tony b

Second MacKenzie on this one. Better to get the fire started, use a hairdryer (or equivalent) to make sure it's started well. Then, close the lid and spin the top vent open wide, with the bottom vent fully open, as well. I don't pull the bottom vent door out anymore. Too easy to get dust/charcoal bits in there and not be able to close it down completely at the end of cooks (YMMV). If I need to "turbo" the process, I'll pull the guru port plug. Erik, it sounds like you just ran out of fuel. Next time make sure that you fully load the basket, as these very high heat cooks run through some charcoal. Especially if you're doing a pizza and you need to heat soak the KK and pizza stone for at least an hour before you start cooking. Fully heat soaked, you will have almost no rebound effect between pizzas and can cook several in a row without worrying about under cooking the crusts before the toppings are done.

Those poor shrimps never knew what hit them! The meatballs look great, too!

Glad to see you posting again, Larry! Missed you, buddy. Not much help here. I have a wrought iron table next to my grill that's covered in ceramic tiles, so I just set my grates on it as my lay-down area.

They look very insulated for sure. How do they compare to Yeti's?

@Aussie Ora Love the name. Hope it's just a joke and not a Warning Label!! @DennisLinkletter - a good start, but I second erik6bd in asking, Where's the Santa Maria?? Haven't tried the Ghost Pepper one, but the Death Dust will certainly "get your attention!"

Ya'll too funny. Like using a sledgehammer to drive a thumbtack.

yeah, what he ^ said. Charles is one of the Pizza Kings here and has posted several thoroughly tested dough recipes that many of us use now.

Big fan here of Oakridge. Won't do a tri-tip any other way than their Santa Maria rub. Love the Black Ops and Carne Costa rubs, too. Like you said, everything that they put out is great! If you like Oakridge, give Lane's BBQ rubs a shot. They are right up there in my book.

Thanks. It was in our local paper, too. I went looking for an online version to post here, so glad that you found one. I'd have said, so what's the big deal, until I read that Meathead had tried it and thought it was a good technique. Looking to try it on my next big hunk of meat instead of my usual mustard rub. Not quite ready to test it out first on a nice steak, but maybe after I've done a couple of other cooks using it first. Thinking that shrimp would be a good test case to see how moist it keeps them while getting some nice crust on the exterior. I hear ya, MacKenzie. I typically use mayo on my grilled cheese sandwiches to help them brown and get crispy. It works great. I think it was a Martha Stewart tip where I first saw it. So, given that I know it works on that, I'm willing to give it a try on meat.

Love me some brontosaurus ribs! Which did you like better of the two rubs?

I don't see the need for the double stones, either. When you say you used "Dennis' stone," on the bottom - are you referring to the deflector stone (comes with the grill) or his pizza stone (a separate accessory) - they are made of different materials. If you have Dennis' pizza stone, you should be using that solo on the top grate. No worries about cracking, even at high temps for pizza. btw - I'm also a fan of parchment over cornmeal. I think it works better. After a couple of minutes on the stone, you can lift up the pizza and pull out the parchment if you have a thing about it. I just leave it on until the cooks over most of the time.

Tasty wings. On my "to cook" list to test out my new basket (I got the flat one, which should work a bit better than the tumbler).

Awesome 1st cook! Those ribeyes were massive! I don't know if I recall anyone baking bread/rolls on their 1st cook - hat's off!

I wish, Aussie. I worked the BBQ Festival yesterday from 10 am to 9:30 pm, with only a short break to run home to feed my dogs. Health dept rules say we can't have alcohol inside the vending tent. But, boy could we have used one! It was very hot & humid all day. So, I had to wait and had a double G&T when I got home! Now, tomorrow evening pouring beer with the Club will be a whole different deal!

I've always lusted after a Ken Onion knife, as, they are beautiful works of art. But even at 1/2 price, still outside my budget.

Probably won't be able to accommodate that one, Aussie, as I couldn't afford the overnight shipping costs - !!!

Welcome to the Obsession and thanks for the pictures. Can't wait to see it in action. And, don't fret the burn-in; it's not as difficult as people believe it to be, just takes patience (and a few adult beverages make the process go smoother - LOL!)

Beautiful, but too rich for my blood.

How coincidental - we had a gentleman come by our both at the BBQ Festival last night and asked if we had any beef products in our food (we didn't). He told us that he'd been bitten by a tick and was now allergic to beef. We all went - That really sucks! So, this is a real thing people. Be careful.

Thanks, Everyone! Looking forward to more cooks with the Stix, but I am crazy busy this weekend - helping a buddy vend BBQ at the local Festival and pouring beer with the homebrew club.

Will start a list for the next box to Down Under - Gibson's White Sauce, Uncle Dougie's (?), anything else you fancy.

OK, so tonight's dinner showcases 2 Kickstarter items - the MEATER, which I've posted about before, and the lastest one - Sriracha Stix. Yes, these guys came up with a way to make seasoning sticks using actual Sriracha! Mine arrived on Monday and I've been champing at the bit to try them. So, without further ado, tonight's cook. A nice whole chicken bought on sale at the local market. Plan is to rotisserie with the MEATER, and use the Sriracha Stix as the injection, with Yardbird on the outside. Used the needle from my regular injector (off to the left) with a wooden skewer to insert the Sriracha stix into the bird. Quick spray of Canola oil and dust the outside with Yardbird. Then onto the rotisserie rod. The MEATER is the black thing sticking out of the chicken on the left side. Onto the KK, direct, @ 375F, with a couple of chunks of apple wood. The MEATER didn't want to sync up with the app on my phone at first. But, with some persistence, I got it to finally work. I was almost ready to toss in the towel when it finally worked after many attempts, including rebooting my phone. As before on another rotisserie cook, the MEATER worked great on monitoring the food temperature, but went squirrely again on the "ambient" temperature monitoring. The end of the probe didn't get coated with drippings this time, like it did before, so I'm at a bit of a loss to figure out what's going on with it?? Doesn't really affect anything, as the meat temperature is the critical parameter. As Aussie would say, nicely spun chook. Don't know if it was the quality of the bird, or the Sriracha Stix (my money is on the better quality bird), but this was, by far, one of the juiciest chickens that I've ever cooked. Insane runnings on the cutting board, even after a 10 minute rest. But, the real story here is the Sriracha Stix. You can see the results once you cut into the bird. The flavor infusion seemed to permeate a bit further than what the color would indicate. I'm liking these a LOT! But, those veins of spice were excellent! Next time I'll stick in more. This time there were 2 stix in each breast, 2 half stix in opposite sides of the legs, a half stick in each wing, and a whole stick in each thigh. Will double up on the breasts next time. I don't know when they'll be commercially available (these were my Kickstarter reward), but here's a link to their website, if you want to bookmark it for later. https://www.srirachastix.com/ The same guys have developed an earlier Kickstater, that I didn't know about in time, but are doing the same thing with lots of other seasoning blends. http://www.seasoningstixs.com/ I think these folks have a big hit on their hands!

I hear you, Charles! I'm extremely fussy about my cooking. I'm rarely satisfied, but when I am, it's ecstasy! Some rough patches on tonight's cook, like the unexpected thunderstorm that wasn't predicted at lunchtime! And, had some difficulties getting the MEATER to sync up with my phone for some reason? But, it finally did and we're off to the races on the rotisserie whole chicken, with an extra bonus (I'll post the cook later with details elsewhere in the Forum).

Bet it still tasted good though!