Picked up a discounted 3-1/4 lb brisket flat marked “sell by today” and turned it into something way better than expected. Injected it with beef tallow, then coated it with a light smear of Au Jus prep before hitting it with a simple Texas-style rub — 50/50 CHUDS 16 mesh black pepper and kosher salt, plus a little garlic powder and a touch of Goldee's brisket rub. Let everything soak in for a couple hours before it hit the smoker.
Ran it low and slow over a touch of post oak and Jealous Devil lump charcoal until the bark set around 165–170°. Wrapped it with a little beef consommé and let it ride until perfectly probe tender. The injected tallow kept the flat incredibly juicy, rich, and beefy with a deep smoky bark and that classic pepper-forward Texas brisket flavor.
Something simple. “Rrrrice eng bins” two towns over is the largest Cuban population in America outside of Miami. There’s lots of good Cuban food in NJ. Anyway, these are my favorite beans. Smoked ham hock and sofrito are non negotiable. When I was a vegetarian I used to go to this place in Hoboken and I always used to think, man, how do they make these beans taste so good. 😂😂😂🙄🙄🙄
What a happy way to lose weight, hoovarmin . Salsa-ing those lbs away.
JCBBQ , I really like the look of those beans. I have several recipes for Cuban beans, but some of them sound so "blah" from just reading the ingredient list. What spices did you use?
Ham hock and bacon, bay leaves, green pepper, garlic, jalepeno, cumin, pepper, oregano, white vinegar and some brown sugar. I followed the NYT recipe. I think it’s pretty good.
I’m becoming a big fan of the Cholula brand products they make! After being very impressed with their Taco Seasoning last week, I decided to try a few more of their products. I’d seen Cholula branded products in stores many times in the past but never tried them until last week. While at the grocery store today I thought I’d pick up one of their frozen meals and give it a shot. And based on a recommendation from klflowers I also picked up a bottle of their hot sauce. The dinner I got was their Smoky Chipotle Chicken, gotta say, it was pretty good! There was a good amount of seasoning to let you know this was a Mexican dish, not spicy but flavorful, and the vegetables looked fresh after cooking it. I’d give this a solid B+ or A- for being a frozen meal. Their hot sauce was a winner and had a great taste and just the right amount of heat…….will be adding all this to my rotation for sure! 👍👍
jayjordan I got mine at HEB. There was only 2-3 varieties if I’m not mistaken, so they might not stand out as much as the big boys. I just kind of stumbled onto them. Do you have the HEB, Kroger and Walmart apps? I have all 3 and use them a lot to see who might have what before heading to the store. Maybe a search in the app can tell you if they have em.
Ok, could be a regional thing or somethin. 🤷♂️ I just checked the Plano HEB website and it showed they have 2 frozen Cholula enchilada varieties but didn’t show anything else from them.
Smokin-It 3D
Weber Kettle with an SNS
Masterbuilt kettle that I call the $30 wonder grill
Bullet by Bull Grills gasser
Anova WiFi sous vide machine
Thermoworks Thermapen and Chef Alarm
TACOS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Alaskan cod variety!! And….with goodness from Vitmina T - salsa taquera, salsa macha, and habanero pickled onions! These salsas just elevate whatever it is you put on them!
Ha! Cheater black beans..from the can but I put them in the processor, I like them this way much more. And the fish - grilled gave them a nice flavor paired with everything else. Hope you like them when you do cook them!
Retired, living in Western Mass. Enjoy music, cooking and my family.
Current cookers Weber Spirit 3 burner with a full insert griddle added. A 22" Kettle with vortex, SnS and a Smokey Joe. The most recent addition is a Pit Barrel Jr with bird hanger, 4 hooks and cover. ThermoWorks Smoke 2 probe, DOT, 2 ThermoPops and a Thermapen MK4. A Thermoworks RFX Gateway 2 probe meat thermometer.
12 oz. C.A.B Strip Steak. Brined a few hours with Meathead's Beef Brine/Rub. Kettle with SnS. B&B indirect to 90° flip to 120°. Then direct to sear to 130°.
I used B&B because prior to the steak, I did a pastrami. Store bought Corned Beef. It's wrapped in foil and in fridge. To be sliced tomorrow. It was about a 6.5 hour cook.
Juice, Juicy chicken.
spatchcock, trimmed, seasoned with salt and pepper,
smoked at 225*F with super smoke to internal temp 130*F internal temp
set Traeger to 350*F and continued cooking to 160*F
Tender, juicy and flavorful. Skin was a bit less than bite through.
I rate this 9/10 will do again.
Note, this was a trail cook for tomorrow for a friend who had a heart attack and 2 stents put in.
As I mentioned yesterday, I did another smoked chuck since the Kamander was already warmed up from prior night's smoking. This one was a bit smaller than the last and had more fat that I would have liked. Still came our great. Rubbed with my #1 beef rub. Smoked about 5 hours, low-and-slow, hickory for smoke, lump charcoal for fuel. 155F internal temp when pulled.
Sliced as shown before tossing in the pressure cooker for braising stage:
I used water and low-sodium beef base instead of stock for the braising liquid (along with drippings), as I think I got carried away with my beef rub (it has kosher salt) and was afraid it would come out too salty. Good call there, as it was perfectly salted.
