May Long Weekend Beef Brisket Part 2

Posted on May 20, 2013 by

Howdy,

Ok, I have probably left you all in suspense long enough… so how did it turn out???

Well, I put it on the Big Green Egg at 4am and I took it off around 7pm, so it was on there for 15 hours and I did not open the lid once to sneak a peak. This is what it looked like when I finally did open the lid…

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The Point, (the thicker part) was super tender and the flat was fork tender on top but a bit dry on the bottom. I think I could have taken it off a bit sooner.

It was interesting to watch the meat thermometers go. At one point the Flat was 20 degrees out in front of the Point, but then when they were both in the plateau, the Point caught up and by the time I took it off, there was a 2 degree difference. The flat was 196 and the point was 194.

After I got it off I wrapped in foil and then in some kitchen towels and I put it in a cooler to rest for 30 minutes.

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This last one was separating the Flat from the Point, but at this time my hands were too briskety to carve it up and continue to take pictures…

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I can say without a doubt it was the BEST brisket I have ever cooked!!! However, that isn’t to say there isn’t some room for improvement.

The point was perfect and super juicy but the flat was a little dry. I think next time I might try a water tray below the grill so that it helps diffuse some of the heat off the plate setter so that the bottom of the brisket doesn’t dry out like it did a little with this one.

I will also be a little less afraid to open the lid and check on it. I think once the flat hits 190F, I will check how tender it is. I was waiting for the point to catch the flat, but the flat was done first and could have come off sooner.

The basic flavour of just using the 3 types of wood for smoking and the salt and pepper was very good and I think I would stick to that for the next couple of attempts so that I can get my cooking method down. I did like the fact that the brisket itself had a very meaty flavour without a lot of extra complexity so that those people that like a ketchup based sauce could use that and those that like a mustard based sauce could use that and you didn’t have a lot of conflicting flavours. The brisket itself was simple but lent itself to whatever else you wanted to do with it.

Overall I was quite happy with the result and the DigiQ II worked great, even in the rain. I just put a ziplock bag over it to keep it protected and it kept my Egg a solid 250 for most of the cook, except near the end when I set it to use Ramp Up Mode, which drops the temp of the cooker as the meat temp rises.

I will definitely do another brisket!!!

Happy Egging!!!
Brian

Posted in Beef, Brian's Posts, Brisket | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

May Long Weekend Beef Brisket Part 1

Posted on May 19, 2013 by

Howdy,

Admittedly I have not done nearly as many beef briskets as I have pork butts. I think I have only ever tried to do 2 briskets on the Big Green Egg since I got it and I have only done 2 on gas grills before that. Brisket is and has been a challenge for me and I hope that I can break the brisket curse with this one.

My first ever brisket was done on a gas grill before I knew the concept of what true low and slow was about. I put it on at 6 in the morning and thought it would be done in 12 hours. Well I think at 9pm it was still tough as hell!!! It had a good flavour but I did not even use a meat thermometer nor did I really know what I was doing. I watched a couple YouTube videos and thought I could do it too… I was so wrong.

My second attempt was also on gas, but this time after I smoked the meat for about 5 hours I threw it in a pan with some beer and wrapped it in foil and finished it for 4 hours as a braise. This worked as the meat this time was juicy and more the way a brisket should be… but hell, I could have done that in the oven.

The 2 times I did brisket on the Big Green Egg I had moderate success. By now I knew the concepts better. I actually USED a meat thermometer. I knew that I had a target temperature north of 195F. I knew about the plateau that smoking meat goes through as it breaks down the connective tissue, where you might actually see your meat temp DROP!!! Don’t worry, it’s all good, it’s supposed to do that! My problem was the grade of meat I bought. We were down in North Dakota and their Wally Worlds down there sell brisket. So I bought some thinking this was cool… well big mistake. I didn’t know the USDA meat grading system and what I bought was the lowest quality meat you could get. Even the Big Green Egg couldn’t fix that!!! These 2 were closer to what I wanted but still missed the mark as they were still tough at 200F.

