tekobo

Small admission here. I did spend a bit of my childhood in California and I like kale. That pile of kale was moistened with oil, chilli and soy and then turned into delicious kale chips in the dehydrator.

Wow indeed. That duck looks great @Tangles. I am imagining my teeth breaking through the crisp skin and then chewing the nice moist meat beneath. Ooh, yum!

I feel like a grown up now. I finally got to do a reverse sear. Not totally sure it was necessary, given my lunch friend and I both like our steaks blue. She was worried I would overcook them but I was worried by her requirement that the meat shouldn't be cold in the middle. Sous vide would have solved that problem but I went for one experiment at a time and just did it all on the KK. Turned out just fine.

A friend came round a couple of days ago. He is a tidy freak and took his mother down to our freezer room to show her my inventory system. He pointed out that the label that says "CAT CHICKEN & PHEASANT" might lead one to think that I eat my cats. For the record: we feed our cats (at least the two that are interested) a raw meat diet. This is where we store their packs of chicken and pheasant. Cat may well be tasty but my Bengals are not for the pot. Gratuitous cute kitty picture follows. Here is Sinbad. He is not from California. And he does not like kale.

I saw your post about the Maverick thermometer and resolutely refused to "like" your post or look up the thermometer online. That is my method of seeking protection from the buying genie. I am just hoping that @Chanly1983 takes the leap and goes for the 22" table top. That will satisfy my buying urges for a while to come. I love the 22" and don't think enough people buy them.

At last! I can say that I don't have to copy you with this one @Pequod. I have actually used this Meathead recipe and can say that the salmon tasted as good as it looks in your photos.

Looks like you had a busy week @amusedtodeath! My favourite are the ribs, followed by the bread. Still working my pizza seam but will one day join you on the bread journey.

Sounds fab. Good brisket is so tasty!

I agree!

Awesome bread @Pequod! Looking forward to the verdict on the "special" marmite butter. I made the mistake of showing The Husband a picture of your bread. You need to give us the recipe and instructions for making that bread. Otherwise he might find you and move in. He is fairly clean and tidy but I suspect giving us the recipe would be less hassle.

What's for dinner? If the weather ever gets better round where you live I might make it over for a meal. Or two.

Ha ha. I do hope the magnum story is not apochryphal. In any case you can quote it with authority as having come from a Nigerian woman in England! Pale interior may be due to high temp pizza cooks? Keep meaning to find @Syzygies' post about keeping his interior clean with runs at high temps.

Thank you all. Especially pleased to hear from you @Tyrus. The meat was yummy. @Pequod, v interested in the Piedmontese beef. I find the breed of animal makes the biggest difference to taste. Ageing amps it up but isn't the be all and end all for me. Because of the long lead times with aged meat I happen to have a lump of 75 day aged Longhorn arriving this week. That tastes different again and I think I will cut into 2"+ steaks so that I can try the reverse sear (or even sous vide!) technique.

The Husband recently received an email about magnums of wine, explaining why they were the better way to store wine in the long term. It included a story about Winston Churchill. Apparently Churchill said that a magnum was a perfect amount of wine for two gentlemen to share over lunch, particularly if one of them wasn't drinking. Well this amount of meat was the perfect amount for four people, particularly if two of them are older and don't eat quite so much as they used to. All trimmed up and ready to go. We bought two KKs so that we could cook at different temps concurrently and also so that we could get the timing right for serving. Even so, I often try to sequence things with one KK because I can't quite bring myself to light two KKs at once. Today I reminded myself that I ought to be true to the cause and bravely lit both at once. Here are the obligatory veggie shots, this time in the 21" And the now for the meat shots. I have still never done a reverse sear. The steaks were only about 1" thick and I wanted most of them rare so there didn't seem to be a need for a reverse sear. No fat collection mechanism either. I do like the taste of the smoke from the burnt fat, particularly as it is only from a few minutes of burn. I am keen, however, to hear if there are other and better ways to do this. Done And yum Let's hear it for the dairy cows! This is just another picture of cooked meat but I can assure you that it tasted exceptional. Not butter soft but with texture and great flavour. If this takes off it will be a good way of helping to keep dairy farms afloat, alongside promoting the sale of baby male calves for humane rose veal.

Wasn't it just. We live vicariously through every new KK owner's journey. That's the only thing that stops us from mortgaging our homes to buy yet another KK so we can feel the buzz again!

