Nine-to-six, five days a week, Robyn Medlin works in sales for a marketing company in Coral Gables.

After the stop-and-go commute home to Hollywood, she lets out her three dogs and pours a glass of white wine and heads to her backyard.

There, like some poolside superwoman, she morphs into GrillGl, the identity she created when she started blogging on GrillGl.com .

Two years later, magazines are noticing her, and she’s about to partner with McCormick spice company to develop recipes for her blog as an official "flavor correspondent."

For her first blog post in 2008, Medlin invited friends for brunch and served Grand Marnier marinated french toast, cooked on the grill.

Welcome to the adventures of a girl on the grill. Adventures she hopes other women will embrace.

Medlin, 31, started her blog as a creative outlet and to learn online social media, an important part of her job. After moving to South Florida, she discovered grilling was a year-round pursuit.

"I started to blog to document all the things I tried," she says. "Of course, there was wine consumption involved."

Medlin grew up "all over the South" and earned a journalism degree at Appalachian State University in Boone, N.C. She wanted to be a reporter, but there weren’t any jobs, so she turned to sales.

Dad was master griller

While Medlin has no formal culinary training, her mother is a great baker who makes an excellent coconut cake and her dad is a master of the Big Green Egg, the ceramic smoker/grill combo that many backyard cooks swear by.

Medlin’s recipes typically start with an online search. She loves spicy foods. She’ll find one recipe, then another and then one more, and come up with something uniquely GrillGl – never too many ingredients, never too involved. Her chipotle-sriracha Buffalo wings, for instance, start with a 3-pound bag of frozen drummettes and a marinade of just four ingredients.

Medlin wants to empower women grillers, not saddle them with hours of prep work and fussy cooking. Knowing that women, more than men, love dessert, Medlin has perfected a recipe for cobbler on the grill that includes a box of Jiffy Corn Muffin Mix.

Medlin leaves complicated cooking to her fiancé, Scott Lindars, a marketing manager for Citrix Systems in Fort Lauderdale. "We always joke that if there’s not 20 ingredients, I’m not going to cook it," he says.

The two were engaged on Christmas Eve while camping in Islamorada, off their boat . They’re headed back to Islamorada for their wedding in November.

Grilling during power failure

Medlin doesn’t want to get too excited about the future lest she jinx the wave of success she’s been riding the last few months.

"If I could make a career out of doing what I love to do, that would be great," says Medlin. "If I could stop my drive to Coral Gables every day, that would be great, too."

In the current issue of Every Day With Rachael Ray, she gets a brief mention. The editors collected tips from grillers in all 50 states and used Medlin’s tips for grilling during a power failure . Chile Pepper magazine is working on a GrillGrrl story, too.

So will Medlin become a Food Network star? Would a cookbook deal make her happy?

"Honestly? Whatever happens, happens. I’m always thinking of ways to take GrillGl to the next level. Even if I’m bottling my own hot sauce, I’ll figure something out."

These medium-spicy wings are perfect for an easy appetizer or dinner while hanging with friends outside.

Chipotle-Sriracha Buffalo Wings

Serves 4

1 3-pound bag of frozen chicken drummettes, defrosted (we used Publix brand)

1 cup Frank’s Red Hot sauce (See note.)

1 cup Sriracha chili sauce (See note.)

4 Chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, chopped

2 heaping tablespoons minced garlic

Sea salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste

Celery sticks for dipping

Scott’s Blue Cheese Dip (See recipe)

Place all ingredients except chicken in a heavy 1 gallon zip-top plastic bag. Seal and shake to combine. Add chicken and marinate in refrigerator for at least 30 minutes.

Preheat grill to medium.

Place chicken on grill, reserving marinade. Cook about 10 minutes per side

For Part 1 of the BBQ, click here

Now, on to those mushrooms I mentioned in Part 1! Once again, my indecision led me to two different mushroom dishes, instead of having to choose between them.

The first was Marsala-marinated portobello mushroom slices. This recipe produced another pairing conundrum in that the marinade had Marsala wine (a fortified wine from Sicily) blended with honey, soy sauce, olive oil and hot sauce. I wasn’t sure which ingredient to consider most, but had read wine used in cooking should take some precedence when choosing wine to serve.

With my go-to wine assistant Ryan Stanford at the Boynton Beach Total Wine store helping me, we decided upon another Sicilian wine for pairing and pulled a 2007 Cusumano Nero D’Avola ($12.99). This grape was new to me, and being the adventurous type, I was eager to give it a taste. (Cool fact: this bottle is stopped with a glass cork!) Read the full story

Day 10′s contest is over, and Kristen Carr won! Congratulations, Kristen. Her tip: Leave your food alone until it let’s go of the grill. If you try turning to early you lose the outside – burgers fall apart, chicken sheds it’s skin. It’ll release itself when it’s time to flip – just keep the temp reasonable!