Well yesterday I popped into my butcher shop and I asked Steve the butcher if he had any brisket. Sure enough he pulls one out and asked me if I wanted it trimmed up. For sure I said, your knives are way better than mine!!! :-)

So I brought home this 10 pound bad boy of Certified Angus Beef. This time I have quality going in, so I am off to a good start!

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Now there are a bajillion ways to cook a brisket and all of them can give you some great results. I have tried some more complex rubs and marinades and injections and mops in different combinations on the 4 briskets that I have done. But my Egging buddy Jason down in Texas recently wrote a blog post about going back to basics… salt, pepper and smoke and that’s IT!

To read Jason’s blog click here

It looked like it worked so well for him that I thought I would give it a shot! Here is my brisket with just salt and pepper…

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As for the smoke, I also took Jason’s advice and I used a combination of Hickory, Mesquite and Cherry wood. I am out of wood chunks but used probably about 8 cups of wood chips with about 6 of them being soaked in water for 4 hours. I mixed in some dry chips when I put them on the Egg.

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I am aiming to run the Egg with a 250F grill level temperature and my DigiQ should help hold it there. I am going to go check on it shortly as it was just coming up to temp and I think it overshot it slightly, but it should come back down. The DigiQ is awesome because even though I had to get up at 3am (the cost of great BBQ!!!) it now allows me to go back to sleep knowing the temperature will remain stable. At this temperature I am shooting for 1 to 1 & a half hours per pound to cook, which would be 10 to 15 hours of cooking time. It was up to temp around 4am so hopefully we’re eating around 7 tonight!

Stay tuned I will post a followup later!

Happy Egging!
Brian

Posted in Beef, Brian's Posts, Brisket | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Reverse Sear Beef Tenderloin

Posted on May 17, 2013 by

Howdy,

Happy May 2-4 to all the Canucks out there!!! Hope it’s a good one! If it’s anything like Manitoba it ALWAYS rains here and it’s not looking good right now.

Of course the days leading UP to the long weekend are always nice and yesterday was beautiful outside. So with Jackie being indifferent to what I made for supper, I went to the butcher and picked up a small beef tenderloin roast.

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We decided for this one to go back to basics… salt, pepper, steak and fire!!! I did give it a shot of worchesetershire while searing, but sometimes it’s nice to leave the fancy rubs and marinades in the cupboard and just go simple!

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Marc from Ontario mentioned to me the last time I did a roast that he did a reverse sear on his, where instead of searing the meat first then letting it finish indirectly, you do it the other way around and start indirect and sear at the end.

I thought this sounded like a great technique to try, so I put my Egg to the task.

I started by setting up the Large Egg to cook indirectly at about 425F. I used a meat thermometer to let me know when the roast hit 120F internal.

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At this point I pulled the roast off the Egg and removed the plate setter and opened up the Egg full blast to give it a good hot, fast sear

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I seared the roast on various sides for about 5 minutes total and then brought it in to rest.

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After about 15 minutes resting (while I finished the mushrooms and cauliflower) I sliced it into steaks for serving.

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The verdict???

This was one of the most tender cuts of meat I have ever done. I would like to try the reverse sear typical steak instead of a roast, but I think it would work just as well. I am quite impressed and I will play around with this technique some more!

Happy Egging!!!
Brian

Posted in Beef, Brian's Posts | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments

More Pizza

Posted on May 8, 2013 by

Last weekend was the Winnipeg Wine Festival and one of our long standing traditions is to go to the fest and then come home and have a BBQ with friends.

This year many commitments got in the way of people going to the Wine Festival, only a few of us went, but we did still manage to pull off the traditional BBQ. We decided the best thing to do would be pizza!!!

Using Jackie’s pizza dough recipe found here: Jackie’s Pizza Dough

We did six of them actually! All pizzas were cooked on the Egg with the plate setter feet down, the little green Egg feet then separating the plate setter from the stone… my standard setup and then cooked once the stone hits about 600F and the Egg wide open. It takes about 4 minutes per pizza.

The first pizza was an asparagus and cheese pizza. We first sauteed the asparagus in some butter to give it some richness, then layered some cheese on the bottom of the pizza and topped the asparagus. This pizza recipe did not call for a sauce but I think a simple olive oil and garlic would have added to it.

