Home on the Grill

I would love to become adept at cooking foods on the grill.  I try, but I'm never as satisfied as when the expert does the cooking.  It just tastes so much better then!

Recently I did make an attempt, however.  My friend, Renee, gave me some cute little eggplants that she had gotten in her CSA package. 

I brought them home, washed them, sliced them in half, brushed them with a wee bit of olive oil and put them on the grill.

My loaded grill

That is the cute little eggplant there in the gill basket.  I also brushed slices of a garlic loaf with some Mediterranean dipping sauce and marinated some special Smith pork chops with a secret concoction. 

The garlic bread toasted up nicely and was quite delicious.  Then, the flame under the pork chops got a little carried away on me and blackened them a bit more than I wanted.

They were still nice and moist and flavorful - probably because I kept slopping sauce on them the entire time I was cooking them.  However, I just don't like them when they are blackened like that.

I sprinkled the eggplant with a little cheese right before I took them off the grill.  I'm wishing I'd just grilled them till tender and sprinkled a bit of Parmesan cheese on them.  They were tasty but not as light as when Mike cooks big eggplant with only a bit of Parmesan. 

My light, hot off the grill dinner looks beautiful.  However, it wasn't quite as light and tasty as when the master chef does all the cooking.  Is it because I am not at home on the grill or is it because anything tastes better when it is prepared special for me?