Brinkman markets a nearly identical grill, manufactured by the same folks, I'd guess. They are terrific. Use mine more than my big kettle. The adjustable pan comes in handy for searing.

Thanks Gary. Years ago a friend of mine had a larger version of that style of grill (with the movable charcoal grate). I was very impressed with it, but hadn't seen one in a while.

(BTW, I factored-in the free grill ... and my perception of your review didn't change.)

I wanted to make some sausage this weekend, but forgot to soak the hog casings and ended up improvising.

I cut some chunks off of a frozen pork butt, sprinkled with sea salt and red pepper. I chopped up a lot of garlic thyme and rosemary to mix with it during the grind.



I then rolled it into a sausage shape and wrapped in prosciutto (instead of stuffing into a casing, but is it sausage?!? A fancy fatty w/o a center?).



I cooked it at around 250-300 over a cherry/apple fire for about 40 minutes.

I roasted a yellow pepper and made a roasted pepper sauce by processing the pepper with EVOO, champagne vinegar, honey, and a dash of cumin. I toasted a bun on the stove w/duck fat and threw some chunks of aged Gouda on top of it.



This was good. Gooooooood.......

Before I can tender judgement on whether that constitutes sausage I'm going to have to have a sample. for, uh, testing. Perhaps several samples just in case.

Wow those look fantastic. I recently saw someone do a similar thing using a tamale wrapper instead of a casing. I've been really wanting to do some sausage lately and now I am properly motivated. Time to pull a shoulder out of the deep freeze.

One note-How was the texture of the prosciutto after the smoke?

being that there's a TON of swine eaters in this smoke meat thread........

I've done a little searching on LTH, and don't want to start a new thread cause I'm sure there's one already but can't find it...

If I want a source for pasture raised pig meat close to the Northside of Chicago, and fat to render to my own lard, where do I bring it up?

I got my pig from Gunthorp and I have been more then pleased.

go see Nate with Jakes Country Meats at the Loagn Square farmers market..tell him I sent ya

I wish I had taken a picture but a few days ago I smoked a prime rib. At the same time, while the Weber was smoking nicely, I threw on a few freshly shucked oysters, sprinkled with a bit of Old Bay. I left them on for 10 minutes and they were a bit smokey, moist, and delicious sprinkled with a few drops of lemon.

Hi,

I recently bought half a pig from Cedar Valley Sustainable Farm. They have multiple drop-off sites in and around Chicago, and also sell at various markets, including the Logan Square farmers market, which is where I first met Jody Osmund, the owner/farmer.

I'm very pleased with the pork. Not too lean, and custom cut to my picky specs. They saved the beautiful leaf fat for me, as well as the cheeks for homemade guanciale. Actually, I bought additional cheeks for $2.30/lb. I think for custom cutting, you do have to buy a whole or half pig.

http://www.cedarvalleysustainable.com

Grace

kenji wrote:being that there's a TON of swine eaters in this smoke meat thread........

I've done a little searching on LTH, and don't want to start a new thread cause I'm sure there's one already but can't find it...

If I want a source for pasture raised pig meat close to the Northside of Chicago, and fat to render to my own lard, where do I bring it up?

I found a few packs of rib tips in the freezer yesterday. Defrosted them and find that they are not whole and together but already cut up. I'm in the middle of reading and following Gwiv's book. I decided to following the directions for a spare rib cook with these tips. I created the fire the exact same way I do everytime and really only added total time to the cook from say baby backs.

Well at 3 hours I took them off. Turns out to be my worst cook ever. Just about creosoted every piece.

It's because they were individual pieces not connected, right?

What else could I have done to make them better?

kenji wrote:Well at 3 hours I took them off. Turns out to be my worst cook ever. Just about creosoted every piece.

If the tips tasted like creosote you mismanaged the fire and/or used too much wood. If they were tough and chewy you could, probably, attribute that to the tips being in small pieces.

as mentioned..best to cook the trimming whole then put the cleaver to them after they are done ..as far as too much creosote..what gary said or possibly just some "skank" wood in the mix

I agree with everything above. The problem with chopped pieces is that you should always get a bark on any ribs that you smoke, and if the pieces are too small they'll turn out being all bark and no meat. I had the same situation once with A LOT of chopped up tips, I smoked them for a few hours at a really low temp (210-15 or so) and then foiled with some hard apple cider and cooked for a few more hours around 250. They turned out pretty well, but I certainly would have rather cooked them as large pieces.

(and yeah - creosote is likely a fire management issue)

Inspired by curry71's post on smoked mashed potatoes, I decided to give it a go over the weekend. I switched the order and mashed them before putting them on my WSM for an hour. The results were amazing.



The potatoes absorbed the smoke while retaining their wet creamy texture. As an added bonus, a beautiful crust formed on top that gave some unexpectedly nice crispness.



Adding some nice blue cheese to the finished product made it even better.

The nicest thing about the mashed potatoes is that because they're already cooked, consistent heat from the smoker is less important. They're an ideal thing to make as the day's smoke is winding down and your meat is resting. Another option, which I also tried over the weekend, was to cook the potatoes on the bottom rack, thereby getting some extra flavor from whatever meat is on top. The results were about as delicious, though not nearly as photogenic.

MarlaCollins'Husband wrote:Another option, which I also tried over the weekend, was to cook the potatoes on the bottom rack, thereby getting some extra flavor from whatever meat is on top.

