Any Time is Grillin Time

[lunatic59]

The wife was is the mood for ribs yesterday so I whipped up a nice St. Louis style rack for her. I can never get a picture of them when I make them. They don't last long enough. Accompanied by sauteed summer vegetables (green and yellow squash, peppers, onions and mushrooms) on a bed of rice and a bottle of chardonnay.


*burp*

Followed by a cognac and a nice cigar.

 

[olbriar]

I'm hungry for ribs. Have been since I smoked some for my neighbors. Maybe next weekend... hope so.

 

[ocnbrze]

I'm hungry for ribs. Have been since I smoked some for my neighbors. Maybe next weekend... hope so.

what time should i come over?

 

[Unforgiven]

It has been a while, but I finally cooked something on the grill. Boneless chicken thighs rubbed down with a sweet rub, black pepper, and some chili powder glazed with a homemade soy sauce, honey, red pepper, and garlic sauce to finish it.

 

[olbriar]

Now that's what I'm talking about. We do a lot of boneless skinless chicken thighs on the grill. They are cheap and very versatile. Your cook looks great!

 

[ocnbrze]

so grilling up some beef short ribs with some friends marinated with a bunch of onions and a teriyaki sauce i made. its basically soy sauce, brown sugar, sembal (hot chili sauce), hoisin sauce, and worcestershire sauce).

please solve this for me........i think bbq means with wood or charcoal......gas has nothing to do with it.....right?

edit: also doing a little experiment. i put a whole onion on my grill i did not cut or anything. it went straight from the store to the grill. i plan on slow smoking it until the outside is charged and the inside is soft. i saw a thing on the internet and wanted to try it out.....anybody try this before?

 

[Unforgiven]

please solve this for me........i think bbq means with wood or charcoal......gas has nothing to do with it.....right?

meh, I wouldn't stress that definition. Grilling and Smoking are different or the same depending on your methods, temps, etc, but I've had pretty good bbq from ovens, gas grills, pellet grills, electric smokers, and charcoal grills.

 

[ocnbrze]

yeah i know. but my friend thinks he is a grilling master. but all he has ever used were gas grills. he came over and had no idea on how to light and get the coals going on my char-broil kamander, which is their much cheaper version of the green egg. he thought he was all high and mighty until that point. to me bbq will always be with wood or fire. gas just seems like an extension of the stove or oven from the kitchen, except you get to cook outdoors which is nice.

 

[olbriar]

There are numerous ways too slow bake or sear meats. It would be fun to be master of them all. I once had some outstanding pulled pork that was slow cooked in a crock pot with Dr. Pepper lol. And the amazing thing was... it was darn good. I've never tried smoking meats with a stick burner or burying meat with hot coals. I've tried about everything else one time or another. I'm a master of none
I sure enjoy the cooks and the meals however.

I smoked boneless skinless chicken breasts and thighs last night. I brined the pieces for a few hours then I rubbed them with a hot rub.... mostly habanero powder and garlic powder. I smoked them in a shallow pan to let them baste in their own juices. I finished them off with a sweet bbq sauce that I let set on the chicken before serving. Boneless skinless = dry if you aren't careful. This chicken turned out fantastic. Sweet and then very hot and quite juicy. Clean up was no fun but I'll cook them that way again. Being an old scout, I'll remember the trick of soaping the bottom of my pan over smoke next time.

 

[Unforgiven]

...or burying meat with hot coals...

^^^I was camping with friends one time, long before I was big into grilling and smoking and some folks we were camping with just doused a pork loin with kosher salt and fresh ground pepper, then mummified it with waxed paper and tossed the whole damn thing in the fire for about 2 hours. It was fantastic. I've wanted to try that ever since but keep forgetting until I get reminded. LOL. But proves the point, there's no "right" way to make tasty, so really no way better than another. If it tastes good, then its a good cook.

 

[olbriar]

^^^I was camping with friends one time, long before I was big into grilling and smoking and some folks we were camping with just doused a pork loin with kosher salt and fresh ground pepper, then mummified it with waxed paper and tossed the whole damn thing in the fire for about 2 hours. It was fantastic. I've wanted to try that ever since but keep forgetting until I get reminded. LOL. But proves the point, there's no "right" way to make tasty, so really no way better than another. If it tastes good, then its a good cook.

