Syzygies

Food safety Many foods are traditionally eaten below their "safe" temperature. There's no joy left in a safely cooked egg or hamburger, for example. If no one at the table has an impaired immune system (young, sick, old) then simply take careful notes, so the Thermapen can tell you quicker what you would have decided anyway. Don't slavishly change cooking habits to "fly by instrument" according to some table, or your cooking will suffer. Botulism, either via canning or fermenting, is a serious risk that can cripple or kill. Cooking meat isn't quite so dangerous. One hears of serious E Coli incidents involving commercial food; the take home message for me is to not eat commercial food. That burger on an airplane is far more likely to be mystery meat tainted with feces than anything that crosses our KK grates. Always buy "sushi grade" high quality natural or organic meat, grind it yourself if needed, and cook it however you like? The "four hours below 140 F" danger zone rule is most interesting here. For e.g. a low & slow pork butt, the interior flesh can easily spend more than four hours in the danger zone. In general, this is unbroken flesh, but even the act of inserting a temperature probe could introduce the needed bacteria for trouble. In practice, one never hears of this being a problem. Any rule of thumb has a back story. These bugs grow exponentially, as in doubling every so many minutes. The people making up these rules decide how much of a head start the bugs have in practice. If your meat is cleaner than they're thinking, this translates to extra minutes of leeway. Etc. Etc. This probably explains why low and slow cooks aren't such a hazard.

Carbling? I wish there was a term like "marbling" to describe collagen rather than fat. The connective tissue that dissolves as part of a low and slow cook. For lean meat uninterrupted by any features that benefit from low & slow, I'd side with the fast cook approach. I see this sort of meat at commercial BBQ establishments outside Texas, because it's cheap and customers don't know or don't care. To me it's not brisket. (The best brisket in my life was served to me in Elgin, Texas. #2 through #N have come off my KK, all low & slow and expensive meat.) Paying more for brisket can be one way of insuring lots of collagen. It certainly isn't the only way, and it offends purists concerned about process. (By this argument, should one be using a $3K cooker? ) I spend what I have to for brisket that benefits from a low & slow. With enough collagen, the brisket is never dry.

Syzygy (Oxford English Dictionary) Syzygy (Oxford English Dictionary) Who knew it was a barbecue term! Some of my work is described in that book. More significantly, the author, David Eisenbud, became a minister of the Universal Life Church, so that he could perform the wedding ceremony for Laurie and me on a hillside on Mt. Diablo, a few years back.

Caldonia! Caldonia! What makes your big head so hard? Clearly, you have to name her Caldonia.

Hot sauce n66737 We just bottled last season's (fermented) hot sauce.

Re: Chris Lilly's Six-time World Championship Pork Shoulder

Re: Florida Charcoal 2011 Yep. There's only one reasonable rule of thumb for figuring out how many boxes to order. Measure all available storage space. Plan on filling it. Add five boxes.

So we like to grind various meats for burgers (using The Sausage Maker TSM Stainless Steel Meat Grinder #10 and various blades, accessories). Best bets in the past have included short ribs, brisket, skirt steak. Tonight at my favorite butcher (Diablo Foods in Lafayette, CA), Porterhouse and T-Bone were on sale for $11 per pound. I asked for a few steaks and let slip I'd be grinding them. (We really do prefer burgers to steak, if they're done right.) An up-and-coming kid was horrified; he insisted on cutting me a 3 pound "first cut" chunk off the end of a whole chuck, next to where the rib eye steaks come from, for all of $10. I ground it through the 1/2" and 1/4" plates in turn, discarding what didn't pass through easily, and made 150g burgers. I grilled them on the main grill two minutes per side at 600 F, coming off rather rare, but cooking further en route to table. Best burgers ever, both texture and flavor. I'm sure I'm preaching to the primeats choir, but I thought I'd nevertheless share.

Re: SB XLV Chicken wings recipe? I have a friend who makes Buffalo wings indoors (deep fried) that are twice as good as any restaurant version I've ever tried. (As in, someone else ordered them. I wouldn't.) The two critical pieces of advice: Cook thoroughly[/*:m:osnzdnqv] Use a potent hot sauce to prevent soggy wings[/*:m:osnzdnqv] How one best translates this to the KK is a good question, but these two principles explain every dreadful wing I've ever had in a restaurant.

Re: Introduction, a bit late and my new love No, Kamado King is not RJ. Here's a guide to ceramic cookers (quite inclusive, they also list cookers made from portland cement): http://biggreenegghead.com/big-green-eg ... ic-cookers

Re: New HandHewnFloors.com Site up and Running So it's not prohibitive to ship to the states? You make me want to change jobs so I can build a house. Nice site!

