Live fire cooking and barbecue have been so intimately linked with human evolution and history and politics. Everything we do, barbecue informs it in some way.

Where your food comes from is as important as how you smoke it.

My message is use grass-fed beef, use heirloom pork varieties, use organic chickens, wait until wild salmon or wild seafood are in season, smoke organic vegetables.

I really love the smoked ice cream because it's so unexpected. Yet when you taste it, it's sort of familiar and otherworldly at the same time. I guess that's what I really like about what smoke does to food.

If you're new to the smoking game, the first dish I suggest you smoke would be a pork shoulder. Unlike brisket or ribs, the meat is intrinsically tender. It's very well marbled both on the outside of the shoulder and throughout the meat, so even if you overcook it, even if you get a spike in temperature, it's very hard to screw up. It usually comes out moist, crispy and delicious no matter what you do to it.

Live fire cooking and barbecue have been so intimately linked with human evolution and history and politics. Everything we do, barbecue informs it in some way.

One thing that has been fascinating to me is the exploding interest in traditional American barbecue in Europe. We Americans have historically always imported food ideas from other places, and now we are exporting this gastronomic treasure called barbecue.