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Sometimes things just go oh so right and this one of those cooks. Chicken thighs, rice cooked with chicken stock and white Miso, steamed carrots that were just recently pulled from the garden before they froze in solid and peas picked early in the season then blanched and frozen.

Great to see you back @Basher! put up the Christmas tree and decorations yesterday and shaved off a chicken schwarma meat stick during the afternoon Mediterranean salad with garbanzo beans, bell peppers, red onion, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, feta basil & herb pearled cous cous homemade tadziki toasted pita

With these ribs I prepped them first by laying them in a sheet of Aluminum foil and dousing them with enough Japanese BBQ sauce for absorbtion. Wrapped up and placed in frig for 2-3 hours. They come out a nice soft brown in color, then a rub called Saucehound sweet/salty and well balanced. It's a rub you can use on beef, pork, chicken or fish....find it on Amazon however they only have it in the small shaker, I generally order the 5lb bag and divy out shares. At the 3hr point I wrapped in a combined sauce of Go-Chu-Jang, Sweet Mirin and a sweet Ginger Sauce for a little heat. I removed the ribs after 30 to 40 mins and placed back on the grill for some more sauce to set. Beautiful colored ribs and the taste was there too. Layers of flavor

Thank you peeps. We are limping back into home with much Reno work yet to be completed. The dry aging fridge is our every day fridge until the cold room is built back in on Monday, the outside is incomplete, the rooftop garden is yet to be waterproofed and landscaped, we are moving boxes and trying to clean up our other house. All in all thing are pretty ugly around here just glad to get a cook up on the KK….. and the Parilla. Here is part of the kitchen. I’ll post some more tomorrow. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

After a lot of research, trial and error, great talks with Dennis, I’ve unlocked some secrets to the perfect rotisserie Turkey. 1. Brine: 1 gal of water. 1/2 cup of kosher salt. 1/4 cup brown sugar. That’s it. Nothing more. Top chefs I’ve talked to, that’s all they use and all that is needed. Brine for 24 hours. Double recipe if needed. 2. Baking Powder: It must NOT contain aluminum. Pat dry the bird after brining. Use a fine mesh sieve and dust the entire bird. This works great for crisping up the skin and also works great on chicken wings too 👍. 3. Air Dry: Air dry the bird 24 hours uncovered in the refrigerator. Bring to room temp about an hour before the fire. 4. Drainage: Use a Jacard meat tenderizer or knife to make small slits in the skin in fatty areas to drain rendered fat. This will allow rendered fat to drain, fall into the hot coals and smoke which will give your bird absolutely incredible flavor. 5. Truss: Truss the bird and Install the skewer directly through the center of bird. Use the skewer point and a hammer to pierce the cartilage making sure it is evenly placed through the center. 6. Fire: 375-400 at the dome. Preheat at least one hour in cold temps. Add 2 cherry wood chunks to the fire about an hour into the cook - gives nice subtle hint of smoke and adds nice color to the bird. 7. BIG SECRET-Heat deflector: This is a game changer I discovered. Use a Weber stainless steel perforated roasting pan as your heat deflector. The square one fits perfectly between the handles on a 23 Ultimate. See picture below. This deflects the heat, but most importantly, allows renderings from the bird to drain through and reach the fire which adds incredible flavor to the bird. Better yet, the pan blocks all flareups from reaching the bird. 8. Baste Recipe: Roast the bird for 1 hour. Prepare a baste consisting of 1 cup olive oil, one stick of butter, chop thyme, rosemary, chive, sage - add to oil. Purée’ a shallot, and mash two garlic cloves - add to oil. Salt and pepper to taste. Heat on low and combine. 9. Basting Mop: Take a small bunch of thyme, rosemary, and sage stalks and tie them up super tight with twine twice at the end making a mop. Stir and saturate in the basting oil. Remove basting oil from heat. 10. Baste: Baste the bird every 20-30 minutes after the first hour. The basting oil will drip into the hot fire again creating incredible flavor. The oil will also help crisp up the skin. 11. Temp: 170-175 breast and 185 dark meat. Generally, white meat finishes first. As the white meat approaches its finish temp, I stop the rotisserie so the dark meat is facing the fire and I hold this until the dark meat hits the indicated temps. Do this when the white meat is about 165+ for about 15 minutes. The connective tissues in dark meat will not render until about 180-185. If you go above to 190, no big deal. The higher the better. 12. Scorch: Turn the rotisserie back on. Bring the fire up to 500 and finish for 5 minutes. This will give the bird its final color and crisp it up. 13. Remove the bird. Let rest for 15-45 minutes - I find that 30+ works best. Carve and enjoy. 14. Meater Probe: These work fantastic with no wires and really changes the rotisserie game. You get internal temps and external temps directly at the pint of the cook and the software interface is really nice. The estimated cook times get you close in terms of internal temps but use a Thermopen to spot check around the bird to fine tune. This is the very best turkey all of my guests including a professional chef has ever tasted. My neighbors texted me and I found them hovering around the grill waiting for samples 😂. Been asked to do a demo for a local William Sanoma store. It’s incredibly flavorful throughout. The white meat is moist without being watery or salty and has incredible grilled flavor. The dark meat is succulent - absolutely delicious. The key is the perforated heat deflector - it is truly a game changer - Enjoy!