When my kids were little, we had a membership to an old sand pit. Fishing and swimming was the norm but we adults partied way into the wee hours many nights while the kids slept in my van. It was a small group and we often pooled our resources for a cookout. At the end of the second or third year we were members, the owner dug a pit and built a fire in it. I don't know how he prepared the half hog but he then buried it in the coals and we uncovered it that night... might have even been the second night.. no clue. It was simply amazing. He put on the pork and a keg and we all got fat and drunk. I do believe it was the best pork I've ever eaten. I wish I had paid attention to how he prepped the hog and what he seasoned it with. It seems like it might have been wrapped in burlap.. man, I just don't remember. He had the pit covered with a couple of sections of corrugated tin with dirt on top to hold it down. An interesting cook that I've contemplated trying to duplicate for a year end blowout at the cabin. Sure would hate to bugger that much meat though.

 

[olbriar]

It's about time for me to smoke some shank steaks again. I have some in the freezer but I have a rain check for ten steaks buy one get one free. I might just pull the trigger on that and restock and then smoke some up.

My son did a slow, no wrap, no spritz pork butt last weekend. I might have to try that cook soon. It took 15 hours at 250° to complete the cook but what bark.. wow. The pic he showed me looked wonderful. He pulled it and mixed it with chili paste and served it up with fresh tortillas and avacodo slices.

 

[Unforgiven]

My son did a slow, no wrap, no spritz pork butt last weekend. I might have to try that cook soon. It took 15 hours at 250° to complete the cook but what bark..

That's how I always do my pulled pork. Be prepared though, I've had butts that weight the same amount and smoke them at 225 and sometimes it's 10-12 hours and sometimes it's 14-15 to reach 205 internal. That's what makes FTC such a dream solution.

So we have a local farm who's corn just came into season and its always the best. My dinner request from my wife was Foppama's corn, and good food. So I grabbed a half dozen ears of corn, 3 lobsters weighing 4lbs. total, 5 lbs. of steamers, and a few steaks. The ocean cockroaches (lobster) will get steamed as is. I'll soak the steamers for a bit to get the salt and sand out, then steam them with fresh cut basil and peppercorns. The corn will be steamed in the house because I only have so many outside steaming options. Finally, the steaks are just sirloins, so I'll rubs them in Montreal and so a reverse sear cook.

Since the weather is hot, the food is messy, and I got nuthin' to do tomorrow, I'm going to crank up a camp fire in the back yard just before we sit down to eat, we can burn all of the clam shells (they actually burn great BTW) and my wife can have some S'Mores

 

[olbriar]

That's how I always do my pulled pork. Be prepared though, I've had butts that weight the same amount and smoke them at 225 and sometimes it's 10-12 hours and sometimes it's 14-15 to reach 205 internal. That's what makes FTC such a dream solution.

I have always rapped my butts at 160° or so. It only takes sixty to ninety minutes to finish from there. It shortens the cook a lot! It also cheats the eaters from having a lot of bark in the pulled pork. I like the bark.. I'll have to do a full slow cook soon.

So we have a local farm who's corn just came into season and its always the best. My dinner request from my wife was Foppama's corn, and good food.

Sounds great and fun too. I love to smoke/roast corn on the smoker. Corn is at all the farmer's market here as well. So far I've passed up the corn because of my teeth situation. It's killing me. I love good corn.

I had some time this afternoon and ran to Costco. My cook for tomorrow will be ribeye caps instead of flank steaks. They weren't on sale but I just couldn't say no to a couple of beautifully marbled steaks. I scored some boneless rib strips and a package of pork shoulder country style spareribs. They had a couple of nice looking slabs of atlantic cod that almost jumped in my basket. I was laying low for some salmon but all they had today was farm raised. I stopped and marveled at a full ribeye slab..roast. It would be fun to try slow smoking such a huge chunk of prime meat. At $174 dollar I'd be a bit nervous smoking it but it would just have to be some kind of wonderful!

Have fun at the clam bake my friend. Enjoy your day with the family.

 

[dontpanicbobby]

So my Nephew bought a Weber style grill.
The funny thing is he doesn't use it.
Are there no cast iron double Hibachis left for sale?

 

[olbriar]

I saw a couple the other day. It might have been in an Ace Hardware though it might have been elsewhere. I stopped and looked at them and was thinking of your desire for one. These were still well made and designed well. I was impressed.

