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I never really understood or appreciated how much of a sacrifice caregivers make to care for others. I now have the utmost respect and admiration for them. Quick story..... My Mother is 91 years old. She was able to live by herself in Michigan until a couple of years ago, when she started falling. My Sister, who lives in Iowa (by Tony B.), retired and would spend summers with Mom in Michigan and then take her back to Iowa for the winter. Last July, my sister's husband died unexpectedly and she had to go back home to handle everything. I stayed with Mom in Michigan into August and then brought her back to Syracuse for a few months. In mid October, she went back to her home in Michigan and my sister rejoined her. These next comments are not complaints but instead expressions of respect for caregivers. For three months, my life as I knew it.......changed. Almost every minute of the day was consumed with caring for Mom. Came home 3 times a day from work, preparing meals, doctor visits, regulating her medicine, shopping for her, helping her move around from room to room, checking on her during the night and just spending quality time with her. Again....not a complaint.............as I would do it again in a heart beat............but Holy Crap what an eye opener!!! Caregivers are Amazing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This is my first time back to the forum since June, I'm finally getting caught up at home and work. I didn't BBQ much over the summer, as Mom was not a big fan of grilled/smoked food. Forget about the boating season. Now I'm hoping to start on my KK repair project for Dennis. Don't think I will ever take spare time / down time for granted again. If you know a caregiver....thank them......offer to give them a break.......do something nice for them..............it is a stressful and many times a thankless job. I call and thank my sister all the time now Went to Michigan last weekend to give her a break. . My hat is off to caregivers!!!!!!!!!

I have been doing pretty well with my bread baking. The loaves rise reliably and folk like the taste. There was one Tartine No 3 loaf that came out flat as a pancake when I first tried it back in February. Thought I would try it again last week. I felt like I was back where I started. Sticky dough, wouldn't turn out of the banneton easily and it even stuck to the pizza stone in my indoor oven and ripped when I tried to drag it off. Aaaargh. It was so bad that I just slipped the loaves straight in the bin. Then I remembered Syzygies' comment above about hydration. The recipe included soaked buckwheat groats and creme fraiche and called for 85% hydration. Waaaay too much liquid overall. I tried again the next day, dialling back hydration to 75%. The perfect loaf. Not as precise as S's spreadsheet but realising that the author of the cookbook may not have taken into account the variation in the amount of soaking water I might use helped me solve this problem. And helped to restore The Husband's faith in my breadmaking.

@MacKenzie doesn’t speak to me when I cook seafood but tonight was grilled salmon dusted with garlic and rubbed with a local fish blend served with day old microwaved mashed potatoes and de thawed pesto I made a few weeks back....I never thought you could have too much pesto but I definitely served too much here

Another cook in the dark (it's that time of year and we're a month away from the winter solstice!) Tonight - snags in the dark. Lower grate, direct, 325F dome. No smoking wood. Snags are beer brats and bacon/cheddar brats (2 each). Plated with homemade potato salad. 3 mustards - Dijon, spicy brown and Stone Brewery's smoky chipotle. Top it off with a side salad, crusty bread and a tasty IPA (Stillwater's 420 Series Hoppy Pilsner.)

Amazing story, Jon! Welcome back! Hope to see pics of that rebuild project soon! I took care of my Dad for a month right after my Mom died, while I arranged for him to have in-home care and then eventually in a care facility. I know exactly what you're talking about. Folks that do this full-time are practically saints!

Look at that! I came back to this thread to comment on something that I had learned from @Syzygies. Had to hunt for the quote and, en route, I saw these pictures of Pequod's. Not fair. That looks so good. Still learning here.

Two Years ?? That's almost like getting the car before the ink on the order form is dry. I ordered my Morgan from F.H. Douglass in South Ealing in 1982 and went to pick it up from the factory in Malvern in March 1989. Had to sell it in 1992 just before the first RokDoklette was born. She was very nearly called Morgan.

