jonj

I decided to smoke some baby back ribs yesterday and took the opportunity to try out the Billows Battery Bank. I didn't need the Billows fan or Signals control for temperature maintenance on the KK23 for this cook, but tried it out just to see how it worked. The battery pack came fully charged, with all four led charge indicators fully illuminated. My Signals unit hadn't been used for a few months so its charge level was undetermined. Hookup of the system was simple, substituting the battery pack for the wall wart power adapter on the cable. I had already had the KK heat sunk and at the 225°F temperature when I decided to try the new device, so the fan didn't have much to do initially. The battery pack has an on/off button on the top which allows the unit to discharge power to the fan (which I missed for a few seconds after hooking everything up - once pushed, the fan started right up). The ribs were a 5 1/2 hour cook to temperature and the Signals unit also was fully charged by the battery pack during the cook. All four charge leds were still illuminated after the cook so the unit didn't discharge much during the process. I don't know about the full capacity of the battery pack, said to be able to run the fan for 24 hours in the product information, but from this brief cook I have no reason to doubt it at this point. (sharp observers will note the KK temperature has crept up to 247° versus the 225° set temp. It was a windy day and even with the dampers shut down, the fire gained a few degrees at the tail end of the cook. No harm, no foul.)

Beautiful locations and stunning food! Thanks for sharing

I ordered the Billows battery pack when I first saw the announcement and received it a few days ago. Very substantial and came with a full charge already. I haven't tried it yet but will get around to it the next time I cook brisket overnight.

@Troble, I think you and I have the same idea of how to spend a birthday. Mine is Sunday and I am super jealous of your current trip... Best wishes for a happy birthday (but I think you already have it covered)!

Steak, potato, and last corn for Chiefs-Ravens football game last night. Steak was great, corn was last of season and so-so. Game didn't end well for my team (Chiefs); wine was great (2004 Shafer Hillside Select cabernet).

His original post indicated it was used when he got it and it had spent some time in the rain. I suspect it has accumulated some moisture prior to his ownership and the 500° burn was acting like a burn-in. It might be a good idea to actually do a burn-in with a little higher temp to be sure the excess moisture is out.

Doesn't say the haddock was actually eaten... but it does look pretty tasty.

Yum, sausage...

We had a few friends over for the weekend and I finally made @Troble Tacos de Adobada. They were terrific! Served with mango-coconut rice with Jamaican curry, Schramsberg sparkling wine, and flan for dessert. Very well received by all. Thanks again to TR for the recipe and care package! I used a 9.4 lb pork shoulder, which just barely fit on the Trompo King, but was perfect for the amount of marinade. LOTS of leftovers. I added the deflector stone under the double drip pan about 2/3 through the cook to reduce the direct heat on the bottom since on the KK23 I had to use the lower grate for the vertical stack to fit under the dome. Very, very happy with this recipe.

@Syzygies, I have been thinking about this off and on since Dennis announced the availability of dedicated smoker port retrofit parts. I've held off buying them as I wanted to be sure when I did, I got the benefit of any subsequent Dennis improvements (such as the interior retention nut, face plate locking wing nuts, bracket, straight smoker discharge tube, etc). Like you, I have given some thought to how I might carefully install the new port and sleeve once I got them. For what it's worth, here is my plan (Word document) of attack for this so far (which includes how a backer board could used in the process), absent the actual parts and updated instructions from Dennis when I actually order and receive them. So, basically a thought exercise... KK Smoker Port Installation Plan.docx I would be interested in any improvements to, or critiques of, this. I do woodworking as a hobby and have found developing a work plan / checklist well in advance can help with a successful outcome. Kind of the extension of the "measure twice, cut once" philosophy.

And our early congratulations to you and @Sharky as well! Best wishes for a great weekend!

Jerk Pork last night to celebrate our 46th wedding anniversary. Pork tenderloin with Carib Dry Jerk rub grilled with pimento smoke wood, rice & peas cooked in coconut milk, and fresh corn from the cob, served with 2011 Forman Cabernet Sauvignon. Followed by grilled peaches and vanilla bean ice cream, with a 2008 Merry Edwards Late Harvest Sauvignon Blanc.

Welcome! The grill and the new platform look great!

JD is what I have using lately.

@tony b what is the mesh size you’re using for the charcoal?

@tony bI plan to go by Mad Fritz while we are here. I’ve known Nile for years when he was still a homebrewer (former winemaker of Barnett and now at David Arthur, plus his own label). A great and adventurous brewer. @Troble, I checked out Freeman; looks terrific. They were booked up today as we went through RRV (in Calistoga now), but may take a trip back over to catch them if I can work it out. Thanks to you both for the tips. (Apologies for the non-food content although, if I remember correctly, wine and beer constitute 2 of the 7 categories on the food pyramid)

@tony b we haven’t yet made to the Russian River but today for lunch I had fish & chips at the Fishetarian in Bodega Bay. Accompanied it with a Pliny The Elder. Pretty tasty brew and excellent fish & chips. I see why you and @Troble like it. Headed to Calistoga tomorrow.

Terrific looking pizza!

