Be Excellent To Each Other

I use short rib in mine now.

My single favourite cut, I think.

We got a restaurant meal box for dinner last night: Haar at home. Haar is a restaurant in St Andrews opened by Dean Banks, a finalist in Masterchef Professionals. We’ve eaten there and the food is amazing.

Ours was the steak and langoustines box. It was no where near as polished and well put together as the Home by Nico boxes and I had to prep the langoustines myself (butterfly, remove the brain and vein) which was a bit of a faff when there were so many but oh my goodness was it worth it. I had a religious experience eating this meal. I saw the face of god. It was a langoustine.

https://haarathome.co.uk/collections/al ... xury-boxes

I saw this article about a book on the science of Indian cookery, and thought it might be something a few folks here would enjoy, specifically @doctor Glyndwr amongst others https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-56066970

I totally should have taken the plunge and bought a WSM (47cm) when I was talking about it before, because (predictably) you can't get hold of them for love nor money at the moment.

Weird, I bought mine in the middle of summer last year

Stick it on eBay, Cras.

Wiener Skinning Machine?

Exactly right.

Bad time of year to buy BBQs - 2020 stock has been sold off, 2021 stock is not yet plentiful.

Got everything I need to get in on some of the smoking action now, except for the meat. I imagine there'll be a trip to the local butchers in my immediate future - although Jem did some pulled pork in the slow cooker over the weekend so I guess we should use all that before I add more to it.

What? Don't be daft, pulled pork is a condiment.

Nice recipe for Brascioloe steaks with "butter sauce":

Couple of hours into my first cook on the WSM. Took a surprising (to me) length of time to get up to temperature but broadly seems to be holding steady at ~225F.

It’s only a tiny pork shoulder from the butcher (just over 4lbs) so hopefully won’t take ages to cook through - aiming for between 190 and 200F as that seems to be recommended for easy pulling.

The InkBird thermometers are pretty snazzy and the BT range is super impressive, only downside is that the app doesn’t have an Apple Watch widget, or even a normal phone widget. Dunno if there’s another app that can do this?

Unless someone's reverse engineered the Bluetooth protocol, I doubt it. Some other thermometers have watch apps (eg I have the iGrill 2 and the Fireboard.) It's nice, but it's not totally critical.

BTW I have upgrade suggestions for the WSM whenever you're ready...

I should probably get used to the way it all works before I improve it, but yep when I'm ready I'll let you know

I would like to subscribe to your newsletter, however.

The internal temp has been 140/142 for quite a while now - just over an hour (and am now 5 hours in) - grill temp has been relatively stable at 225-230 for that time.

I guess this is the dreaded "stall"? (although from what I've read it seems like that'd be early?)

Sounds like it. From what I read just last week stall starts anywhere 140-170 depending on the species, the specific animal, the cut, the humidity, the rub, the temperature - all sorts.

It apparently being evaporative cooling, the water bath of the Weber will make it last a little longer. I did brisket last weekend and I had it on the lower rack first, it sped up when I moved it to the top.

I usually aim my Weber at 275 for pretty much everything, because I'm too lazy to start early, and it works well enough for me. Days just aren't long enough for me to cook that low!

Have admitted defeat for now, did not expect it to take this long and we have hungry children - have taken it out to be done in the oven for the last stretch.

Doubt it’ll get up to proper “pulling” temp but I’ll see how it goes.

I was gonna start it off yesterday afternoon in case it took longer than planned, but tbh I expect the shitty weather and me not really knowing what I’m doing / how much fuel to use etc. has basically stuffed me up like a kipper.

Now I see why it’s not recommended to do a brisket first

1) Foil it and bang it in the oven and it'll be just fine, you can even keep the probe in I expect

2) always start early. BBQ is cooked when it decides to be and you have no say in the matter

3) Now you know why we're still pulling meat off the smoker at midnight at meatup

Aye, it went up to 192F fairly soon after I posted so “FTC”d it for 30 minutes (needed to get kids fed otherwise I’d have left it longer)

Turned out pretty nice - a little dry perhaps (I didn’t put any sauce or anything on it towards the end) but Jem was pleased so that’ll do, pig.

And yes, a new level of respect for the Yes Chefs

Here’s the end result.

So last year I got bored and decided to upgrade my WSM and didn't really know how to stop.

I got

1) Fireboard 2 Drive - set-and-forget forced air temperature controller. Unbelievably simple to cook with this thing. Surprisingly nice side effect: set the temperature to 400-450 at the end of the cook for 10 minutes, and it'll burn all the crap off, and the smoker won't be mouldy next time you use it. Worth noting: although it has an integrated battery pack, it really wants 12V to run the fan, so don't rely on the battery unless you're only using it as a thermometer. The magnetic mount is really handy too. And it has the nicest, solidest, most premium-feeling probes I've ever seen.
https://www.fireboard-eu.com/shop/

2) Pit Viper fan - for the above - works fine with the Fireboard. The adapter kit for the Fireboard's own fan wasn't in stock, so I got this instead.
https://www.bbqland.co.uk/bbq-guru-pit- ... m-fan.html

3) Replacement door & latch - the Weber door is notoriously leaky, being made out of thin aluminium that is easily distorted. This door is a much snugger fit and has a cam-driven latch that cinches it up nice and tight to the body of the smoker, for less heat loss.
https://prosmokebbq.co.uk/collections/w ... andit-door

