grilling in the summer (or making 15-minute meals) should definitely consider getting one. They're not that expensive as far as kitchen gadgets go, either. Ours looks a lot like this:
Unfortunately, the air in our apartment doesn't move. The lack of air circulation makes smoke from fatty meats like chicken thighs hang in the air; our apartment starts looking like photos of LA. The first time we set off the fire alarm (BBQ chicken breasts) Andrew stopped moving and just stared at me like a wounded deer while I opened our window, turned on the stove vent, and started fanning at the alarm with a towel. I'd never actually seen a person freeze in the middle of a fight-or-flight response before, and it was a little freaky. Fortunately, after at least four fire alarms he's now an old pro. We get the towel ready, open the window, and turn on the vent all before we start cooking. Tonight we learned that dark meat is best cooked outdoors - after wearing out both of our sets of arms fanning, we've learned to stay away from chicken thighs on the grill pan. Ah, the delights of a studio apartment!