Spun a chook in the dark last night. Rotisserie basket, 375F, direct, injected with Seasoning Stix and outside rubbed with Slap yo Daddy, apple wood chunks. Another squirrely MEATER+ performance on the ambient temperature. Meat temps were good, just really odd behavior again on the ambient probe. I'm beginning to wonder if it's gone off somehow? It started out weird - very slow increase, then shoots up after 30 minutes, but plateaus out well below dome temperature (375F). Probe wasn't overly gunked up after the cook, as I had made sure to put it in as parallel to the axis of rotation as possible, so juices wouldn't run down it and bake on (my theory on the last cook with it.) OK, onto the plated pics - garlic mashed potatoes (sous vide) and sautéed green beans. Chicken was falling off the bone and very moist. Decent crispiness on the skin, too.

G’day folks. Haven’t posted many cooks lately because I’ve been busy with a few things. Still cooking and eating 😳. One of my major distractions has just been eliminated 🤔. Another distraction has been building my time machine. It has the ability to look into the past! Here it is: Here it is looking at 2.5 million years ago: 2.5 million year old light. This is pre-processed. I’ll post the fully processed image later. Something streaked across the sky during exposure. Here’s a look at 7500 years ago. Also pre-processed.

Wonderful looking dinner, Tony. I love a hoppy beer.

It only looks good because it is. I know I've name dropped my BFF (Bread Friend Forever) Trevor Jay Wilson here before. Summarizing his mantra: Hydration is for squares. Okay...not really. But his point is: hydration is one of the last things you worry about in perfecting a loaf. For most amateurs (me), dough handling is far more important than hydration. His Champlain Sourdough recipe is only 75% hydration, and yet has a beautifully open crumb if you follow his dough handling techniques.

I shall take that as an endorsement and give it a go. I'm probably overthinking it because I read that book. Hit me up for a good dough when you get to it, I'll send you some snaps from the book to help you. Think a pizza steel is the way forward for this type of pizza.

You must have sore teeth after that meal Troble! lol........ or blunt knives?

@Braai-Qi did see that post and I have yet to attempt neopolitan pizza yet. It’s on a list in my head of things I want to but haven’t yet. That and whole hog. But i am eager to try as I love neopolitan. For me though NY style is my favorite and at this long I did it almost every week from may-October andI just got the process down and have gotten comfortable

Well, you paid a deposit for a car and then after 5 or 6 years you came near the top of the waiting list and you could then choose the exact spec. We made a few trips to the factory to see it in various stages of production - there was a little brown parcel label tied onto it with our name on and the car would just be pushed around the factory to the various craftsmen. I'll never forget the spec- Connaught Green, Tan Connolly Hide Seats, Chrome Wires, Walnut Dash, Bonnet Strap ..... and door handles were extra. It was a 4/4 ...Perhaps I should start calling her Fi-Fi

I bought a copy of The Pizza Bible by Tony Gemignani. I've read through most of it, but haven't tackled any of his recipes yet. I've tried various methods before to keep it simple, including the 2 ingredient one (AP flour and Greek yogurt) and some "no kneed." I just don't make pizza that often to hone in on a "go to" recipe. Not just the work to make the dough, but the amount of charcoal that it takes to heat soak everything up to cooking temperatures for a 12 minute cook (I'm normally just cooking for me) just rubs me the wrong way. Plus, having to buy more ingredients than I need for one pizza (pepperoni, mozz, etc.) only to not use it all up - I hate wasting food. I'm just too miserly! 😜

Winging it's way on a boat? Is this a SpaceX edition? 😆 Talking of cars, I had to wait nearly 2 years for a car I ordered a few years back. I had a bespoke colour and a whole lot of customisation done at factory so it's the very definition of a first world problem and one that if I sought any sympathy for would get me mercilessly pilloried by my friends so I had to suffer quietly. But the emotional torment of constantly changing delivery dates and the timescale drove me insane. It only had to leave the dock in Hamburg and the dealer gave me the ship number but by the time I received the information, the ship had already docked, off loaded and was somewhere near the horn of Africa. Captain Philips was still far too fresh in mind having only been released a few years earlier! Hanging around on this forum is a good coping strategy and builds anticipation and we all understand. I only recently realised that @tekobo was sans KK which is akin to losing a limb in her world. However, she is probably one of the few people on the forum who can claim to having owned the entire range...

