mguerra

Re: Temperature probe plug for dual probes I whittled down a wine cork to fit the hole, then cut a slot for the wires. Free, easy, effective.

Re: Guru /Thermapen question You will get super results finishing your steaks with a Thermapen. You will quickly learn what temp gives what result. Absolutely reproducible results. Happy satisfied guests. Use it.

Re: Questions about the 19.5 inch Komodo Kamado If you use the 2x4 method shown in the photo, PAD the 2x4's!!! I gouged the hell out of my tiles doing that.

Re: Thermapen on sale I did not mean those temps apply to ground meats. Ground meats need higher.

Re: Thermapen on sale You gotta be kidding me. It's simple. Chicken and turkey need the highest temps to be safe. Cook 'em to 170. Then just remember the low end temps for the other meats, 140 for beef, 150 for pork. If you don't like them rare, cook a little more than the minimums. Pork butts go to 185 plus. Briskets cook til tender. Each person will hit on the temp they like for the various cuts after a few cooks. That will cover 95% of your cooking. For fish and shrimp, eyeball it.

Re: Thermapen on sale There are meat doneness charts all over the internet. After a very short while you will memorize these temps anyway. I keep one bookmarked for quick reference, just in case. Or you can print one out. Heres just one: http://www.reluctantgourmet.com/doneness_chart.htm Or, here is the whole search result!! http://www.google.com/search?aq=0&oq=me ... ness+chart

Re: New Ultimate Contender? I have no intention of buying anything but KK. The one thing I would like is a different top vent. Something that offers finer airflow control and is EASY to keep clean and tar free. But that seems to a problem only I have, tarring up the top vent. And I have figured out ways to deal with it. This stainless thing is pretty cool looking, albeit that rear spring/ hinge assembly is awful like Dennis said. But for now, all I want is that stainless KK Portable!!!

Re: Total Cooking Surface Area? Dennis, here's an easy way to figure it. Get some thin, easily weighed material that you can cut to the shape of the grills. Cardboard, veneer, sheet acrylic, plywood, sheetrock, sheet metal or anything handy that you can weigh accurately. Cut a one foot square and weigh it. Now weigh the total of your pieces that you cut out to the shape of the grills. You can use any units of weight, pounds, kilos, ounces, whatever. Divide that number by the weight of the one square foot piece. That will be your square feet of grill area. Multiply that number times 144. That is your total square inches of grill. No need to try to massage the usual formulas for circles and rectangles etc. This will be dead on accurate.

Re: My Brisket is dry You don't finish the brisket by internal temp. When you think it is getting close to being done, poke it with a sharp object at half hour intervals. When it is very tender, it is done. I use a skewer. If you have wrapped it in foil at the 160ish mark, poke your sharp object only in to the meat but not all the way through! You will lose the considerable amount of juice that is collecting in the foil, and you WANT that juice.

Re: Replacement probes for the BBQ Guru competitor I have had a couple of bad probes from them.

Re: My Brisket is dry Long time members may be sick of hearing this, but for newer members here goes: Low and slow is the traditional method for brisket, but it can easily result in a dry product. High heat, fast cooking with foil at the halfway point WILL give you a super juicy and tender result. There is a sticky, I think under the "Techniques" thread. Basically you cook your brisket indirect at any temp from 225 to 325 until it hits an internal temp of 160 to 170. Then wrap it tightly in foil and cook it until it is very tender when poked with a sharp object. Having done many briskets both ways, I will never do a low and slow unfoiled. Check the sticky for the full method.

Re: Waiting on my Cobalt Blue Apogee, perigee, syzygy. Gee!

Re: Everyday Misc Cooking Photos w/ details I'd like that recipe/technique for your fermented hot sauce, Syz. Please.

Re: Florida Charcoal 2011 Nothing to say, just a picture of Dixie.

Re: 1st bacon I'm not a home brewer. But the best beer I have EVER tasted came from a home brewer! Must be like roasting your own coffee, you get quality that far outshines most(not all) commercial product.