I was hungry for ribeye and caesar salad, so this was tonight's dinner. Ribeyes were trimmed and fixed up with duck fat and Montreal seasoning. Pulled at 130°. Very tasty with salad, potato, and a 2005 Barnett Cyrus Ryan Cabernet Sauvignon.

I generally only wear gloves (nitrile) when working with chilies. Frequent hand washing for everything else.

@Troble, I just finished dinner but I'm sure I could squeeze in a couple of slices and some salad if it was in front of me! Yum!

@C6Bill, great cook and welcome to retirement!

@tony b, Is "leaf lard" some sort of brewer's secret additive?

A few months ago I finally bought a ThermoWorks Signals / Billows setup. Needing to clear the freezer of a 19 pound package of pork butt (which was taking up a lot of space) and having house guests to help eat it, I decided to try an overnight cook using the controller / fan to check it out. After three days of thawing, I separated and trimmed the two bone-in butts. I marinaded one overnight with Wicker's Marinade, then rubbed with Wicker's dry rub. The other I rubbed with a 50-50 mix of KC Butt Spice and Bad Byron's Butt Rub, using duck fat as a binder. Butt Number Two (number one was very similar in size and fat content): KC Butt Spice/Bad Byron's Butt Rub over duck fat binder: Both were refrigerated until placed into the KK23, set at 225° and heat soaked for 1.5 hours. The double drip pan was used and smoke wood was a mix of cherry and apple wood chunks. The meat (33.5°F) was added to the KK at 8:00 pm (which was under a tarp as we were expected to have 2 - 4 inches of rain over to coming 24 hours). Adding 19 lbs of cold pork to pulled the smoker temperature down to about 140° and it took about 1.5 hours to get back to 225° with the Billows fan (I had choked it down for the KK using the accessory damper since the Billows cfm is ridiculously high for a KK). Billows fit into the KK Guru port using the Billows accessory snout: Billows damper setting I used to tame the cfm (via inspection mirror), which turned out about right: Since dinner was not to be until 23 hours later, I decided to not wrap the butts at the stall, but to instead see how the KK/Signals/Billows setup worked for a long cook (without any intervention on my part). Plus, I didn't want to get up at 0' Dark Thirty to wrap them. Butts at 45 minutes in: Left (green probe) is Wicker's Marinade; Right (yellow probe + toothpick) is KC/BB dry rub The Billows overshot the 225° setting in the initial push to return the KK to temperature by only 10°, then was within 5° of the set 225° temperature throughout the 19.5 hours of the cook. I was very impressed with the consistency. Here is the graph at 9:00 am, 13 hours into the cook (the slight dip in pit temp at 6:00 am was to check the results after the overnight smoke): Temperature readings at 13 hours: The butts continued to leisurely accrue internal temperature throughout the day, reaching high 190°s by around 2:00 pm, at which time I bumped the set temp up to 250° to get a bit more temperature differential to push the butts to 203°, which was to be my pull target. The Wicker's butt reached 204° at 3:10 pm (19 hours in the smoker) while the KC/BB butt reached 203° at 3:30 pm (19.5 hours). They were wrapped in foil and a towel, then placed in a cooler for a three hour rest until dinner. I didn't get any photos of the finished butts in the KK as it was pouring rain then and the activity was a bit frantic. Here are the results. Left is KC/Bad Byron Rub; Right is Wicker's Marinade & Rub: Partially chunked up / pre-pulled. Notice the internal color difference between the dry rub (left) and marinade (right - more intense and deeper into the meat) versions. Bark was about the same on both. These are not the entire butts; just the amount for dinner (19 lbs of pork butt is A LOT of pork butt...). Plated at 7:00 pm, 23 hours after the meat was placed into the KK: In summary, I found the KK/Signals/Billows combination to be very satisfactory. It was my first use of a controller & fan combination and while I probably won't use it often, I will likely use it for future brisket and pork butt overnight cooks. I will probably do the normal butcher paper wrap to cut down the time in the future as well (I typically do so but wanted to experiment with the new gear). There was no lack of moisture in the pork without the butcher paper crutch. I was impressed with the low temperature variation of the Signals / Billows combination after the system stabilized. With the large cfm of the Billows, I was concerned it might repeatedly overshoot the set temperature but this was not the case. Other than the first return to temperature after the cold meat was added to the KK, the temperature variation was 5° or less. I set the Billows diffuser to almost closed, and fortunately it seemed to be about right. The KK was miserly with the use of its charcoal (FOGO Super Premium - large chunks). I started with a full basket and 1.5 hour heat soak, then a 19.5 hour cook at 225°, followed by a run up to 350° for 2.5 hours waiting to grill the corn and mushroom. At the end, I still have over one-half basket of charcoal left. As I have mentioned before, I am not a huge fan of pulled pork but this certainly was a moist and tasty result. Between the marinade and dry rub versions, I preferred the marinade version. As for the guests, the preference was evenly split between the two butts among the carnivores (the vegetarian had no opinion about the pork, but pronounced the EVO/Balsamic grilled portobello to be superior).

@Basher what a great occasion and friends to help you celebrate! Happy birthday to you and cheers to your friends who made it so memorable! All the best.