Really i haven't been looking 😏 (i am such a bad fibber) It's been teasing me it went right past Southampton. Then to Rotterdam Netherlands Then it left dock early and headed North!!!! (The wrong way) grrrrr . Now its anchored in the North sea, probably surrounded by pirates as we type @Braai-Q did mentioned Captain Phillips. And we recently had a boat near Southampton with some stowaways on that had a special forces intervention. Nerves what nerves lol The burn it will be easy after this,what did we all do before the internet.

I've always been surprised by how much moisture the skin carries and the difference that letting it sit out uncovered for 10-12 hours or so makes to the crispiness of the skin. I then pat dry with paper towel to ensure it is as dry as possible before it goes on the rotisserie. Then cook it at about 150°C. I find you get it much crispier if you have it directly over coal but you have to watch for flare ups and it makes a bit of a mess unless you put a container under the coals. I have been known to put foil at the bottom of the KK to make clean up less awful. It's a fabulous dish on the KK, particularly when you can impart some smoke from flavoured wood. This is what it should look like:

Hey Mac, nice plate. Made me think if you had a large contingent of Portuguese in your area. Not often you would see this ethnic food unless a number of cultural people were by to represent it. As you travel further west, the likelihood of coming across it diminishes. I prefer the Linguica over the chorizo, and as a matter of fact this morning I had Chorizo mixed with my scrambled...fancy that. Nothing like a Linguica sandwich on a toasted bun with yellow mustard. Sorry, talk too much,..

Grilled some chorizo and plated it with Mac & Cheese and a spinach side salad. Running out of this summer's tomatoes. Plated. Silk Chili and Zanzibar Black Pepper on the Mac and Cheese. Side salad.

Did a Porchetta on the KK last night with Apple and Pear wood. Came out fine but it was a bit fattier than I like. Served up with Sicilian Caponata as I got a bit carried away and bought a few too many aubergines at the local farm shop when I was there the other day. I just did a drive by on the dish while in the fridge (Caponata is superb cold as well) on the way to getting milk out for my morning coffee. Had to make myself stop at one large spoonful. Breakfast of champions! 😆

The staff were character actors and when people asked what the parts were made of, they refused to break character which added tremendously to the theatre. It was a lot of sausage meat and bacon from what I could tell! You could have some real fun with an Alien shop - having them all set in KY Jelly (which is what the special FX team used for the slime in the film).

Kewl very realistic. Are you sure he is not using the real thing lol. The face hugger was made out of a bone in lamb saddle Sent from my SM-T835 using Tapatalk

Yeah. I’m pretty robust but it could ruin sausage meat and bacon. They were selling burgers with fingers sticking out the side of the bun too. It got huge media and PR attention. It’s a bit like Gunther von Hagens’ Bodyworlds.

I don’t know if it’s the repose or what but the woman actually makes me feel quite uncomfortable. I remember the scale and how well observed it was in reality and it would totally freak guests out.

Hey, you both know how to cook it - just git after it!

Brilliant. I've sent this to my butcher who expressed an alarming amount of enthusiasm. When I was working in London, we were right next to Smithfields Meat Market and Microsoft did a launch for a computer game (think it was Resident Evil). Computer games aren't my bag but they did an awesome approach as a nod to the game. This is what my local butcher did this year. I rather fear having shown him the human body parts above together with the Alien Facehugger video that I may have started something.

How I wish that was my dinner tonight.

Fat Bastard would have loved last night's baby back ribs - LOL! Indirect (there's that damn pesky thin sheet of aluminum foil again - ha, ha!), smoker pot of hickory and apple, 250F. Rubbed with Eat This & Sucklebusters Bamm. Plated with tots w/Green Crack, side salad and crusty bread.

Left over KK rib fillet steaks were diced, added with onion to stock, reduced with rye flour, then cooked for a tasty puff pastry meat pie. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Cleaned the leftovers out of the fridge today. Still tasty. Za'atar sweet onions, steamed cabbage and carrots, smashed potatoes and beef roast from a previous KK cook and then there are those pickled hot peppers.