Re: Thermapens on Sale We can't imagine not having a Thermapen for our KK. Laurie gave me a second one for Christmas, for my New York apartment. Just before the sale, which is on through Jan 31. I just used it to keep an eye on my "reverse sear" shell steak. Dry aged from Fairway Markets; vacuum packed with salt, pepper, butter and heated in a Sous Vide water bath to 134 F. Then pan-seared and sauced with mushrooms, side of sweet plantains.

Re: Grill Floss vs Billy Bar Ok, here's what I know, and what I don't know: The Komodo Kamado has 3/8" - 304 Stainless grates. This is beefier than other ceramic cookers. Grill Floss tools come with a "Dual Sized Cleaning Head", 5/16" and 3/8". The larger head matches the KK spec. Billy Bar tools come in a single size, which fit my previous K7 (not recommended) grates well. My guess (the site doesn't say) is that they were 5/16". In any case, I formed the impression that it was a poor fit for my new KK, so I gave the tool to my neighbor along with the (now tileless) K7. (He was thrilled, a fire is a fire, but given the choice he'd take the KK any day.) So what's the debate here? If the Billy Bar doesn't fit, it doesn't matter if it's made of Play-Doh, right? My primary cleaning regimen has been to place the grill in an Oatey 24" water heater pan (plastic or metal, Home Depot, Lowes, or Oatey #34078 24" Aluminum Water Heater Pan (Amazon)). Plastic is fine if the grill is cool, one also needs a rubber stopper for the plumbing hole in the pan. After a decent soak, a wad of aluminum foil does a great job of cleanup. I also like to alternate low and high cooks; only the second low cook in a row presents interesting hygiene questions. Then, I might use soap. Nevertheless, it's nice to get the grill as clean as possible before the soak, or before a high cook. I just ordered a Grill Floss; I'm convinced. Come to think of it, I've never used the hinge feature on the main grill. I mainly wish it weren't there, when I flip the grill in the KK to get a better scrape on the underside. I'd vote (and pay) for a reversible main grill, given comments here and my experience. For that matter, a hinge could go either way; the main obstruction to reversibility are the tabs for grabbing the grill with the lifter tools.

Re: Saying expectations were exceeded is like Well, I deliberately added "group" to try to deflect attention away from the Yeats "Love has pitched his mansion" quote...

Re: Saying expectations were exceeded is like Yeah, it's crazy how people mix up the terms "anal retentive" and "obsessive compulsive". Different muscle groups...

Re: SNAKE RIVER FARMS Whole Bone-In Pork Shoulder I planned on 22 hours at 225 F. I should have gone lower or shorter (210 F or 17 hours) as it hit an internal temp of 185 F well before needed. (I'm rather distracted by a work-related project, but one can "phone in" KK cooks with enough practice.) So I turned the Guru (the no-longer-available oven dial basic model) down to 195 F. I was a bit under the weather (seasonal cold) and I'm a rather spoiled and fussy eater (at least we cook for ourselves) so it didn't taste spectacular to me. However, pretty much everyone at the party said it tasted spectacular. Who knows! Laurie admonished me to accept compliments graciously. One South Carolina expat said it was the best pulled pork he'd had outside of the state. I'd take that seriously, but remember that the "standard" for pulled pork is chopped up rope shreds, leaving a huge margin for sloppy, indifferent execution in a commercial setting. We KK folks strive for better than that. Part of my "avoid rope" thinking is to stop below 195 F internal, never go above 200 F as some do. The cooking time/temp issues may have played in the shoulder's favor, as winter pork can be quite fatty, but this was well-rendered, with all connective tissue nicely melted. I'd take off the fat cap before cooking, next time; the smoke and our rub of salt, pepper, chiles didn't get through that side. On the other hand, many people honestly like bland meat. People chose the bark side (spicy, salty, good textures) or the interior meat (bland, wonderful texture) to suit their tastes. For the ongoing brisket debate here, I side with a slow cook while sparing no expense for the meat. However, for pork I'm now leaning toward faster cooks that still manage to render fat and melt connective tissue. Stall below 120 F to absorb smoke, race to 160 F and stall to melt connective tissue, then clear the 180 F to 190 F stretch quickly.

Re: SNAKE RIVER FARMS Whole Bone-In Pork Shoulder A 20 lb pork shoulder from Diablo Foods in Lafayette, CA, just went on to bring tomorrow night to what some dear friends consider an intimate gathering. (There will be lots of other food; she's a great cook.)

