PPCLT, Pancetta, pimento cheese, lettuce and tomato.
I toasted the bread and cooked the pancetta to crispy perfection on my gasser side burner to avoid filling the house with smoke. As on my previous sandwich, I see jalapeño pimento cheese, romaine and a couple of slices of an heirloom tomato. OH-MM-GEE! Crispy fried pancetta is the bomb! It’s like a gastronomical La petite mort.
I had some leftover smoked chicken from a roast earlier this week, so I decided to make some of my chicken salad. I didn't have pics from the roast because it was ugly and looked like a fail (it was fine under the skin), but it was my typical Vortex roasting method. Here are a couple pics:
Fresh celery, mayo, a bunch of spices, and some acid; roast chicken breast and some dark meat on the right. I like my chicken salad chopped fine, so I use my Ninja to do the work on that. I always poach my chicken breast, so using leftover roast was a something a little different.
Everything mixed:
It doesn't look like much, but this is awesome. The smoked chicken just knocks this into another level of tasty. I codified my chicken salad ingredients a few years ago, but I haven't put it in Paprika yet nor written instructions. I will share in the recipes section once I do that.
I of course love smoked meats of all kinds, but also like quick cooks like chicken portions, pork tenderloins, steak and fish. Really into cooking of all kinds.
My outdoor kitchen has a Lone Star Grillz Adjustable and it is wonderful. There also is a Pit Boss 5 Burner Ultimate Griddle and a Pit Boss Copperhead pellet grill.
There is an outdoor fire pit that has grilling capability and limited Santa Maria-style grill raising and lowering.
Had a prime brisket from Sam's that was wet aged about 5 weeks. It started as 9.3 lbs. After aggressive trimming (1 hour, no bandaids, yay!) got a 3.3 lb flat.
The point was nearly as large, at 2.6 lbs.
Dry brined overnight and then hit with Meathead's Red Meat rub. Onto the LSG Adjustable as it came up to 250.
At about 4.5 hours, the point (left) was already at about 190 and very probe tender, so it came off, got wrapped in foil and went into a 170 oven.
I'm still learning this cooker and didn't quite load enough lump, so there were a few adventures with the fire while getting the flat finished. After reloading, I decided to move it to the upper shelf, which runs hotter. I also reset for a 300 cooking temp. That got us to 200 at around 7 hours (would likely have been faster without the mess-up).
The flat joined the point in the oven and got a two hour hold before we headed to our friend's house.
Very nice heirloom tomato, peach, burrata, pistachio and arugula salads met us there.
For the first time, I actually harvested the drippings from the point and put an ounce or so into the foil wrapping the flat. This was easily the tenderest, juiciest flat I have ever cooked.
Turned out great and was a pleasant evening.
The leftovers got dropped with another friend who just came down with covid.
smokenoob We hit Hutchinson Island next weekend and Italy next month. Probably won't pack the blue gloves, though.
HotSun There's a good chance it's frozen pizza for us tonight.
hoovarmin No Academy, but our daughter just dropped of some fresh-cut oak to dry for her fire pit and I'm thinking to steal a few pieces to cut to size.
22” Blue Weber Kettle with SnS insert
Kamado Joe Jr with Kick Ash Basket
Char-Broil Smartchef Tru Infrared Gasser
Anovo Hot Tub Time Machine with Custom Hot Tub
Last night I tried a Stromboli again. Better prep. I brushed it with garlic butter and sprinkled herbs and Romano cheese. And I did it on the weber. Served with wings also from the grill. Marinara for dipping. Raw veggies not shown.
Oldest Daughter came over today. Told her I would make Tuna Tetrazzini. She said I had fed her tuna the last 2 times she had been over. So, Beef Stroganoff it is then! I caught her filling up a Tupperware to take home.
Well, given it is football season, I decided to try some tailgating-esque food. A few days ago, Malcom Reed posted a really interesting video on his Instagram for cheese-stuffed sausage dogs, so I absolutely had to make them. Here's the link to the video: https://www.instagram.com/p/CwXzjo6Pa6g/
(Quick aside: while he has not abandoned his YouTube channel by any means, most of his stuff is now short-format videos on Instagram that he cross-posts to TikTok. He tends not to post these also to YouTube for some reason.)
I wanted to use hot Italian sausage like Malcom did, but my wife didn't want it....even though I don't consider it hot at all, so I went with mild.
I took some string cheese and sliced them in half, lengthwise. I also trimmed them down by about an inch, although I don't think that was necessary. Slicing the sausages open and placing the cheese inside was a breeze.
After that, I wrapped each sausage with two strips of bacon. Do not use thick cut here; by the time it would crisp up, the sausages will be horrendously overdone.
I dusted all of them with Malcom's The BBQ Rub, as he also does in the video. I had a long strip of bacon leftover, so I placed it on the rack as well.
Into my Chimp they went (Malcom also used a pellet grill) at 350 F. It took about 40 minutes for the bacon to crisp up and the sausages to get to 160 F internal.
Here they are about to be pulled. You can see the gooey cheese oozing out on top.
Now, I did make one mistake here. I totally forgot about my past experience. If I use a sheet tray like this, it acts as a heat shield and the bacon on the bottom of the sausages will not crisp well. (I suspect this also happened to Malcom as you never get to see the bottom of the sausages in his video.)
I plated them up as Malcom did: a little mayo in a hot dog bun, the bacon-wrapped cheese sausage and garnished with slices of fire-roasted red peppers (the ones from a jar) and some mustard.
This was good, but wow is it rich! I normally can easily eat two hot dogs. I could only eat one of these! And thankfully, the lesser-crisped bacon didn't negatively affect the dish all that much.
I really liked how the fennel-flavored sausage went so well with the red pepper slices. That was good.
barelfly I was going to mention that but forgot! I kinda want to try Matt's version to compare. Matt does elect not to wrap his in bacon, which I think is the better idea. The bacon makes these really heavy.
Did some filets via sous vide que today. Ordered these from Wild Fork, but didn't read the fine print. Thought I was getting 8oz filets, but they were pairs of 4oz-ers.
Dry brined about five hours then into the SV at 131F/55C for four hours after dousing with granulated garlic and coarse ground black pepper. Vac sealed them with a glug of EVOO and a bay leaf.
After the SV, patted them good and dry and hit them with Uncle Chris's steak seasoning (because it's Extra Fancy).
We had a line of storms passing through, but, undeterred, I fired up the gasser and ran back and forth between the grill and shelter to get them seared on the flat side of my GrillGrates. Plated with steamed broccoli and baked taters.
Steaks were tender as buttah, just delicious. Sear could have been a bit better, but it was raining hard! Taters and broc were wonderful, and I poured a 2019 Hall Ranch zinfandel to go with. Definitely successful.
Here's the link to the video: 
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