Tod’s new toy—a blowtorch. It’s the perfect partner for our grill. Although it looks like he might be about to scorch the swordfish he’s cooking for our dinner, really the blowtorch is just for lighting the charcoal.

This is a cleverly designed device. It’s a torch head that fits onto a standard “gas bombe” canister. That makes is very convenient for refueling since you can buy canisters of compressed gas at every convenience store. The torch uses it up pretty quickly (about 35 minutes of wicked-hot flaming per can) but if you’re just lighting a fire, it lasts for quite a few grilling sessions.

No doubt the blowtorch could be used for other things, but so far it’s just our grill-lighter. Maybe I’ll experiment this weekend with some creme brulee or lampwork beads. Posted by kuri at May 17, 2002 08:10 AM