Re: My KK needs a sidekick!! Of course you realize we will be getting the KK Junior here sometime soon. And I take full credit for urging Dennis to make it! So you can just wait for it, and then have a proper fraternal sibling for your KK. I was going to get a Primo for my secondary, but once Dennis agreed to go with KK Junior, I decided to wait for it. The "Portable" is actually Dennis' name for it, not the Junior.

Re: How long are your butts taking? Here's a little pork butt trick. When I pull mine, I pull the muscles apart along their natural seams and scrape ALL the fat off. Also the fat/skin cap if there is one. I used to just throw all that fat away. Now I take all that fat and cook it down in a skillet. You get a fair bit of liquid fat in the pan along with a handful of crispy bits. I drain and save the cooked crispies. Now take the meat and chop/shred it and saute it for a few minutes in some of the liquid fat in the skillet. Add a little salt to taste and eat that hot right away! Oh my. And eat a few of the crispy bits, too. Basically, they are home made cracklin's. I eat just a smidge of these crispies for the awesome flavor and give the rest to the hounds. Now I seek out picnics and butts with the MOST fat cap/ skin!

Re: Greetings and Thanks! It's funny, I just installed Campy Ergo shifters for the first time on one of my bikes. They have been around for 20 years or more, but I never tried them. I still keep reaching for my downtube shifters. What's even funnier is my indexed downtube shifters still seem new and fancy to me, having been used to friction shifters before that!!! I've been riding a LONG time and I'm really getting old, I guess.

Re: My KK needs a sidekick!! I like the Meco products. Last time I bought one they were made in the USA. These used to be widely available at local stores but I don't see them anymore, so I bought mine straight from the company. I like the Swinger II. http://www.aussiegrills.com/index.html The only reason I never tried a Weber is that they don't have a hinged lid, but they do seem to be VERY popular and well made. They were on "How It's Made" one night and the QC looks good.

Re: First cut chuck ("rib eye") = best burgers ever Interesting and consistent with some of our past posts extolling the superiority of low and slow chuck over briskets. For newcomers to the forum, search "Chuck Roll". Also see: http://www.virtualweberbullet.com/chuckroll.html The Weber Bullet forum is dense packed with cooking info, I peruse it often: http://www.virtualweberbullet.com/cook.html A great primer on brining there, btw.

Re: Knives Got one, thanks for the heads up!

Re: Air Combat USA That's funny, my whole goal was to get the airplane as out of shape as possible. I'm sick of straight and level!!!

Re: New Blue Use a FULL basket of lump for any cook, grilling or low and slow. You can grill at any height level above the fire using your various grates. I like to grill up high on the main grill, because it takes longer and gets more smoke time. It does use more fuel. If you like the "done on the outside, red on the inside" then grill down lower. If you like it more evenly cooked throughout, cook up higher. There is no need to monitor your fire temp for grilling. Just get a good hot fire going. I start a chimney full of lump and dump it out on to a full basket of charcoal. Open the daisy wheel all the way and open the top vent fully off its seat. That gets a hot grilling fire. If you want it hotter yet, pull open the bottom front draft door. If you do this BE SURE to put something under the opening to catch embers!!! Don't set your porch on fire, your house will follow.

Re: Air Combat USA I wasn't sure just how much G we were pulling, I see it was about 4. You had six high G pulls in 90 seconds, pretty cool!

Re: iMac, iPod, iTunes, iPhone and iPad. Now iGrill. As far as Bluetooth range is concerned, I would think the 10 meters for iPhone refers to transmission, not reception. Since Bluetooth is a radio, as long as the received signal strength meets the reception threshold, there is no inherent "range" on reception. The Bluetooth radio receiver has no idea how far away the transmitter is, it only knows how strong the received signal is. My guess is the iGrill has a powerful enough transmitter to achieve threshold reception strength at the designated 200 feet. I am not a Bluetooth expert, but I am sure there is a technical standard for Bluetooth power and range. It is a radio. I seem to recall the standard is a pretty short range. So if 200 feet exceeds the Bluetooth technical standard, maybe the iGrill folks are bending the rules on transmission power.