Mac, you cut me to the quick with every color there, the nice thing was they all blended together so well, nice cook.!

So we ended up with the Alfa 5 Minuti and have tried pizzas twice now. Still on the learning curves with pizzas - those done in our KK tend to cook the bottom faster than the top, and in the WFO the top faster than the bottom. We'll get there eventually, but may not have many clothes that fit by then.

I saw some Grade A scallops at Costco for over $30/lb I think. I'm not sure that's apples to apples since I'm not sure on the details on where they originated from but they looked pretty good.

I'm encouraged. I think I will try the wet brine and the rotisserie. I'll have backup if I ruin the bird in the fire, but I agree, the 42 should be up to the task, and I think I can make sure the rod is tight when I put it in. I might get a few extra degrees of heat while I have the KK open futzing with making sure the rod is placed well, so I will heat soak at a lower temp and if the cook starts a little high, that won't be a problem. I will let you know how it goes - I will brine in the yeti 24-36 hrs. Should be really good. Really appreciate the input @Tyrus @tekobo @C6Bill @tony b

That’s really useful, had forgotten a cover. Am hoping to hear from Dennis on WhatsApp sometime soon, but this is all speculative for a mid 2023 order when funds become available.

I usually don’t go to the trouble of making char siu. it's available everywhere in hk and you simply buy it from the shop. but my pork shoulder came in two small pieces. too small to do low and slow, so this is what i ended up with. The secret to char siu is maltose. It makes better glazing overall than honey. If you ever need to do any "sticky" type of bbq, use maltose. You can do this in the KK, but it was raining and I cooked it in the oven. The way I cut the pieces sort of made them into burnt ends char siu. recipe here:

I've smoked jerky a few times. I place an old pan (meatloaf, pie, etc.) in the bottom and use just a few pieces of charcoal and wood in that pan. Gives better control of flame/temp. Also stay out of the wind. It can more or less pull a vacuum on the smoker making temp harder to control. YMMV

homemade cured salmon and bagels. i would have smoked it on the kk with the cold smoker, but life got in the way and there's a typhoon outside so i couldn't do it. still tastes wonderful. if you want to cure/smoke your own salmon, there is almost no $ saved because a half salmon is just as expensive as one already smoked.. homemade bagels of course..

Vermicular has a new oven safe cast-iron frying pan and mine arrived this week so I took advantage of it today to make Pull Apart Bread. Egg wash. These light weight ceramic coated frying pans are amazing. I have one with the walnut handle, which obviously can't go in the oven but it is a thing of beauty. This week I got one with an oven safe handle, it does get hot in the oven but this handle stays cool when used on the stove top as does the walnut one.

special dinner tonight. got my hands on chilled rubia gallega striploin. rubia is an old galecian cow breed. it has this milky spoiled fermented bovine smell and taste to it. hard to explain. i prefer this over any other beef, including japanese waygu… sous vide in apo to 118f and held temp for about an hour while i worked on the sauce and sides.. finished in the alfa burning wood roasted veg accompaniment green peppercorn sauce IMG_9779.MOV