tekobo

That all looks very yummy. No danger of me becoming a vegetarian any time soon. @Troble that lamb looked good and moist. I'd eat it any day.

🤪😛😄 Beaner schnitzel. I can't stop laughing! Looking forward to hearing how your sister and her family enjoy your Al Pastor. It's been another great contribution to the forum from @Troble and, once you have sourced and mastered the achiote, it is a doddle to make.

That does look like a great plate of food @PVPAUL. And I wouldn't have minded a taste of that tequila! Soo..given you are of Mexican origin you must know more than any of us about how Al Pastor should taste. Was this authentic from your point of view? I see that you put a stone underneath the pan. Was that to keep the meat tender? I usually try to get the base as hot as possible towards the end so that the meat that I have cut off, crisps up a bit in the pan. Is that what you did too or should I be doing less of that and taking the meat off sooner? Thanks.

Looking forward to seeing the results @PVPAUL and hearing about how it went. My hope and expectation is that it was a hit.

Just to close this out. I did use the meat hanger to hang the bacon for cold smoking. I took @jonj's advice and dropped a hot coal in amongst the pellets in the cold smoker unit and it burned for hours on end. The only problem is that I chose the windiest day of the year and it appeared to disrupt the flow of smoke into the KK. I gave up after about 8 hours and only had a slight hint of smoke. You live and you learn. Next time! Here is a shot to prove that it happened.

Petite tender. That looks interesting and, never having heard of it before, I can see that there are lots of references to it on the web. I hope it was tasty @Tyrus!

I have some bacon curing just now. The meat hanger is going to be ideal for cold smoking the bacon when it is ready for that stage.

Yes, Dennis is the one to ask. His tile size is very specific and, having hunted everywhere, I found that the only company in the UK that had the right size tile was a swimming pool company. Good luck with your search and welcome to the KK family.

Yup. I have owned five KKs in total. Sold my first two - a 21 and a 23 in blue pebble - and bought these three in tile. I am therefore fully qualified to say that tile cooks better. I sought advice from the forum before I bought my first two KKs. I was right to get two but wrong not to have got the 32 in the first place. I thought that the "go big or go home" rhetoric was just that, macho rhetoric. I should have listened. The 32 is the ideal KK and does most everything I've ever wanted to do.

I just wanted to refer to the post above. I ditched these extra bolts.

I ordered side tables for my 23 Ultimate and they arrived today. Thank you to @Komodo_Kamado_UK for the home delivery service. @MacKenzie was more impatient that me and sent me a message to check if I had opened the boxes after waiting patiently for precisely 3 hours and 8 minutes for an update. So, I opened the boxes. Meat hanger for the 32 Big Bad and side tables for the 23 Ultimate. I was worried when I approached the 23 Ultimate. I have the grate hanger permanently attached on the left and the rotisserie motor bracket on the right. Was I going to need to take both off because they would not fit with the side tables in place? Happily the answer was no. On the right hand side we fitted the rotisserie motor bracket over the top of the side table bracket. I texted Dennis a photo while I was doing this and he suggested the rotisserie motor bracket should go under the side table bracket. Wouldn't work for me because of the small vertical screws on the rotisserie motor bracket that you can see in the right hand side picture. I will see how things work but I may need to size and cut a new shaft to go between the rotisserie motor and the KK to take account of the extra depth introduced by the new side table bracket. I took off the old accessory hanger on the left hand side and installed the new one under the side table here: So, I get to keep all the functionality that I used to have AND I have new side tables. Very happy. Looking at the time stamps on the photos, we went from unwrapped table tops at 18:10 to fitted tables at 18:40. Not bad. How do I know that Dennis is NOT going to insert a post telling me that I have the tables the wrong way round? Because I already got that from him on WhatsApp and fixed it before posting. So there.

Thanks @Tyrus. The rabbit came from our butcher in Italy. I brought it back frozen and only just had the courage to cook it. Difficult to buy rabbit in towns in the UK. @C6Bill, I guess I am not as sentimental as you. My very first pet was a white rabbit with pink eyes called Jane. We didn't eat her but I did keep chickens that we eventually ate. A funny feeling I will have to admit.

That looks really robust @Tyrus. If you have built it right it should outlast you!

Common themes here. Italians make simple ingredients taste great and food like rabbit is common place on the continent but is generally seen as old school in the English speaking world. It is a little bony and lean but I look forward to trying it in different recipes - low and slow on the KK for instance or braised in nice stews.

