No this isn't a Bill & Ted story but it's about as goofy. So I usually plan my cooks several days out while approaching the weekend, like a prize fighter waiting to slew his opponent. Most of my meat is in a freezer in my garage refrigerator and when I pull in at night and step out of my truck, that's the first thing I see. I usually reach into the frig and grab a couple cold ones for the house, but I digress. On Wednesday of last week I looked in said freezer always aware of the oldest piece of meat and sometimes the cook gets built around it. Well a nice 3 pound CAB chuck roast which I had my butcher cut for me was just that piece. So I pulled it from the freezer and placed it in the frig below to thaw while liberating said cold ones.
Well I kind of forgot about chuckie and by Friday the wife is reminding me that I was going to smoke a pork shoulder for pulled pork as my contribution to a Super Bowl/birthday bash we were invited to. No problem I go get the butt, grabbed a couple of chickens for additional credit, and proceeded on Saturday to fire up my old stick burner for the cook. Was kind of rainy and nasty so I threw up a tent over the cooker and used what turned out to be the rest of my splits for fuel, actually had to use some charcoal as well. Cook went off kind of rocky but got done by Sunday in the morning, fuel pretty much spent.
For some odd reason (I think I was checking my beer count) I went to the garage refrig and there was chuckie. Oh crap, quick thinking I de-bag it and stick it on the now almost defunct stick burner. Figure I'd get some pre-smoke benefit and sous vide it for a Monday night meal, problem solved. Well after 45 minutes or so the cooker is down to about 150* so the meat is getting no benefit at this point so instead of relighting the fire I just fired up the pellet pooper and chuck the chuckie into it for a 180* smoke. Problem solved again. He takes on what smoke he could, got up to an IT of 100* so I pulled, shrunk wrapped and refrigerated him. That evening I calculated a 24 hour bath at 130* to reach medium rare (our favorite way to do chuck now!) and let her rip. Exactly 24 hours later I come home, de-bag and immediately he goes on the sear zone on my propane gasser to be seared to a deep mahogany perfection. Sliced, diced and consumed.....
Bottom line it turned out better than anything I cooked or ate the entire Super Bowl weekend. That poor forgotten chuckie has got to hold some sort of record for the most varied cook of a piece of meat in one session; stick burner to pellet pooper to sous vide to propane. Now if that isn't the perfect definition of sous-vide-cue I don't know what is !!!
Thought you'd appreciate my musings ...... Troutman Steve is once again out !!!!!
Well I kind of forgot about chuckie and by Friday the wife is reminding me that I was going to smoke a pork shoulder for pulled pork as my contribution to a Super Bowl/birthday bash we were invited to. No problem I go get the butt, grabbed a couple of chickens for additional credit, and proceeded on Saturday to fire up my old stick burner for the cook. Was kind of rainy and nasty so I threw up a tent over the cooker and used what turned out to be the rest of my splits for fuel, actually had to use some charcoal as well. Cook went off kind of rocky but got done by Sunday in the morning, fuel pretty much spent.
For some odd reason (I think I was checking my beer count) I went to the garage refrig and there was chuckie. Oh crap, quick thinking I de-bag it and stick it on the now almost defunct stick burner. Figure I'd get some pre-smoke benefit and sous vide it for a Monday night meal, problem solved. Well after 45 minutes or so the cooker is down to about 150* so the meat is getting no benefit at this point so instead of relighting the fire I just fired up the pellet pooper and chuck the chuckie into it for a 180* smoke. Problem solved again. He takes on what smoke he could, got up to an IT of 100* so I pulled, shrunk wrapped and refrigerated him. That evening I calculated a 24 hour bath at 130* to reach medium rare (our favorite way to do chuck now!) and let her rip. Exactly 24 hours later I come home, de-bag and immediately he goes on the sear zone on my propane gasser to be seared to a deep mahogany perfection. Sliced, diced and consumed.....
Bottom line it turned out better than anything I cooked or ate the entire Super Bowl weekend. That poor forgotten chuckie has got to hold some sort of record for the most varied cook of a piece of meat in one session; stick burner to pellet pooper to sous vide to propane. Now if that isn't the perfect definition of sous-vide-cue I don't know what is !!!
Thought you'd appreciate my musings ...... Troutman Steve is once again out !!!!!
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