I've never owned a Weber though they are supposed to be great and carry a price tag that reflects their popularity. I've had a desire lately to return to the charcoal scene. I would use it to put a great sear of steaks and chops etc. I'm still very much in the smoker camp for my cooking. I have an old Jen Air gas grill that takes up a lot of real estate on my patio. It's a beautiful cooker and high dollar investment as well. I've replaced and repaired it many times until there is nothing that I can do to make it functional again. Perhaps I can locate a cast iron roasting pan that might serve as a charcoal bed and use it once again. The thought just came to me but now my interest is piqued. Being as I can't bring myself to toss a $1200 cooker and I have a desire for a charcoal grill... hmmmmmm

 

[olbriar]

I'm trying something different with my ribeye caps today. I just put them in a marinate of allegro, beer, and a dash of garlic. Coarse salt and pepper prior to the fire naturally. They have a stand alone flavor as is but my wife was hungry for a bit of allegro taste. We'll see.

 

[olbriar]

I can't say that the marinate enhanced the flavor of the caps. I didn't even taste it. On the other hand, it didn't hurt them any. They were excellent.

 

[olbriar]

Well, opportunity knocked today and I tried but failed to ignore it. I even asked around and tried to hand the deal off to another but the timing was wrong for everyone. So.. tonight I took the deal. One of my son's coworkers recently purchased a Green Mountain Jim Bowie pellet smoker. He discovered it is just too big to transport back and forth to the lake property he frequents. It has less than ten cooks through it and in perfect shape. $950 new and I bought it for $350. It's the largest of the Green Mountain smokers... a step larger than the Daniel Boone model I have. It's WiFi equipped and has the stainless lid. It's more smoker than I need most of the time but on rare occasions I'll enjoy the extra grill space. And, mine though working fine, has not quite been the same since it suffered an electric spike this spring. The icing on the cake is that while asking about for someone I thought might be interested in the deal, one of my best friends son (a son to me as well) wanted the cooker so very badly but just didn't have the money. I upgrade my cooker and I gift him my old smoker. Win win!

 

[Unforgiven]

Nice score. I've decided my next one will be much larger as well.

 

[olbriar]

The Green Mountain Prime is the one I want. It's the $950 model. The one I bought yesterday is $750. It's still a good deal. The Prime has windows at the hopper and lid, two probes, and much heavier duty in all respects. It has a keep warm feature that might be nice as well. Same size as the Jim Bowie.

 

[olbriar]

Reading up on the GM Jim Bowie Prim it does come with a well thought out feature that would be sweet. It has a sealed access port with a tube running to the fire pot. It's designed to open the port and stick your shop vac over the pipe to clean the ashes from the fire pot. This would eliminate the need to remove all of the heat shield and grease ramp to do the chore. I need that

I did receive my new to me Jim Bowie Saturday morning. It was a bit more used than represented so it was just a so so deal. If I hadn't already given my Daniel Boone model away I would have said no to the deal. I cleaned on it ( very dirty) and fired it up. It worked fine so I guess that's the bottom line. I smoked out some boneless spare ribs Sunday and the cook went without a hitch. I still wish I had just bought the Prime unit and not bought the used smoker. It's hard for me to believe someone would let a cooker get that greasy.
It is a wonder it hadn't caught on fire Oh well.... I have a big smoker now.

 

[Unforgiven]

I found some Kansas style ribs on sale so I'm making them tomorrow. Tonight I'm doing a family favorite I haven't made in a couple years. Cheddar stuffed hot dogs wrapped in bacon.

I made a turdload and froze about 24 of them for future cooks.

Nothing fancy, slice a hot dog down the middle, put in some cheddar, and wrap in bacon securing the ends with toothpicks.

 

[olbriar]

That looks seriously good for hot dogs! My wife has a desire to cut way back on her carb consumption. She eats her hot dogs without a bun. This is right up her alley. Thanks!

I have chuck beef ribs.. (strips) smoking, I wrapped them at 160° and will call them done at the two hundred or so mark. They are almost ready to put in the hot box. Baked sweet potato and sliced mushrooms softened in butter and garlic will complete the meal. Tomorrow it's baby backs. I'll do the 3-3-1 cook on them. It's been a while since we've had ribs. They sound really good.

 

[ocnbrze]

right now i'm marinating some cherry cola wings for the grill and that will be served with grilled eggplants and a mixed summer greens salad with cherries and a champagne vinaigrette.

edit: made the cherry cola bbq sauce all by myself with real cherries.