Well, all was not lost with the subpar brisket.
I made Burnt Ends out of the point.
They are/were a little too rich. They needed more fat removed. I would give them a 7/10. I almost Made the mistake of using a Pork belly burnt end recipe. Glad I reviewed the recipe for brisket burnt ends.
Anyway, I included a picture just to show it did happen.
Tonight I tried to recreate a dish I used to order at T.K.Tripps, a regional chain restaurant here in NC, years ago when the kids were young. There was a server there named Jeff that was great with small kids and would even take them over to watch him put in orders. That was one draw with the other being the dish of which I spoke.
They called it southwest chicken pasta and was composed of penne, Italian pink sauce (tomato cream or Parma rosa) and Cajun spiced blackened chicken. After dry brining about 3 hours, I did a SV cook of the chicken breasts at 149F for 1.5 hours. After the sauna, I doused it well with Spiceology BK blackening rub. In retrospect, I should have read the ingredients before searing. There was nothing with heat in the rub. Mea culpa.
I sliced some peppers and onions to go in the dish like I remember at Tripps. I found a pretty good Parma Rosa sauce recipe online to use which turned out slightly above average but just didn’t have the umami I wanted. After putting it all together I was underwhelmed but hopeful that my next iteration will improve upon this foundation.
Giving the breasts a good sear between a rock and hard place.
Finished breasts, one plain for the pooch.
The fully assembled dish with penne, Parma Rosa, blackened chicken strips, red pepper flakes, basil and Parmesan. I wish it would have tasted as good as it looked.
I'm starting to get some reliable puff on my tortillas. I'm starting to get some timing and rhythm going, which is key, I think.
And Tacos de Pescado. I really need to make these even more often than I already do. Except for the whole "making tortillas because the ones in the fridge went moldy" thing, you can throw these together in the time it takes to heat the oil.
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
Turkey and black bean chili (notwithstanding the delusional ravings of that madman, texastweeter), made with leftover smoked turkey breast and a batch of Rancho Gordo Midnight Black beans. Ridiculous levels of detail in this thread. Amazingly excellent!
I use the side burner on my gasser, and my camp stove to make this. So easy and so good. Try it with the hulihuli sauce from the free site for a change.
Grill/Smoke/Roast = SnS Grills Kettle + SnS Deluxe Insert & Drip n' Griddle
Grill/Smoke/Roast = Hasty-Bake Gourmet Dual Finish with HB rotisserie and Grill Grates
Smoke = Weber Smokey Mountain 22.5"
Pizza = Blackstone Propane Pizza Oven (Stacy's, but she let's me use it sometimes)
Indoor Cooking = LG Studio 30" gas range
Camp Cooking = Coleman 2 burner white gas stove
Thermometer = FireBoard FBX2 with 2 ambient and 6 meat probes
Thermapen Mk IV = Light blue
Thermapen Mk IV = Black
PID Controller = Fireboard Drive + Auber 20 CFM Fan (FB gen 1 fan)
PID Controller = Fireboard Drive + Fireboard 20 CFM Fan (FB gen 2 fan)
Knives
Wusthof Classic Ikon set: 9" carving knive, 2X 8" Chef's Knife, 7" Santoku and three utility knives
Kamikoto Kuro set: 7" Santoku, 6.5" Nakiri, 5" Utility
Amazing Ribs Brazilian Steak knife set
Favorite wine = whatever is currently in the wine rack
Favorite beer = Sam Adams Boston Lager or Shiner Bock
Favorite whisky = Lagavulin Distiller's Edition 16 year old single malt
Best Cookbooks - Meathead's "The Science of Great Barbecue and Grilling", Chris Lilly's "Big Bob Gibson's BBQ Book", Aaron Franklin's "Franklin BBQ", Raichlen’s “Brisket Chronicles”
Current MCBS - Momofuku
Current fanboy cookbook - "Chasing Smoke: Cooking Over Fire Around the Levant"
Pastrami on rye with brown mustard and sauerkraut plus beef barley soup. Only thing missing is a Brooklyn Lager!
I gotta say, Dave’s Killer Bread Rye is pretty damn good. Darn good for grocery store Rye. Made the pastrami myself, start to finish. Same with the soup. And got enough of both for lunches all next week!
Last edited by ecowper; October 6, 2023, 08:36 PM.
ecowper Good point about, uh, the point. I might have inadvertently used a flat thinking it would be best for sandwiches, but I definitely now agree that a point will set me up for the most success.
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
Simple chicken wings off the weber. Rubbed with a store bought “buffalo” rub. It’s really tasty 😋 and served with leftover delivery pizza and tons of celery and cucumber and bleu cheese dressing.
AfFirst low and slow session on my new Pellet Pooper. Kosher salt and black pepper. Started at 0230 this morning. Set at 200°F. B&B pecan pellets. At the six hour mark it's started taking on some color. I'm not going to wrap. Just spritz occasionally with a 50/50 mix of ACV and water. I'm trying to see the effects of time and get an idea about the smoke profile. I'm using pecan because my wife doesn't like a strong hickory flavor. If the pecan on this butt is very mild, I'm going to try and sneak in some hickory on the next butt.
After 10 hours the butt hit the stall at 171°F. and remained there. This is the butt at the stall. With game time approaching I decided to wrap it in butchers paper and increase the heat to 260F. The internal temp started rising and by halftime, I started probing. It was done at 196°. Tender, juicy and a nice smoke flavor the my wife enjoyed. It was a pleasurable cook without any technical errors.
In my experience it's very difficult to tell one wood smoke flavor from another from pellets. Even mesquite pellets, ostensibly from one of the strongest flavored smokes, are tough to tell apart from anything else. Does your unit have a low-temp "smoke" or "turbo" setting by any chance? That step really helps getting smoke on the meat when it first goes in, cold out of the fridge when uptake is strongest. Looking forward to seeing the result!!
I'm a pellet head. Love my Traeger, but the prices
I cooked really good ribs and a spatchcocked chicken on the cheap, lowest-cost Pit Boss pellet grill.
Some days you just want a steak sandwich: thinly-sliced seasoned flank steak seared in cast iron, placed on a homemade bagel with horseradish mayo, red onion slivers, dill pickles, and swiss cheese.
For something that I threw together at the last minute (bagel was frozen, steak was from last night)..... that was a good sandwich!
The horseradish mayo was ~2 tbl Hellman's mayo, about a 1 tsp of prepared horseradish, and 1/2 a tsp or so of lemon juice.
So with the weather getting cooler I got the bug to make some ham and split pea soup
Threw everything in a skillet to give it some color
Put it in a pot to simmer for about an hour
The results were good but a little salty. I was able to tamp it down with some heavy cream. I used a ham steak from the local store, and it didn't taste overly salty but over time I guess it leached out into the soup. I have two plans for the next batch.
1) Place the ham in cold water for an hour or two before using to remove excess salt
or
2) Once the soup is ready add then add the ham for 15 minutes or so just to heat it up
I would go with choice 2. The cold water soak could have unintended consequences on the texture of the ham IMO, but if you add it late, just long enough to heat through, you'll get the full hamminess and, as you say, much less time to draw out the salt. You could do the experiment and make a split batch, one each way, and test it out, even! *nrrrrrrrrrrd*
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