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Early morning. 20+ Lb beast of a brisket with an amazingly thick fat cap. Going to try it somewhat hotter than the last one, starting it about 275, and plan to raise that to 325 or so, hopefully finishing it in about 12 hours. IMG_0187.MOV

Hey @tony b. Nothing makes me happier than sharing food experiences. When you said you had enjoyed the first lot of pepper soup mix that I sent you, I had to make sure you had enough supplies to keep you going. The only problem was that my supplies, brought to me by my father in Nigeria, were running low. I had never needed to go to a local African store before because my parents always supplied me with what I needed. Mr Google told me that I had at least three stores within five minutes' drive of my house. I called them up and they all had pepper soup mix. I made it to "Mama Lit" and found pepper soup and more. I have learned a lot and have been back since. She has plantain chips (delicious with or without chilli), palm wine (turns out you need that for making a favourite childhood roadside snack of mine, puff puff) and things I had never heard of - ogiri and iru. When I told my mother I had bought some melon seed for making Ijebu egusi she said I needed to find a fermented product called ogiri. Here I am in England, making Japanese inspired groundnut miso using a book written by some guy in the South and I never knew we had a culture of fermented foods in my own country. A whole new world of food has opened up and I am having fun. So, to your care package Tony: Northern Nigerian chilli mix - I have no idea what makes up this mix but it is good and hot and I like it. Makes me sneeze so I suspect it has a reasonable amount of black pepper in it. I use it for everything. Red pepper - go to heat amper for stews Pepper soup mix - ready mix for adding to stock and meat/chicken/prawns to make a tasty, super hot soup as you know. Our favourites are made with goat or chicken gizzards but you can use any mix of meats that you like. Ground hot pepper - you can never have enough Mystery packs are things I had never bought myself either. They are the makings of the pepper soup mix if you want to make it yourself. The lady in the shop gave me no idea what proportions to mix them in, just that that is what she uses. Noone measures stuff so I wasn't going to get any more help than that. I photographed here boxes so I would remember the names of each. The five ingredients you need are: 1. Wedeaba (calabash nutmeg) 2. Efom wisa (alligator pepper) 3. Hwenteaa 4. Esuru wisa (grains of paradise) 5. Cloves The first three are left to right in your picture. I didn't get you 4 and 5 because she said 4 were black peppercorns and I thought you could get both easily where you are. Over to you. I await the outcomes of your research and experimentation so that I can try this out myself once you have perfected the recipe. The jollof mix was new to me. I make jollof rice from scratch and there are recipes online. I usually make a stew using stock, water, bones, tomatoes and chillis to build a flavourful base for making the stew. That mix looks like a short cut. I bought some for me too. Will report back when I have tried it. Have fun!

Got a nice package of goodies from Nigeria via the UK today - one guess as to who that benefactor was? Now my challenge is to eat a LOT of pepper soup! LOL! Now for the quiz of the day. What are the spices in the 3 small bags?

Big props to @tekobo - for sharing. I used some of the new pepper soup seasoning (Home Taste) in a bowl of canned soup today. It's good. Did a side-by-side tasting of it against the original one that you sent me. This one is very similar in taste, but hotter. You’ll need: * 6 to 8 pieces calabash Nutmeg * 8 pieces Negro pepper (Uda seeds) * 1 tablespoonful seeds of Aligator pepper (Atariko/Ulima seed) **this makes about 3 tablespoonful pepper soup spice mix Note: some people add dried ginger roots and cubeb peppers(uziza seeds) to their mix, so feel free to add a little if you want to. Uziza seeds are very similar to regular black peppercorns. Use high quality black peppercorns to get as close as possible.

Oooh. You’ve sparked an idea. My wife. She needs a shed...with a roll off roof...and high speed internet. Chicken and egg. I was a space nerd decades ago. All of my degrees are aerospace engineering. There’s a period of my life when I worked on big rockets that launched people into space. I couldn’t indulge my astronomy interests much in DC due to light pollution. We chose our new location, in part, by consulting light pollution maps, in addition to local food scene and wineries.

5% discount code on the Steak ager: GC5 It's good on the main unit but not the accessories. It was provided by the Grateful Chef - he has a lot of videos on YouTube, is a big fan of the SteakAger, and is active on the FB page for users. I've ordered mine...

Grilled Salmon on the KK16 with evo, salt & pepper. Missed framing the KK logo in the shot; it was too cold out to retake. Pulled at 125°F Plate with roasted potatoes and carrots, steamed broccoli. Pretty tasty with a 2017 Jericho Canyon Sauvignon Blanc.

Thank you Tekobo. A couple of things playing in my mind. We have tropical summers here and even the edge of the cold room around the doors can pick up a little black mould that needs attending to. Never inside but I’m mindful that white mould can be ok, black mould is never good. Also, after renovating the back yard complete with outdoor kitchen( mostly my design inspired to house a new KK), my clever half is wanting to renovate her indoor kitchen..... and all of the upstairs house- all her design. This will very likely include a complete relocation of the current cold room- knock it out and install a new one. We live in a timber workers cottage built in 1913 and although this sounds new amongst British houses, it has a character dwelling overlay..... suggesting it’s old by our standards and needs some level of preservation. Anyway, a dedicated dry aging meat fridge has more appeal to me than a wine fridge. So thank you again for inspiring this desire, I will see if I can sway the dedicated dry aging meat fridge into the new design. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Soooo close. Not sure I would let him go RD. Tantalising. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

That's frustrating. Feel for you. It'll be forgotten once you've got it setup and running.

