first smoke of the spring

O.K., I was lucky enough to have a work-at-home day on this wonderful Spring Friday. A perfect day for stoking the smoker in the early morning, then laying on the meat for my first bbq of the season (I promise that I did work during the 10-12 hours of smoking).

The smokees were four nice briskets and three pork roasts from Costco, dry-rubbed and held overnight) and about six pounds of fresh, nicely spiced hot links from Tony’s on Elston. The woods were oak and hickory.

To monitor the smoking temp, I used a new remote thermometer that displays both meat and smoking chamber temp. Not spot-on accurate, but close enough. I used a second back-up remote for the meat temp. I’m an expatriate Texan, and I’ve been doing this enough to have developed a sixth sense about the heat source, but I used the remotes because of the long trek: out of courtesy to my nice Albany Park neighbors in the Spring and Summer, I haul the smoker out near the alley between garages. The alley provides a nice smoke-pull effect that takes the stream away from open windows. During the Fall and winter, I smoke under a protected area under my back-yard deck.

Anyway, after a day at 200 degrees, here’s the result:





Briskets and hot links at the start





Pork roasts



Briskets



Brisket



Brisket and hot links



Pulled pork and sauces (of course I have cole slaw for the sandwiches)

Because I really DID work during the day, I opted for the easy way out regarding sauces: I had a bottle each left of my favorites of the two Carolina commercial sauces: Shealy’s S.C. mustard sauce and Scott’s N.C. vinegar sauce. These are both great, and available by mail-order:
http://www.shealysbbq.com/
http://scottsbarbecuesauce.com/

Um . . . my brisket needs no sauce, thank you, except, perhaps, for chopped brisket sandwiches fashioned from the “burnt” ends.

Yow . . . You don't think that our esteemed City Council would ever ban outdoor meat-smoking . . . . ?

Cheers,
Wade

waderoberts wrote:Yow . . . You don't think that our esteemed City Council would ever ban outdoor meat-smoking . . . . ?

Wade,

Why, yes I do given the fact that Honey 1 has received numerous visits from the Chicago Dept. of Environment about their practice of burning actual real wood to make BBQ.

Your BBQ looks terrific! You said you live in Albany Park, umm, where exactly, seems I have an errand on your street later.

Enjoy,
Gary

Wade,

It all looks excellent.

On your pulled pork, did you pull it or chop it or alternatively pull it and chop the bark?

Have your neighbors complained about the smoke? While I do it on my back patio, the whole neighborhood is scented with my cook. Once your cook is launched you don't have too much smoke coming from your smoker, right? I don't live in too close quarters presently. If it should ever change, then I may have to deal with unhappy neighbors, though the common strategy seems to be to feed them.

Regards,

Cathy2 wrote:Wade,


Have your neighbors complained about the smoke? While I do it on my back patio, the whole neighborhood is scented with my cook. Once your cook is launched you don't have too much smoke coming from your smoker, right? I don't live in too close quarters presently. If it should ever change, then I may have to deal with unhappy neighbors, though the common strategy seems to be to feed them.

Regards,

This strategy seems to work well. Many years ago when my grandfather was still alive and living in Beverly he had a smoker and when he'd get it going he'd have a neighbor that would always complain to him and threaten to call a complaint in on him. As soon as he started bringing some of the meat over for them to sample, all the complaining melted away, and everything went back to being friendly.

I've only had a couple through the five years at this place, but they were from the same older lady in the six-flat next door who complained that my 75-watt back-porch light kept her awake at night.

She is now gone; I think the six-flat is being re-habbed into condos .

The smoke is minimal, but the fire/grease/meat smell DOES spread. In another neighborhood, I received a visit from the fire department, which was alerted by an alert neighbor who was certain that my place was on fire.

Spreading the joy (sharing) does work wonders with the neighbors. I do that regularly.

I chop the pork, and then pull it by hand. Pix of the sandwiches to come.

Cheers,
Wade

I may be a native Texan, but I'm not a brisket-bigot. I love bbq in all of its regional inflections (including mutton).

Here are the pulled-pork sandwiches with cole slaw (left, with S.C. mustard sauce; right, with N.C. vinegar sauce), and the requisite white-bread buns.



Just don't get me started on chili.

Cheers,
Wade

Wow

That looks amazing.. I live in Albany park too.. I guess the next time you fire up the smoker I'll have to follow my nose!

The pictures are amazing, especially the pork roast -- my mouth is watering. That's some impressive bbq! I'm very jealous as I have no room for a smoker and my gas grill just won't cut it.

Cathy2 wrote:Have your neighbors complained about the smoke?

We have a small electric smoker. It gets used mainly for things like turkey breasts and almonds. The latter are frequently a holiday thing, and cold outdoor temps require an extended smoke, so we often leave the thing going all night, near our back door.

In the middle of winter, on the concrete patio outside our brick house, there's hardly any kind of fire risk in leaving this wimpy little electric smoker unattended and it doesn't put much smoke in the air, but despite having the process explained to him, our former next door neighbor used to get upset about it and would call us at 1 in the morning to tell us there was smoke in our back yard. He didn't really think the place was on fire -- he'd have called the fire department -- he was just annoyed any time we did anything "messy."