There was a food event this weekend in a large county called "Södermanland" in Sweden. The event is called "Aptitrundan", which roughly translates to "appetite circuit". Every farm/company working with food was invited to participate by inviting visitors to their place of business. I was enlisted by a local cattle farm called 'Landsbergs'. They produce truly outstanding meat, mostly grassfed Hereford cattle, allowed to grow slowly before slaughtering them at 30-36 months of age. Mind blowing beef flavor. They have now started breeding pigs too, and the pork is fantastic. Anyhow, the whole event was held yesterday (Sunday), with approx. 40 000 visitors. Not everyone visits every place, but we sure had our fair share. The owner, Calle, is into barbecue, so he involved me and a few other 'names' in barbecue to cook and serve the meat they sell. Which we did, it was a great success. Visitors got a tour of the farm to see how the animals were treated et.c. A few local vendors were invited to sell custom engraved leather aprons, PK grills and a few other things. Except for me smoking meat there was a burger stand also, doing smash burgers, which was a real crowd pleaser. The 'burger guy', Mathias, won the Nordic burger battle 1-2 years ago. He knows his stuff for sure.
I didn't get to take a lot of photos, sorry about that, but I was crazy busy the whole weekend. Here's a few though.
My smoker on the trailer. Getting a nice rust red color, matches my polished smoke stack well. The dogs smelled that mat cooking :-)
The crowd, long lines to get food. I'm under the black tent somewhere.
The night before: the calm before the storm
We met up for a little get-together to sample some different cuts of meat. Calle cooked oyster steak, flap meat, thick pork chops and some other nice cuts on a Primo Oval 400. Man, I like that grill. The rest of us sat around and sipped on a beer. Very laid back, we ate straight off the cutting board. Just (top quality) meat and beer. If it ain't broken, don't fix it 😃
The Primo, showing off some searing action
Nice selection of meats for us
The plan
I knew I had to cook for 300, so I hooked up my smoker, Rude Boy, behind my BMW X3 and hauled it over to the farm. I had it set up at 10:30 on Saturday morning. I then proceeded with trimming and rubbing meat. Since I was cooking a lot of meat the trimming took 2.5 hours. I planned for an overnight cook, starting at 23:00 and being done at 08:00 on Sunday morning, followed by a little sleep before the guests arrived.
Brisket trimming
The menu I created
This is what I cooked and served:
I smoked all the meat, made all the sides. It was plenty of work, but with good planning I managed to get it all ready in time.
I did 3 briskets, 3 pork hams, 15 topside beef and 25 pork bellies. All in one go, in my smoker. Pretty darn cool. I had 60 kilos (140 lbs) of meat in that smoker. Love that oak wood flavor! This means I cooked food for 300 people, single handedly. Definitely my biggest crowd yet. I'm glad Rude Boy has the capacity, monitoring more than one smoker would be too much. I'm also very glad I got a guy to help me plate and serve, on my own it would be impossible.
Read on in the next post for the second half...
I didn't get to take a lot of photos, sorry about that, but I was crazy busy the whole weekend. Here's a few though.
My smoker on the trailer. Getting a nice rust red color, matches my polished smoke stack well. The dogs smelled that mat cooking :-)
The crowd, long lines to get food. I'm under the black tent somewhere.
The night before: the calm before the storm
We met up for a little get-together to sample some different cuts of meat. Calle cooked oyster steak, flap meat, thick pork chops and some other nice cuts on a Primo Oval 400. Man, I like that grill. The rest of us sat around and sipped on a beer. Very laid back, we ate straight off the cutting board. Just (top quality) meat and beer. If it ain't broken, don't fix it 😃
The Primo, showing off some searing action
Nice selection of meats for us
The plan
I knew I had to cook for 300, so I hooked up my smoker, Rude Boy, behind my BMW X3 and hauled it over to the farm. I had it set up at 10:30 on Saturday morning. I then proceeded with trimming and rubbing meat. Since I was cooking a lot of meat the trimming took 2.5 hours. I planned for an overnight cook, starting at 23:00 and being done at 08:00 on Sunday morning, followed by a little sleep before the guests arrived.
Brisket trimming
The menu I created
This is what I cooked and served:
- Classic brisket with pickled red onion, cole slaw and a slice of bread
- Golden syrup glazed pork belly on dark rye with apple sauce, spinach leaves and pickles
- Topside beef with bourbon baked beans and a tomato salsa
- Allspice rubbed pork ham with a lemon curd glaze
I smoked all the meat, made all the sides. It was plenty of work, but with good planning I managed to get it all ready in time.
I did 3 briskets, 3 pork hams, 15 topside beef and 25 pork bellies. All in one go, in my smoker. Pretty darn cool. I had 60 kilos (140 lbs) of meat in that smoker. Love that oak wood flavor! This means I cooked food for 300 people, single handedly. Definitely my biggest crowd yet. I'm glad Rude Boy has the capacity, monitoring more than one smoker would be too much. I'm also very glad I got a guy to help me plate and serve, on my own it would be impossible.
Read on in the next post for the second half...
🤗😇🤗
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