Excellent. Do post! Looking forward to seeing how you get on. @Basher Most places I have been, restauranteurs or butchers use a cool room rather than a ready made fridge. One farmer friend did buy the commercial humidity controlled fridges for his charcuterie while another added in an extra ventilation unit into his cold room when he started to hang his whole carcasses for over 50 days. Happy to find out more from them if you decide this is the route for you.

Tony, I am quite. The driver was really rattled by his boss on the phone and wouldn't wait for the crate to be put back on. I did ask him what the situation would be if it was damaged and he said it would be the responsibility of the delivery company. To be fair - it's not going to roll off the pallet and it is incredibly well protected with bubble wrap. I did feel a bit sorry for him. I wasn't cross with him at all - just a bit deflated.

Exactly right on the rabbithole. I though KK'ing was an obsession. Pfffft! That's nothing compared to astrophotography. Now I daydream about my next scope, mount, camera, filters...and whether I can sneak an observatory past my Homeowners' Association...and wife.

Ha. I thought you had a cool room? You could work on getting the conditions right in there. Air circulation is key. So true. I wonder if any of the commercial offerings allow for that split. For avoidance of doubt, I am NOT buying a second one but I can vouch for the fact that making charcuterie is really satisfying. Just need to time getting the dry ager clear for charcuterie for a number of weeks at a time and make a decent sized batch when you do.

Just for fun.

Aussie day lamb lollipops Sent from my SM-T835 using Tapatalk

This was our Conference championship meal. Crazy delicious. The recipes were from the Pitt Cue Co book. Found a copy for the chicken online here: https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2014/07/whole-spicy-smoked-roast-chicken-from-pitt-cue.html I originally thought I should have cooked the chicken directly on the grate but I did as I was told in the recipe and cooked it in a pan. So glad that I did. These juices and sticky stuff were delicious! The anticipation was off the scale when we cut it up And we paired the chicken with a real flavour hit from the Pitt Cue Co book: pumpkin home fries with Nduja mayonnaise. Picture not pretty but so, so tasty.

Be careful with that gunpowder Tony you don’t want to blow up you KK! Lol

Tonight's cook, before the impending snow storm (maybe up to 8+ inches of wet, heavy snow tomorrow afternoon through Tuesday morning), another interesting cut from Porter Road - Teres Major. Grilled direct on the lower grate, post oak & mesquite, rubbed with Gunpowder. Tossed on a slab of "grilling cheese" (aka haloumi). The challenge of this cook was the taper on the steak at each end, which necessitated frequent turns and moving around the grill as the coals developed hot spots, so as to not overcook the tips too much, while get the thicker center to a nice medium rare. Managed it well. The tips were about medium well, while the center was a nice medium-rare. Plated with crusty potatoes and side salad. Peruvian green sauce for the spuds and a mash-up steak sauce for the meat. Need to keep working on this potato recipe. I dialed back the cooking time, but they were still a bit too crunchy and not enough creamy interiors. I think the cut was too small. Next time, I'll do wedges.

Australia Day on the 26th of January so I’ve tried making our national dish..... meat pies. Left over ribs And pork. With a few spuds, roast garlic Chopped up and boiled down with beef stock And this has to be the greatest thickener for any sauce. It basically dehydrated granulated connective tissue. Once cooled, all went into puff pastry crust- a filo crust would be better, but this was worth a try. And finally baked. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Last night's dinner was an homage to Jon B - chicken thighs with Dinosaur BBQ - Wango Tango and Wegmann's salt potatoes.

Dry aged tomahawk turned out great! My first dry aged steak, definitely had a different flavor and texture. The steak was over 3lbs so needless to say it’ll be steak and eggs this morning! Y’all have a great Sunday!

I’m batching at the moment with my 13 y.o. son while wife and daughter are off to a water polo comp. My son asked for a steak for dinner so I picked up a couple of t bones on the way home, lit the fire, position the lid at 3/4 open and went for a run. Is this the perfect grilling fire? When I came home about an hour later, my son had seasoned and cooked these. I guess he was hungry and had been watching my behaviours at home after all? It looks like I may have someone to leave the KK to..... assuming it out lives me. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Just finished slicing, packaging and vacuum sealing Canadian Bacon. It is now in the freezer.

Don’t know how I missed this post, but here’s the chart I consult for my back yard. My skies are Bortle 4. https://www.cleardarksky.com/c/CfMtnOvrVAkey.html?1 Our local astronomy club also does observing from a local microbrewery close to this location (Bortle 3’ish): https://www.cleardarksky.com/c/FnMtnObkey.html?1 I know you saw this one on Instagram. Post it here for the locals too.

It's a specific cheese for grilling. It's very dense and low moisture, it's also a bit salty, like a Feta. I probably should have cut this slab in half; although it was nice and smoky, it really didn't melt much. That's the thing to be mindful of doing this cheese, once it starts to soften, watch it closely or you'll be trying to scoop it out of the grooves in the grate!