45 minutes high pressure, natural release. It was in the 90's yesterday, so I cooked this in the mud room just off the kitchen, which is technically outside, thus keeping the house cooler. I've also been using a portable induction cooktop with my pressure cookers, which has been used a lot over the past 5 months.
Pulled the beef today after work. Really, really good.
Side note: I've given two types of lump charcoal a try: Fogo medium lump and Royal Oak. Both are working well, though Fogo is more consistent in size and cooking is easier to control. Royal Oak is a hot mess, no pun intended. I have had bark and a scrap of lumber thus far, and the pieces are all shapes and sizes. At least it burns well. I'll probably make Fogo my go-to, since I can get it right down the street and the price is not terrible.
Scotch: Current favorite- The Arran (anything by them), Glenmorangie 12yr Lasanta, sherry cask finished. The Balvenie Double Wood, also like Oban 18yr, and The Glenlivet Nadurra (Oloroso sherry cask finished) among others. Neat please.
About meReal name: Aaron
Location: Farwell, Michigan - near Clare (dead center of lower peninsula).
Occupation:
Healthcare- Licensed & Registered Respiratory Therapist (RRT) at MyMichigan Health, a University of Michigan Health System.
Teriyaki-marinated chicken breasts thinned down into cutlets, grilled briefly with some wood and chicken trimmings for flavor, then finished on the griddle. Set over a bed of sticky white rice and served with a simple Romaine salad and a Napa red. Simple can be so, so gooooood....
So you just put the scraps on the coals and let them char to ash? I would think it would produce acrid smoke which would be detrimental to the flavor instead of enhancing it, Huskee . Could you elucidate, Professor?
fzxdoc Correct. I add a few pieces of fatty trimmings, some meatier ones but mostly the fatty ones. Not a whole handful, not a lot, just a couple finger pinches worth if that makes sense. It's sort of a similar principle to meat drippings in a PBC or gas grill I think. It stinks when you smell it, and on paper sure seems like a bad idea, but it works. I don't do it the whole cook, that might be too much and be acrid.
I knew you'd have good reasoning for it, Huskee. When I make a chateaubriand on the kettle, I add a couple of poked sausages so they drip on the fire. Same idea, different way to skin that poor cat.
Retired, living in Western Mass. Enjoy music, cooking and my family.
Current cookers Weber Spirit 3 burner with a full insert griddle added. A 22" Kettle with vortex, SnS and a Smokey Joe. The most recent addition is a Pit Barrel Jr with bird hanger, 4 hooks and cover. ThermoWorks Smoke 2 probe, DOT, 2 ThermoPops and a Thermapen MK4. A Thermoworks RFX Gateway 2 probe meat thermometer.
A follow up to last nights strip steak post. BTW it's delicious. I mentioned prior to the steak, I cooked a pastrami from a store bought Corned Beef. Here's a picture after the cook. I had for lunch today and I'm a happy camper. On rye bread and spicy mustard. What a taste and tender, moist. I didn't get a picture of the sandwich. I'll make up for it tomorrow as it's lunch again. I'm going to try it with the Boars Head Deli Seasoning.
My wife recently confirmed that she has Celiac Disease and that she can no longer eat anything with gluten in it. That makes baking deserts a bit more complicated. However I found this recipe for a flourless chocolate cake and I made it for her today. We will cut it after supper tonight.
That looks great! I love a good flourless chocolate cake. Pão de queijo, a/k/a Brazilian cheese bread is gluten free, and really good. You can find a lot of recipes online, but I'll post mine in the recipes section once I can get some pics to go with it. I'll be making some soon.
It is much easier to find gluten free options today than 15-20 years ago. Partly because there are more of them and partly because you don't have to read through every ingredient in the ingredient list to make sure they didn't slip some wheat in somewhere. There's a much better chance it's labeled right on the front of the package.
Passed through Natchitoches, LA returning from New Orleans, stopped and bought frozen meat pies from Lasyone’s. Air fried them tonight and served with sweet potato. Very good, even if the only “cooking” part I did was the air fryer!
Lump charcoal and apple wood produced a fantastic flavor.
Took a few intake adjustments to get the barrel settled in, but once it was, all good. Looking fwd to hanging a few tomahawks.
6 racks of back ribs. Seasoned with Penzeys BBQ 3000 and cooked in the PBC.
Approx 1 rack was eaten that day and the rest were vacuum sealed and thrown in the freezer for emergency use. We define an emergency as "not feeling like cooking anything for dinner tomorrow evening".
6 racks! You must have hit a great sale on those BBs. Good idea to stock the freezer with them for what I call "Desperation Dinners" and you call "Emergency Use".
Thanks for the support! I can’t believe it’s been almost 10 years since joining before I posted. (I’ve been tinkering in the lab until I felt worthy of a post haha). More to come.
Retired, living in Western Mass. Enjoy music, cooking and my family.
Current cookers Weber Spirit 3 burner with a full insert griddle added. A 22" Kettle with vortex, SnS and a Smokey Joe. The most recent addition is a Pit Barrel Jr with bird hanger, 4 hooks and cover. ThermoWorks Smoke 2 probe, DOT, 2 ThermoPops and a Thermapen MK4. A Thermoworks RFX Gateway 2 probe meat thermometer.
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