I am not keen on lean meat and could never see the point of rabbit until we had a wonderful meal at Filippo's in Piedmont, Italy way back in 2017. It included rabbit, cooked slowly over fire right beside you in the dining room. It was a memorable experience. I don't have Filippo's experience or skill but my 32 Big Bad gave me a leg up in the tools department. Here is Filippos set up: Here is my husband's job of getting the rabbit attached to my KK spit. Here is the rabbit, cooked at 150C in the KK. Took under an hour and I took it off at about 70C. My father-in-law had fond memories of eating rabbit in post-war England - a source of protein when meat was still heavily rationed - and came round specially to try some. It didn't disappoint. Nice, moist and tasty. Served here with fennel forward sides. Eating the front leg was not dissimilar to eating a chicken wing.

Lovely looking space and set up!

Lovely looking cooks all. Veal steaks for lunch. Indirect most of the way with a quick sear at the end. One was thicker than the other so I was able to cook them in the same time frame with one rarer than the other. Turned out really well with home made fries, mayonnaise, peas and hot sauce. No plated pics, was too busy eating.

Gosh @Chief, my husband and I were tentative about carrying the top of a 16TT. The lid on 32 is a whole other scale! As @tony b said, I hope your arm was only bruised and not broken. Welcome to the most fun you will have in your back yard with your clothes on.

I didn't like to say, when @tony b and @5698k both said it was easy, that I have always found it hard to separate the point and flat on a raw brisket. I guess practice helps and I do this so rarely that I approach it with trepidation every time. P.S. Your results look good.

Chicken dinner, always a winner. Used the upper rack to get the chicken skin nice and crispy using reflected heat from the dome. Crisped up these potato slices while the chicken was resting. New to me recipe from Francis Mallman's Green Fire. Enjoyed by all. Worked well with chilli sauce and ketchup.

Thanks @tony b. I will set some time aside this weekend to try a few variants. In the past I thought that keeping the mash going for longer was the way to go but now realise that 6-8 weeks is long enough for a mighty fine tasting sauce. I am looking forward to this year's crop of chillis. It will be interesting to explore the different flavours that different chillis deliver in a sauce.

@Tucker I did a quick google search and it appears the sentiment is well known and available on posters and T-shirts in the US. With the growing number of vegans in the UK I don't think I'll be walking down the street in one of those T-shirts anytime soon but I might just spring for an apron.

So...after three days off the booze and eating in a restricted time window, this vegetarian lark seems to be working. I am sleeping better and have lost a little girth and a little weight. @Tyrus is right, I won't ever pass for a vegetarian with two freezers full of meat in the house but I am discovering the benefits of not loading every meal with meat and sides and washing it all down with wine at every opportunity. Baby steps. I can't be bothered with a diet but if I can make some sustainable changes I will be happy.

Yipppee! I made started three batches of Scotch bonnet ferments in early April and tried the first batch last week. At first I was worried that the heat would knock my head off but with the judicious addition of some sushi vinegar it mellowed out and is joyously addictive. I want to try different additives and wondered what others have tried with success. When you add garlic @tony b is it just whizzed in raw with the ferment? Any other interesting flavours? I tried balsamic vinegar but that wasn't as good as the sushi vinegar. Thinking I might riff on the latter with some straight mirin. I also tried with soy tonight but I think I put a bit too much in.

My husband's away for a few days and I decided to try being a vegetarian teetotaller while I was on my own. Otherwise known as drying out and slimming down. The only problem is that my Texan girlfriend was in town for just one night and I had lured her to dinner with a picture of a nice T-bone steak. She arrived with this tea towel for me but quickly got with the programme and we had a lovely evening, sober at dinner for the first time in our acquaintance. I tried out some BBQ recipes from Francis Mallman's Green Fire and they were all a success, washed down with homemade lemonade. I didn't get photos of the fennel and spring onions on the konro grill but this one, shows cooked black beans and broad beans getting some char. It made the black beans a bit crunchy and very tasty. Next came the smashed potatoes, grilled with a fennel seed and fennel pollen topping - intended to replicate the flavours of a porchetta and... it worked! The beans were mixed up with the grilled fennel and spring onions and a bit of vinegar and oil to make the centrepiece salad which we ate with our smashed potatoes. Surprisingly filling. Dessert was one of the weirdest things I have ever made. Grilled stone fruit - I used a plum, a peach and a nectarine - with grilled Raclette cheese! Texan was NOT weirded out. We considered what it might need to lift it. She suggested white balsamic vinegar. It was the perfect match. And yes, I know the picture is not the best but I promise you it was tasty. In fact, I am coming round to thinking that I can eat less meat and still enjoy a meal. Shock! Horror.