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The second pizza was a BLT pizza.

First the crust was brushed with olive oil, then topped with cooked bacon and bocconcini cheese. We then cooked it it off and then topped it with lettuce, tomato and ranch dressing. Super messy to eat… but super awesome and fresh!!!

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The third pizza was the classic Pulled Pork & Pineapple. I hit the pulled pork with some Cluck & Squeal Original before tossing it in Diana’s Original BBQ Sauce. We used Diana’s as the sauce for the pizza as well. Then we put down thinly sliced pineapple, pulled pork and topped it with Monterey Jack cheese and green onions.

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The fourth pizza was a classic Margareta Pizza, with an olive oil and garlic sauce, tomato, basil and bocconcini. So simple yet so awesome!!!

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The fifth pizza I wasn’t actually inside for when it was being made. I know it has a tomato sauce and some salami or pepperoni, tomato, basil and mixed cheese.

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The last pizza was a dessert pizza that was an apple, nut and oat pizza topped with a vanilla butter cream icing.

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This is where my buddy Glenn had an icing bag malfunction… :-)

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So he made the best of it! More icing was awesome!!!

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Happy Egging!
Brian

Posted in Brian's Posts, Pizza | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Sirloin Tip Roast

Posted on April 30, 2013 by

The Sirloin Tip roast is your typical pot roast which I think usually gets tossed in the oven with carrots and potatoes and cooked till it’s grey inside and then you make a gravy from the drippings to try and save it. That is the way I remember having it as a kid (sorry mom!).

It is definitely a tougher cut of meat, lean but without all the soft tender goodness of a tenderloin roast.

We saw a couple of them at the butcher on Sunday and it was so nice outside, I just wanted to kick back with a couple beers and do something that would require at least 2-3 beers to cook before it was done. Steaks would cook too fast… I wanted to enjoy the first nice day of the year in the sun… this seemed perfect!!!

I asked Jackie what kind of rub she wanted and was thinking the garlic/Dijon/Worcestershire/Herb rub that I used on a prime rib, but she said that might be too strong for her right now and a safer bet would be simply some Cluck & Squeal Beef Specific. It’s funny how pregnancy can turn you off of things that you normally love… anyway I kept it simple.

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I set up the Large Big Green Egg the same way I would for a steak cook and got the temperature up to about 650F and I proceeded to sear off the roast on the outside the same way I would a steak for about 6-8 minutes.

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After the sear, I took the meat off, put the plate setter onto the Egg and dropped the Temp to about 375-400F and put the roast back on to finish. I also lopped the top off of a head of garlic and drizzled it with olive oil, S&P and wrapped in foil to go with our Garlic Smashed Potatoes (which I did not get a picture of…)

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I don’t know exactly how long it took for the roast to cook, I forgot to set the timer, but I pulled it off when the meat probe hit 135F. I wanted Rare to Medium Rare in the middle. Too many of these roasts are dry and grey!!!

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It turned out very good!!! A little tougher cut, but was packed with a good beefy flavour, was lean and the Beef Specific was great being crusted on the outside as it was.

We only wished afterwards that we had some horseradish!!!

Happy Egging!!!
Brian

Posted in Beef, Brian's Posts, Food Pics, Rubs | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Pub Grub (ABTs and Wings)

Posted on April 28, 2013 by

Howdy,

Last night was the first time we have had an Egg Party in a long time!!! The sun was out, the weather was perfect and we had a keg of Half Pint’s Bulldog Amber Ale to take us through the evening.

We got together with some friends for a pot luck and poker night. I thought what better than to do some pub grub for an appy.

I started with the ABTs or Atomic Buffalo Turds as they are called. I have blogged about these before, but it’s been a while since I last made them so I figured I would post them again.

An ABT is effectively a Jalapeno Popper that is wrapped in bacon.

I started with about a dozen Jalepenos that I split in half and cleaned out the seeds and membranes. I wanted the flavour without having too much kick.

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I then took some pulled pork that I had previously made and frozen and let it defrost in the fridge for a few hours. I also took packs of cream cheese and mixed in some finely chopped green olives, green onion and Dizzy Pig’s Salt Free Dizzy Dust.

