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Cooked a prime brisket and 4 pork shoulder butts in the KK42 this past weekend. Rub on pork is just salt and course black pepper (after an ACV spritz). Brisket is McCormick Montreal Steak seasoning. This cook is for Christmas gifts. I like to give (and the family likes me to give) frozen BBQ on Christmas. It's consumable, it's something they'll definitely use. It's better than the BBQ people can get in most places they live. This time, I did what I normally do when I cook pork. Pull and bag in vac seal bags put bags in ice water bath to cool it down fast. 1 hr later after it's nice and cold, vac seal in chamber sealer and put them immediately in freezer. Pork BBQ tastes like it is right off the smoker when you warm up in sous vide and cut the bag open. I have been doing this for years but upped my game with the KK and the VacMaster VP215 that I bought in 2021. For the beef I did a similar thing except I didn't slice in pencil width pieces, I sliced in larger pieces that would fit in the vac seal bags. This way hopefully since it's not already fully sliced, when it's warmed up and sliced it's still (hopefully) almost like it was fresh off the KK. I have never had brisket turn out almost the same when warmed up, but I gave it the best chance possible. This was one of the best briskets I've ever done (and definitely best one that has ever come out of my KK). This is maybe the 5th or 6th I have done in 2 years on the KK. This picture is about halfway through the cook. When it fits, I've been doing everything on the upper grate these days. The results on this cook were amazing. I will continue to use this same setup. I use a Thermoworks Billows, temp 225. I put the pit temp gauge on the main grate, food on top grate. The cooks just keep getting better on the KK. 2 years - not sure how many cooks I have done for BBQ (probably 15-20), maybe 100 total cooks, and it feels like the KK is just now broken in. Cheers! - hope everyone is having a good leadup to the holidays. Oh one other note. I love the 42, b/c look how much I can do just on one grate, and it was all absolutely perfect.

IDK why it took me 2 years to find "uncle roger". LOL. I'd imagine you can put pulled pork or pulled beef in egg fried rice.

did the whole cook on the upper rack in this case.

Let someone else do the cooking last night, got together with some old co workers for a holiday dinner, yearly tradition. The key word is old lol Not the worst steak I’ve ever had but not as good as what I regularly cook on the KK at home.

So, I decided to try my hand at making sweet tamales. I have been making traditional tamales for years and upped my game once @Syzygies turned me on to nixtamilized Heirloom corn. I took our family recipe for masa and modified it for sweet tamales and added additional ingredients based on my research and taste I was looking for. Today was my second run at this after making a 1 pound Bach with a number of variables about 3 weeks ago. For this recipe I used Rosado Heirloom corn for the base masa. I added whipped butter crisco with powder sugar, cinnamon, cayenne and baking powder. Then I cooked some rice and added some milk to it after cooking and puréed it and added this to the masa and then blended it until it floats in tepid water. For the filling I whipped up some cream cheese and added maple syrup to it. I also fried up some home make KK bacon until crisp. After spreading the masa on the Hoja I added the cream cheese mixture, 4 blueberries and 2-3 pieces of bacon. I steamed in my steam over for about 1 hour and 20 minutes……….I think I have a winner and am looking forward to sharing with family and friends this Christmas!!! All the best, Paul

Nothing like pork belly burnt ends, KK style. It took hours to render it, but in the end, it was a real hit. Sauce was Head Country, brown sugar, and honey.

I've been wanting a nice bowl of chile for the last month. Finally got around to it today. Smoked a chuckie, simmered down the Chile, put it together to simmer for approx 3 hrs. The chile took a spin in the blender then thru a fine mesh sieve a few onions to add some texture