Ha. I usually check facts before I post but this time I typed in cheese=rotten milk AFTER I had submitted the last post. I found this: "Cheese is not made from "rotten" milk, let me clarify that. Rotting is an uncontrolled process in which bacteria, molds and other life forms colonize milk, eat it, release waste into it and die. The resulting, rather unpredictable, crud we call rotten (or more precisely spoiled) milk. Most cheese is the product of highly controlled action by bacteria that produce acids that coagulate the casein in the milk. The type of bacteria, the temperature, the amount of time they are allowed to act, the amount of water you drain out of the curdling milk, all control the end result in terms of texture, taste and flavor. The kicker, though, is that cheese is by no means a sterile product - not even cheese made with pasteurized milk. Bacteria remain inside the cheese, and of course bacteria (and molds and yeasts) land on its surface through its processing and shelf time" There were lots of people who came on after that to say they were happy that they didn't like cheese and so had less bacteria in their lives. Poor things, they don't know what they are missing. Same with the controlled aging of meat. It has been interesting to stay in touch with people who work to get the balance between ageing and rot just right in a natural product like this. When they do, it is sublime.

Oooh. It feels like I have put a lot of pressure on a summer's evening steak dinner. Hope I don't drink too much and forget to take photos at the critical time! The In-Laws are coming to dinner so you will see the full range from very well done to blue. @Bruce Pearson, funny you should remark on the mould. I had been thinking about it and the outcome of ageing meat. I was very surprised and impressed by the fact that, after two days in the fridge, absolutely no liquid had leached out of the beef and onto the pink butcher paper that it was wrapped in. That may be a feature of the fact that the butcher paper allows it to breathe but good nonetheless. When I had that off cut for lunch yesterday the meat was great but I ate very little of the fat because we had not properly trimmed off all the mould. What I did eat of the "clean" fat reminded me of rancid butter but in a good way. After all, cheese is rotten milk and blue cheese is mouldy rotten milk and like both. Proper KK taste test tonight.

Bizarrely, marmite has a role to play in my access to this beautiful lump of rump. The restaurant that served us the wonderful marmite butter also served mutton. My friend's teenage son said the mutton was "life changing" after he had eaten it. I asked the chef for his supplier's name. And so began a long saga. The supplier only sold to restaurants and his website said sales were "by invitation only". I badgered and begged and even threw in a bit of needle by telling him that I regularly buy from one of his main competitors. Eventually he gave in and has been supplying me with ever more wonderful old sheep for the last couple of years. When I asked for another sheep a few months ago he sent me a note about a scheme they have going to improve the welfare and sale value of old dairy cows. Once dairy cows become unproductive they rest and feed them a special diet for a further 7-8 months to get them in tip top condition and then sell the meat at a premium. Under normal circs I might have thought this was a wheeze to con me out of my money but I had seen the Netflix programme about steak which included the mad Spaniard who specifically breeds bulls/cows to an old age to deliver what they considered to be the best steak in the world. I was all in. The supplier managed to persuade me that I didn't need half of a 440kg cow and that I should try a rump first. Hung for 60 days, the aforesaid rump arrived last week. Here it is with most of the mould rubbed off and cut into steaks: I know the green from the ageing process looks off putting but I tell you, these are some of the best steaks I have ever seen or smelt. We ate some chopped up raw and had an off cut with chips for lunch yesterday. Both very very good. KK action tonight. Will report back.

Awesome looking brisket @sfdrew28. You say it's your best ever - it must have been ridiculously tasty!

Congratulations. I am putting money on the fact that you will be up really early this morning, just to check if it's still there and looking as beautiful as ever. Wow, it does look good and fits well with your garden (and dog!).

ROFL doesn't come close! We have an expression "ka itan soke" which very eloquently describes the act of lying on your back and laughing with your thighs in the air. I couldn't find an emoticon to represent that but that is how much I laughed when I read your post.

Loving that stat! I am still very happy with my choice but one day, when I win the lottery, I will buy a 42" and will hopefully have enough money left over to buy a house with garden big enough to house it.

can't wait!

I have had this cast iron griddle for years. Bought it in a hardware store in France and so cannot offer a handy Amazon link but I thought the features might help with your choice @sfdrew28. It is 16" square and is reversible e.g. for eggs on the smooth side and steak and the ribbed side. The best thing of all is the lip all around the outside. It means you don't get excess oil or liquid slopping over the edge when you are cooking. It sits on a centre burner in the IDK and fits snuggly but well in the 23" KK.

I dare not show these pictures to The Husband. He has got used to pizzas that are not round and are nowhere near as good as yours Mac. Will make him wait a few years before letting on that membership of the forum is not exclusive to the one owner in the family....