Make your last summer barbecue healthy: Avoid this common mistake

We have a long weekend ahead, and as the summer grilling season draws to a close, it's worth making the most of the good weather and firing up the grill with some meat. However, before you start daydreaming about delectable pork neck, it's important to know how to avoid any potential health issues.

If grilling were an Olympic sport, we'd return from Paris with an armful of gold medals. Whenever the weather is kind to us, the aroma of grilled sausage and blood sausage wafts from back gardens and balconies. Alongside these, you often find pork neck on the grill, which requires a bit more time. While we shouldn't consume too much pork due to its fatty nature, we can exacerbate the problem with improper marinade. One ingredient can transform even the best-seasoned and freshest meat into something harmful.

It seems to be an essential part of the marinade, holding everything together. Some people even add it to spices when marinating meat in buttermilk. Oil, which we are discussing, is not a suitable addition to marinated pork neck. It's not about taste or cost, but the most valuable thing we possess – our health.

At high temperatures, oil drips onto the hot coals, creating smoke and harmful substances. Additionally, the pork neck becomes as tough as shoe leather and burns quickly. However, that's not the goal of grilled meat, although some people like charred meat. For your health's sake, it's better to avoid such overly-cooked pieces.

You might wonder, how am I supposed to marinate the meat if the spices won't stick? There's a problem, so there must be a solution. If you want to create a fragrant marinade, use liquid ingredients such as soy sauce, honey, wine vinegar, or citrus juice. Add a pinch of turmeric, ginger, and aromatic herbs like thyme or oregano. For those who prefer spicier flavours, we also recommend adding hot pepper.

You can use dry spices according to your tastes and preferences. However, it's definitely worth forgoing the oil.