Re: Has anyone tried a salt crusted prime rib ?? By which you mean that you executed a procedure as well as anyone could, yet in this instance you were unhappy with the results (too salty). I believe that your execution skills are beyond reproach; I have one of your covers! This calls into question the procedure. How did it differ from the over-the-top procedure that I quoted? Same brand of salt? Same ratio of egg whites, water? If there were differences, then the details of the procedure might matter; that's what we're all trying to figure out. We all hit walls in cooking, where we can't possibly believe that apparently minor differences in technique matter. Most don't, but then there's the occasional epiphany that some do.

Re: Has anyone tried a salt crusted prime rib ?? Baking fish in salt is a common Italian technique, and it doesn't come out too salty. A recent favorite book of mine is over-the-top precise on how to do this; worth an experiment for crossover applications like the question here. The book is worth the price just for the swordfish recipe, which I can't stop making (Pesce Spada alla Ghiotta - Swordfish "Glutton's Style" with tomato, capers, and olives). I highly recommend this book, and you'll notice it made lots of holiday lists. I have many books discussing this method, but these are the most precise directives that I have seen: My Calabria: Rustic Family Cooking from Italy's Undiscovered South [Hardcover] Rosetta Costantino (Author), Janet Fletcher (Author), Shelley Lindgren (Contributor) Branzino Sotto Sale Whole Salt-Baked Sea Bass 3 pounds (1 1/2 kilograms) Diamond Crystal kosher salt 4 large egg whites

Re: Coldest KK Kook? This seems like a good time to queue up again that food-porn classic by our very own Dave Zier: Scroll to 1:40 (See Food Porn for commentary.)

Re: Coldest KK Kook? Not sure I understood this. Which rub?

Re: Cooking a raw ham on the KK Yes. I take it you know Nigel and Matthew? Nigel bought a ceramic cooker after they had tandoori chicken on mine, one evening after class. Alas, I hadn't figured out yet that KK cookers rule. For anyone interested, here is Kasma's web site: Thai Food and Travel Her cooking is as good as the best found traveling in Thailand; I've made the comparison (on one of her food trips). I don't know a viable alternative for studying Thai cooking in the U.S. For people who need to travel to take Oakland classes, the weeklong intensives make for a great vacation in San Francisco. That's what the Seattle contingent did. We always included quiz night at the definitive Brit pub in SF.

Re: Coldest KK Kook? The KK is exceedingly well insulated. The basic equation governing heat transfer is Newton's law of cooling, which states The rate of heat loss of a body is proportional to the difference in temperatures between the body and its surroundings. The KK loses heat both through its walls, and through the airflow needed to maintain the fire. Nevertheless, this rule is a good first approximation; it appears to agree with fuel consumed in various scenarios. I would believe it most closely for slow cooks, where airflow is minimal. A 210 F cook on a 90 F day is a difference of 120 F. A 330 F cook on a 90 F day is a difference of 240 F. Both are absolutely routine for the KK; the latter uses more fuel. A 210 F cook on a minus 30 F day is also a difference of 240 F. This is in principle no more difficult for the KK. The temperature differential should impose no more stress than other situations we consider routine. What would invalidate this would be some sort of vulnerability to very low temperatures in the materials used. One thinks of Richard Feynman, O-rings, and the space shuttle. I was once taken by surprise by these temperatures, winter camping with my brother; my outer shell tore like paper, leading me to discover the North Face brand back when it was more for specialized uses like mountaineering. I learned that the only sports enthusiasts who don't stay in their tents at these temperatures are cross-country skiers traversing Antarctica; they can control their pace to maintain constant temperature. At the other extreme, K2 is a much harder climb than Everest not only because there are actual technical climbing sections, but because one has to wait standing still for unpredictable intervals as one's team tackles these sections. Dennis knows best, but to understand the KK materials one needs to think in thousands of degrees. I doubt that any outdoor temperature swing on this planet poses a particular threat.

Re: Cooking a raw ham on the KK What a great site! They could make it more obvious they're in Seattle, WA. I have some Brit friends from Thai cooking classes who work/worked at Microsoft; hopefully they're all over this store. I just wrote their FAQ to ask if their free range eggs are flash-pastured. How do they keep the yolks from cooking?

Re: Beef Ribs vs Pork Ribs Wow, now you're talking. I was going to come by, but I see you're not all that local. In the same vein, I just made "Pesce Spada alla Ghiotta" from a new Calabrian cookbook, My Calabria. It was great, perhaps my best dinner in weeks, but it reminded me of visiting the "fisherman's table" on Alicudi. There, he would have started the local variant on swordfish over charcoal, then his wife would finish with a sauce not unlike this recipe. Made me wish I was on the same coast as my Komodo.