Every weekday for a month, someone reading these posts will win a generous bag of groceries. Why not you?

To enter today, share your best tip for grilling. (Each weekday’s contest will be different.) Post your tip in the comments section at the end of this entry.

Please use your real email address when you register, so we can reach you when you win. (We won’t use it for any other purpose, I promise.) We’ll pick the best idea or recipe and award that person yummy foods to try!

When you win, we’ll contact you about how to collect your bag ‘o yummies in a reusable, eco-friendly shopping bag (Thanks, Whole Foods, for the bags!).

Watch this space for new questions and prizes every weekday for a month!

A few prizes are coupons for free items which will be sent to you, at no cost. Each bag also has extra packets of grocery coupons.

Every bag is different, but some of the items included are: Hungry-Man meals, Lance whole-grain snack crackers, Crisco olive oils, Skinny Cow ice cream treats, Wickles pickles, Penzey’s cinnamon, Orbit gums, Pepperidge Farm 100-calorie packs and granola cookies, Tyson products, Truvia sweetener, Eagle Mills Ultragrain flour, Zen Crunch, Dunkin Donuts, and lots of grocery coupons, too.

For great grilled vegetables that are tender inside and crispy and smoky outside, moderate heat is key. Go too high and the outside will burn while the insides remain unpleasantly crunchy.

Read the full story

The summer barbecue season wouldn’t be complete without the smoky goodness of grilled chicken.

And the best — and cheapest — way to do that is using whole chickens. Whole birds often run for under $1 per pound, which is considerably cheaper than prepared cuts, such as boneless, skinless breasts or thighs.

Whole chickens also often fare better on the dry, intense heat of a grill than do individual parts. The breasts, for example, quickly dry out. And even when properly cooked, those smaller cuts spend too little time on the grill to develop much flavor from it.

Read the full story

Grilling generally is a healthy cooking method because little or no fat is needed. But the intense, dry heat can quickly turn food tough and leathery, especially if you start with something lean.

Boneless, skinless chicken breasts, pork and beef tenderloin, as well as most white fish and shellfish, are healthy choices because they are all low in fat. That also means they usually are low in flavor and moisture, too.
For these leaner proteins be sure to season assertively using marinades and rubs, plus keep an eye on the grill to avoid overcooking. And be sure to season with salt only just before grilling, as salt can draw moisture out of the meat.
As for the grilling itself, it’s all about timing.
Boneless, skinless chicken and turkey breasts are best grilled quickly, over medium-high heat. Also, don’t use a fork to turn your poultry or you’ll just end up losing valuable moisture when you pierce the surface.
Grill chicken breasts for 4 to 5 minutes per side and turkey breasts for 3 to 4 minutes per side, or until they reach an internal temperature of 165º. Grill whole pork tenderloins over medium-high until they reach an internal temperature of 155º. The temperature will rise to the recommended 160º if you let the pork sit for 5 minutes off the grill before slicing.
To keep lean cuts of beef, such as tenderloin and round steak, from drying out, it’s best to grill them over medium-high heat to a doneness of not much more than medium-rare.
Most lighter-fleshed fish and shellfish should cook for just a few minutes per side over medium-high heat.
This recipe for fennel seed and thyme-crusted grilled shrimp uses an aromatic spice blend to create a flavorful crust. Cook the shrimp until they are just opaque, no more than 2 minutes per side.
To complete the meal, add a spicy arugula salad and some wedges of olive oil-misted grilled flatbread, which can easily be made using store-bought whole-wheat pizza dough.

Time: Start to finish 20 minutes

Fennel Seed and Thyme- Crusted Grilled Shrimp
Servings: 4
1 teaspoon whole fennel seeds
3/4 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
3/4 teaspoon garlic powder
3/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1 pound large raw shrimp, peeled and deveined
1/2 teaspoon salt
Lemon wedges, for serving

In a shallow dish, cover eight 10-inch bamboo skewers with water and set aside to soak.
In a small bowl, combine the fennel seeds, thyme, oregano, garlic powder, pepper and oil. Add the shrimp and toss to coat.
Heat a gas grill to medium-high or prepare a charcoal grill.
Divide the shrimp between the skewers, threading them through the sides. Season with salt. Grill until the shrimp are golden brown on both sides and opaque at the center, about 2 minutes per side. Serve with lemon wedges.

Per serving: 159 calories; 50 calories from fat; 6 g fat (1 g saturated; 0 g trans fats); 172 mg cholesterol; 3 g carbohydrate; 23 g protein; 1 g fiber; 460 mg sodium.