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Then stuff some cheese mixture in the Jalepeno and top with pulled pork before wrapping each popper in a whole slice of bacon.

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I hit each wrapped popper with more Dizzy Dust

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They went onto the Egg at about 400 indirectly, using the plate setter, feet up, with the grill on top.

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I don’t really know how long it took to cook them. I had to go inside and make drinks and by the time I came out, they were pretty much done.

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We also did some wings, but to be honest, by this point I was using the camera a LOT less.

I just tossed the wings in some Cluck & Squeal Original and Egged them indirectly like the ABTs. I took them off when they hit 175F+

We tossed some in a home made buffalo wing sauce and left some naked to enjoy the C&S on it’s own.

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All in all, it was a fun night, great friends, great food, great times… it doesn’t get better!

Happy Egging!
Brian

Posted in Appetizers, Brian's Posts, Chicken, Pork | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Jalapeno & Cheddar Corn Bread

Posted on April 7, 2013 by

I was going through a few old drafts that I started but never posted since we have been away on vacation and I came across the recipe for my Jalapeno & Cheddar Corn Bread. You can do this on the Egg or in the oven and it is a perfect side dish to go with ribs (beef or pork).

I know I don’t normally post exact recipes because that is not usually how I cook, but this time I have a close approximation (for the corn bread part… I eyeballed the peppers, onions and cheese). I got the base corn bread recipe from PattyO on the greeneggers.com forum quite a while back and have been playing around with it and came up with my version I am posting here.

2 cups all-purpose flour
1-1/3 cups yellow cornmeal
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 cup sugar
5 teaspoons baking powder
2 large eggs
1-1/2 cups milk (whole or 3%)
2 Jalapeno Peppers (seeds removed if desired)
3ish cups grated sharp old cheddar cheese
1ish cup diced onion
2-3 slices bacon OR 1-2 tablespoons of butter

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.
2. In a large mixing bowl mix the flour, cornmeal, salt, sugar, and baking powder.
3. Beat the eggs and add to the dry ingredients alternately with the milk. Mix by hand; do not use a mixer.
4. Cook bacon (optional) in 12″ cast iron skillet and remove when cooked (have as a snack) leaving the bacon drippings OR if you want to keep it vegetarian melt 2 tbsp of butter, then quickly cook the onions until soft and add jalapeno peppers to soften. When cooked remove from skillet with a slotted spoon and add to the batter along with about 2 cups of the cheese, reserving some for the top.
5. Pour the mixture into the now greased and warm 12″ cast iron skillet and bake for 25.
6. Remove from oven and add remaining cheese to the top of the bread.

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7. Return the pan to the oven for about 5-10 minutes for the cheese to melt

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8. Transfer to serving dish and serve hot.

A well seasoned cast iron skillet helps with this. Also, it is totally not good for you, but hell, neither are ribs, so you might as well go all out! :-)

Happy Egging!!!
Brian

Posted in Baking, Brian's Posts, Food Pics, Side Dishes, vegetarian | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

DigiQ Pulled Pork 2.0

Posted on March 16, 2013 by

Last night on my way home from work I stopped into the local butcher shop to see what would catch my eye for dinner. Well I ended up getting a couple NY steaks to grill up and make fajitas with… but that’s not what I’m going to talk about. You’ve all seen steak fajita pictures from me before. No what really grabbed me were the 2 amazing looking pork butts sitting in the cooler. We are planning on making pizza tonight with some of our friends and I instantly thought about pulled pork and pineapple pizza. But if I was going to make that, I need some pulled pork. It was just bonus when I found out all the roasts (beef and pork) were on sale so I took both of them. I figured if I am already burning the lump for 1 butt, might as well do 2. It doesn’t take any more.

So I made dinner last night and Jackie suggested I try out my DigiQ II which is made by BBQ Guru. We won this at Fargo Eggfest for finishing in first place last September and I just never had a chance to play with it before it got cold out. I have been leery about using it throughout winter, but it’s starting to warm up so I thought I would give it a shot. It is an digital pit controller that allows to to electronically control the temperature of your cooker.