The potatoes looked great, even though I'm not a bleu cheese fan.

Sometimes I put a turkey breast on the bottom rack and some fatty pork above which nicely flavors the bland turkey. And pop a few shrimp on the top rack for a mid-smoke snack.

Doing a small bragging rights rib cookoff this weekend - 9/18 in Glen Ellyn.

25 Teams doing 2 categories, ribs and a "best dish".

Signed up for this event back in February or March and figured it would be a good last run at competitions.

Turn in for "best dish" is @ 2:00 p.m., turn in for the ribs is @ 4:00 p.m.

Planning on babybacks, but could switch to spares. I have a few ideas for the best dish if I decide to do that category.

A band, raffles, and I am guessing alot of beer and bourbon at this laid back non-KCBS block party type event.

Come on out and say hi, bend and elbow, and get some ribs off my smoker.

http://gebbq.blogspot.com

Im one of the sponsors of that competition ..Ill be around to visit with teams as well as organizer Tom "Pig Daddy"

Good luck, Jim. I know you'll have a good time.

stevez wrote:Good luck, Jim. I know you'll have a good time.

thanks steve,

should be fun and laid back.

my turn in spares and the snack rib tips from the Glen Ellyn cookoff yesterday.

I didnt place(finished 11th out of 26 teams), but was pretty happy with my ribs, tips as well.

Trimmed down the spares so they would fit on the rib rack so none would hang over the water bowl and get singed as they were on the bottom rack. Light rub application, used Kingsford blue bag(my coshell source dried up, and left me hanging late Friday, so I used what i could). Also used Alder and cherry wood. Spares spent almost 6 hours in the WSM, smoked around 210-215 degrees. Quick glaze with The Jug sauce, and finished on the Weber kettle.

Light smoke(which I like), nice color, and texture. Really porky for IBP cryo pork from Restaurant Depot(about $1.79/lb. for a 3 pack of spares).

Tips were on for about 3 hours, then foiled with a little splash f apple juice for about 30 minutes. glazed and finished on the kettle. Really nice batch I thought.

rubbed:



In the WSM:





finished tip:



glazed spares:



turn in:



great event, great company, and alot of beer, bourbon, food and tequila. Rain didnt even matter.

I was looking at my copy of Food & Wine today, and had a thought. With all of the people that smoke meat why isn't there a magazine called Food & Swine, or Swine & Wine?? Just a thought.

Unless its chops or gyros, I'm not a big fan of lamb. However a couple Thursdays back I got a chance to try the Godfathers lamb ribs smoked by the boss himself while over at Toons for the NFL Thursday night season opener. You can call me a typical bandwagon fan jumper b/c I immediately became a fan and I love lamb...

His lamb ribs seen HERE were something else so much so that I had to make some a few days later. Followed his orders and went over to Fresh Farms and got a few lamb breasts and rubbed them with some GWiv rub from Spice House along with some yellow mustard spread on each rack and smoked them with cherry wood at 250 for three hours.


The tips might of been my favorite...as is the case with pork (took them off after 2.5 hours)


Rack of Lamb ribs

Da Beef wrote: I immediately became a fan and I love lamb...

Hot damn, those lamb ribs look delicious!

I was lucky enough to sample some of Gary's and Da Beefs, yes they were delicious!! Call me a Lamb Rib Fan!

got a 4 lbs. meat loaf on the smoker
dave klose brisket rub on it .
after 1 hour covered the top with bacon

jhawk1 wrote:I was lucky enough to sample some of Gary's and Da Beefs, yes they were delicious!! Call me a Lamb Rib Fan!

i did also they where great

I started two Boston Butts (boneless) and a flat section of brisket at 10:30 pm yesterday. The temps stayed a constant 234 deg at the dome vent till 6:30 am. I reloaded briquettes to finish at 6:30 am. I have about 10 strips of rib tips to do today as well. When I check the internal temp of the brisket it was at 145 degrees. I don’t have a lot of experience with brisket. I was thinking of taking the brisket to 185 before removing it from the smoker. Is that too high an internal temp for tender yet sliceable brisket?

gjdad wrote:I started two Boston Butts (boneless) and a flat section of brisket at 10:30 pm yesterday. The temps stayed a constant 234 deg at the dome vent till 6:30 am. I reloaded briquettes to finish at 6:30 am. I have about 10 strips of rib tips to do today as well. When I check the internal temp of the brisket it was at 145 degrees. I don’t have a lot of experience with brisket. I was thinking of taking the brisket to 185 before removing it from the smoker. Is that too high an internal temp for tender yet sliceable brisket?

at 145 im betting that brisket is still undercooked..by the time that brisket is tender its most likely in the 190-200 range...use a fork , temp probe or whatevr..when it goes in without any effort its done
hopefully that flat had some fat cap left on it too ..

Head's Red BBQ wrote:at 145 im betting that brisket is still undercooked..by the time that brisket is tender its most likely in the 190-200 range...use a fork , temp probe or whatevr..when it goes in without any effort its done
hopefully that flat had some fat cap left on it too ..

Yes at 145 the brisket isn’t tender. I left the fat cap on, no trimming. Though I saw a method recently where the pit master removed the fat cap reapplied his rub and "finished" the brisket for another two hours. My quandary is at what internal temp is the brisket "tender" still sliceable? Is it like pork shoulder which will slice nicely at 185 and shred at 195?