The Grillin Fools on TV!! Demonstrating the Pear Tart and Discussing Winter Grilling

The Grillin’ Fools made their television debut on January, 13th 2011 with this segment on Great Day St. Louis.

Here’s what went into that 6.5 minute clip…

This pear tart was not my contribution to the Feast article.  I wrote the article and contributed the meat loaf, which is really, really good.  The pear tart was Tom’s wife, Tracy, the unofficial, official fourth Grillin Fool.  I got the call on Tuesday to do the show on Thursday.  So I had to practice making the tart the night before.  Here is the second tart I made about 10:30 that night:

Did I mention that it was 12 degrees with a windchill of 0?  I’m all about the winter grilling, right?

Here is the first tart that I did:

And here is the second:

We arrived on the set around 9:00 a.m. Here’s where I would be doing the demo:

Here’s Dad, screwing around like a 9 year old:

Dad feeling all important on the couch getting interviewed by Matt Chambers:

Matt was a lot of fun.  He’s not some stiff in a suit who turns it off when the camera isn’t on. He joked around with us and was as nice as can be.

The funniest part of the elaborate kitchen was the sink.  We were told, everything works (oven, stove top, microwave), but the sink:

Looked like a normal sink to me.  Nope:

Here I am, killing time reading all the well wishes that were pouring in on my phone:

Catherine Neville showed up and dove right in to help get ready for the segment by whipping up the mascarpone cheese with the turbinado sugar while I point out the sink that cracked me up:

The show has begun, our segment is in 15 minutes:

Catherine is walking me through the ins and outs of how to pull this off and not look like an idiot.  She’s also reassuring me that I’ll be fine, even though I was tied in a knot at this point:

A little humor helped a lot to relax me:

And this is her telling me what the signal is to hurry up and quit talking as she had the producer whispering in her ear.  If she touched my arm, it meant I needed to wrap it up. She knows me all to well.  I do tend to ramble if given the chance, particularly when stressed.

Here they are doing the lead in to the segment.  And here I am thinking, “Don’t make an ass out of yourself.”:

And we’re on:

And like that, it was over and they were back to filming the hosts.  This is where Kent dropped the line about working with a pair of tarts:

What I didn’t know was that we were still on the air.  I had no idea that we were still in the inset on the lower right of the screen.  I’ve got to thank God that I didn’t do something goofy because I thought the cameras aimed at Cat and I were off.

After the next segment, Kent came over and did a little promo spot just to my left as I was cleaning up.  They filmed the spot maybe 3 feet from me.  And then the 9 year old in me jumped into my head.  I so wanted to jump behind him and make goofy faces or something at the camera.  This was in my head at the moment I looked at Dad who snapped this shot:

That picture was taken during the live shot.  You have no idea how much my inner adolescent almost got me blackballed from any TV in the St. Louis area ever again!?!  Hey, I’ll grow up when I’m damn good and ready!!

I want to give a big shout out and thank you to Ms. Neville.  I was all wound up and she led me through this with the grace of a true pro.  It was a lot of fun and I would’ve looked like a complete tool had I been up there alone.

Scott Thomas

Scott Thomas, the Original Grillin’ Fool, was sent off to college with a suitcase and a grill where he overcooked, undercooked and burned every piece of meat he could find. After thousands of failures, and quite a few successes, nearly two decades later he started a website to show step by step, picture by picture, foolproof instructions on how to make great things out of doors so that others don’t have to repeat the mistakes he’s made on the grill.

See Full Bio

BBQ Grilling

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This article was initially published on: January 13, 2011