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So once I figured out what was what and how it works, I got my XL Egg set up, then I rubbed the pork butts down with the Cluck & Squeal Low Salt Rib Formula. I like this for butts because I don’t like all the extra salt.

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I took everything outside, lit the Egg and got it all set up. The way this thing works is that you put a blower fan into the bottom air vent of the Egg, then you clip a grid level thermometer on the grill and you put a thermometer into the meat.

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You program this little green box with the desired cooker temp and the desired finished meat temp and it will activate the blower to stoke the coals to keep it at the set grill temp.

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Butts went on to a smoking Egg that I used a combo of hickory and maple smoke.

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It took about 14 and a half hours to cook two, approximately 8 pound butts, which is standard. In the morning, the finished internal temp of the Butts was 203 when I took them off. I had it set to 205.

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What is really cool about the DigiQ is that it has what they call Ramp Up zone, so that when it gets near to the desired final meat temp, the blower slows down and lowers the temp of the Egg. In all my past Butt cooks, the last couple hours always always see the Egg temp start to climb as the meat gets closer to finished. The last hour is usually riding around 300F. With the DigiQ it counters the rise in temp to keep everything even.

I can’t explain it well, but check out The Naked Whiz’s article explaining how the DigiQ works here. He has all kinds of technical info to explain how all the different features work.

So after 14.5 hours the Butts were ready to come off.

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I let them rest for about 30 minutes before I started to shred them. I have to say that this was by FAR the juiciest pulled pork I have ever made!!! It just fell apart with little effort and I got a nice smoke ring on the outside.

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In the end, and I know I have said this before… but this was the best pulled pork I have ever made. I find that sometimes they get over cooked, but with the control of the DigiQ it made it super easy. Now I was still a little leery of leaving the thing over night but I did get more sleep than I normally do on an overnighter but next time I’m just going to set it and forget it and head to bed!

I can’t wait to try it out on ribs and I have a few briskets in the deep freeze that need cooking! I highly recommend getting a DigiQ if you like to do Low N Slow. I didn’t think the DigiQ would make that big of a difference since the Egg usually holds its temp pretty well on its own, but honestly it really really did! I have never made better pulled pork!!!

Happy Egging!
Brian

Posted in BBQ EGGcessories, Brian's Posts, Food Pics, Pork, Reviews | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

EGGzilla LIVES!!!

Posted on March 14, 2013 by

That’s right… the Big Green Egg Mothership just announced the launch of it’s new XXL Big Green Egg!!!

This thing is so big that apparently it can cook 40 burgers, 20 racks of ribs or an WHOLE hog!!!

Here is the deal straight from BGE: EGGzilla

Is it overkill? Damn straight! Do I want one? Hell Yeah!!! Just to be able to cook a whole hog all at once without having to contort it to make it fit would be amazing!

Realistically it is probably not in the cards. I think if I really needed that much cooking surface area I would buy a second XL before I would buy EGGzilla and here is why:

1) Can you imagine how much lump you would need to use to get that thing going?

2) It doesn’t look like the air vent on top is big enough… but I suppose I need to see it in action.

3) I already get hot and cold spots on the XL where the lump doesn’t always light evenly, especially for Low N Slow cooks, I can’t imagine what would happen on that monstrosity.

4) Moving it around (or just getting it home) would be a pain in the ass! It took 3 of us just to get my XL out of the back of my CRV and into the back yard… I would need a crane to deliver this thing!

However, all that said, I can’t wait to see one in person… and who knows… maybe someday. Or maybe I just dig an Imu in my back yard if I want to cook a whole pig. It would probably be a LOT cheaper!!!

How to build a Hawaiian Imu

Posted in BBQ EGGcessories, Brian's Posts | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments

Welcome to our guest blogger

Posted on March 7, 2013 by

Welcome to Darcy, our bud, and new guest blogger on Winnipeggheads.com. Darcy came to the 2012 Fargo EggFest with us and helped our team to victory, and also brought home his very own Big Green Egg and has been honing his egging skills ever since.

Posted in Jackie's Posts | Tagged , ,