4) gasket seal - similar to the above, I was trying to seal up the body of it as best I could. I fitted this nomex gasket tape stuff around the lid and around the door. It's helped a lot. Cleaning before fitting it isn't too bad; I rubbed it down with a copper brush, then kitchen cleaner, then IPA. I thought it'd be a lot of work but it only took half an hour to get it looking like new, so the adhesive can stick.
https://prosmokebbq.co.uk/collections/w ... asket-seal

5) hanging rib rack - haven't even used it yet, lol, I am bad
https://prosmokebbq.co.uk/collections/w ... 5891910750

6) Hunsaker firebasket - this was a complete impulse buy but turned out to be awesome. With the fireboard taking care of temperatures, I no longer need thermal ballast, so I took the water tray out entirely and just use this now. This makes cleanup about a billion times easier, as there's no greasy pan to deal with. Also, when you want to empty the ash out, you just lift the whole thing - the ash stays in place in the bottom of it - and place it down inside a black bag. Pick it back up with the bag around it and tilt it to one side. Ash flows off, and you're done. Much, much easier than the Weber system. It also seems to regulate the burn better and more evenly, and be more resistant to getting choked up with ash. I suspect it'd easily go for 24+ hours at 275 when full of Heat Beads.
https://prosmokebbq.co.uk/collections/w ... ds-smokers


I also got some Weber Kettle things - charcoal baskets, a rotisserie, and the ash catcher assembly from the One Touch Gold to upgrade my One Touch Silver. Oh, and a stainless steel plancha/griddle for the gas grill too.

Awesome, cheers. A good seal especially will be useful.

Having seen the additional photos on Facebook the one thing I'd note is that you want that skin off - it'll never be anything but chewy rubber at smoking temps and any bark that forms on that side of the meat is wasted. Looks like good pig!

Yeah, I was more curious to see how it'd turn out with the skin still on. It was cehwy rubber, but it was tasty chewy rubber

Will definitely remove it next time though.

One of the things you have to get used to is just how much you trim off meat for smoking. It feels so wasteful.

An you smoke non-meat things, like tofu perhaps? I’m obviously not looking to get into smoking things, but I’ve only heard of it in terms of meat and wondered if it worked with other things.

Absolutely you can. There are particular chemical reactions that happen with meat that don't happen with not-meat, but you can certainly cook things and give them a smoky flavour

Oh, it cooks as well as flavours? I always thought smoking was a flavouring process only (perhaps because I saw a program about smoking fish (maybe makerel, or haddock... I don’t know much about fish) and bacon and they both are sold raw.

Hmm... I wonder if you could smoke cheese ( because you can buy smoked cheese, can’t you? Or would that melt?)

I saw a post a week or two again and I almost took a screenshot, about ‘well, you’re a white man and you’ve turned 40... time to choose between doing up old cars and smoking meat’

I've smoked cheese. And, recently, water. As you do.

I've smoked veggies for BBQ sauce. Done smoked coleslaw. You can smoke anything.

Huh. I didn’t know that. When I was a student there was a restaurant that used to make a smoked veggie lasagne, and the pasta itself was smoked, and it made a real difference to the taste.

Was the smoked water for something, Grim... or just an experiment? Did it alter the taste at all?

Weed, Heroin & Crack.

I make scratchings, which probably only works because I use s higher temperature.

All the other meat trimmings go in the beans, as is correct.

We're all talking about hot smoking. Cold smoking is more for flavour, but even then it will probably eventually cook things that aren't enormous lumps of meat.

As well as meat and beans I also smoke onions and potatoes.

Smoked water turns into smoked ice which turns into Old Fashions.

Oh my.

Have got a small brisket and a Boston butt being delivered tomorrow, so I'll be prepping those this evening for cooking over the weekend.

Fully expect to fuck up the brisket in some way, but at least it's relatively inexpensive being as small as it is.

I bought the amazon treasure truck airfyer deal this week. So this weekend I will be airfrying pretty much everything

Brisket came out nice, doubt it’ll win any awards or anything but for a first timer I’m plenty happy with it - lovely and tender Lots of slices for sandwiches over the coming few days, too!

Looks better than most of mine, I'd be over the moon to get that result.

I did lamb shoulder sous vide yesterday, pulled it this afternoon, then seared a bit this evening to go on a burger. Worked well, but it's still lamb. I don't think I'll ever like it.

I only got it to make lamb stock ice cubes for the dog - the daft bugger won't drink water except when she's *really* dehydrated so we have to find alternatives; wet food, raw carrot, ice cubes with meat in...

That looks great Gaz!

And here’s the pork butt that I was doing at the same time. Took a couple more hours than the brisket but just pulled and it’s oh so moist, much better compared against the last one - perhaps because not finished off in the oven and was left to rest for another half hour.

Only problem is that now it’s bed time and not eats time, so it’ll have to wait.

A part of me wonders if it could have gone overnight in my cool box to rest (wrapped in foil and a towel!)

Thanks, high praise indeed


Jem wants me to try a lamb shoulder next, and I do love a good bit of lamb so it’s sure tempting.


Our new doggo loves carrots and other veg, but meaty ice cubes sounds like a great idea, and would probably help his teething too!

Thanks

Lamb shoulder is my favourite thing to smoke, and shanks are one of my sous vide favourites

Gaz - I don't think it would stay safely hot overnight. You can pull it and chill it and easily reheat it though

Good looking brisket!

I bet smoked tofu would be brilliant.