mguerra Posted April 26, 2020 Report Share Posted April 26, 2020 Today I smoked a brisket, Franklin style, on briquettes instead of lump. It came out excellent. That is all. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tony b Posted April 26, 2020 Report Share Posted April 26, 2020 Same as the other post - Hi Doc! Missed your posts! Hope all is well with you and the family! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MacKenzie Posted April 26, 2020 Report Share Posted April 26, 2020 Short and sweet, Doc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PVPAUL Posted April 26, 2020 Report Share Posted April 26, 2020 Hey Doc, I see you are from Kerrville , Texas. Last year in spring my wife and I and our two adult kids did a vacation in Texas. Started out in San Antonio and made our way to Austin and then took a drive out of Austin on Easter Sunday and stopped in Kerrville and ate at The Humble Fork there in town before taking scenic HWY 16 down towards Bandera. What a Beautiful Ride. Also after returning from our trip I see that one of my favorite Musicians is from Kerrville. None other than Robert Earl Keen!!! I would love to spend a 4th of July in your town to see REK playing in the park there. Saw him late fall in Madison WI and it was a great show. Try to see him whenever he is near by. All the best, Paul Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mguerra Posted April 26, 2020 Author Report Share Posted April 26, 2020 REK is the bane of my life on the Fourth... Sort of. You see, I am the pyrotechnician who sets up and shoots the Kerrville fireworks. Well, it’s a big park and not everyone is down at the end where REK plays his concert. When it gets dark, everyone down at the opposite end, where I set up the fireworks, starts screaming and hollering, “Come on man, get it going, let’s light it up!” And the drunker they are the more”colorful” and obnoxious they get yelling at me. Because: we don’t shoot the show when it gets dark. We shoot it after REK finishes his last encore. Well the newspaper publishes a defined shoot time, not “when REK gets done” He’s an entertainer, what do those guys crave? Adulation, praise, love, and another encore. And that encore never ends exactly at the published shoot time. He’s got this signature song, his finale, The Road Goes On Forever is I think the name of it. Or at least those lyrics are in it. When I hear that, I know it will be go time shortly. I’m told the guy does the show gratis, so he gets props for that. Or he takes the money and donates to a worthy cause. Something. I don’t know. But apparently he’s a stand up guy. You can’t believe the nerves and butterflies in that last minute before you push the first button. One year my hands were shaking. You have spent all day in the scorching heat wiring up explosives, hoping you did not make one mistake. All the batteries have to be hot, the transmitter has to be synced on the right channel to all the firing modules, all the modules have to have good signal strength, and a whole lot more things have be perfect. By this time we have triple checked everything in the field, and the electronics, it’s stress city, you want it all to go off perfect, and more to the point, safely! When I push that button and the first product goes up, the relief is indescribable! Anyone who wants to come to Kerrville on the Fourth, come ahead on!! 2 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PVPAUL Posted April 26, 2020 Report Share Posted April 26, 2020 Great Story Doc, While I like fireworks, and sorry to say...I would be hanging down by the REK show! His encore song would be “The road goes on forever and the party never ends”. I hope to meet you on the 4th someday in the park, we can talk, fireworks, KK and REK! I have a funny story I will share with you. My wife and I got married in 1986 and went to Hawaii for our honeymoon. While there we went on a sunset food & booze cruise. While on the cruise we met a small group (3) and they asked us where we were from....We told them Wisconsin (very proudly of course!) and they said ......That’s OK.......... we got a laugh out of it...... and they were from Texas and very proud of it! (The feeling I got from them is that somebody has to be from Wisconsin and they were glad it wasn’t them!) During our trip to Texas this last year (my first) we were definitely struck with how folks from Texas are very proud of their state (it shows) and that they are all very patriotic........I really liked this about Texas.............................And you have REK in your backyard to boot!!! All the best, Paul Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tyrus Posted April 26, 2020 Report Share Posted April 26, 2020 10 hours ago, mguerra said: it’s stress city, you want it all to go off perfect Who best than a doctor to light up the fireworks....makes all the sense to me. Patience, understanding and a bit of methodical... dry matches always help. I like the taste of briquettes, it adds a different kind of smokiness to the meat, reminds me of when I was a kid at family gatherings...briquettes is all we had Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mguerra Posted April 27, 2020 Author Report Share Posted April 27, 2020 I gotta tell you, I got extreme kudos on the briquette brisket. It was not the regular blue bag Kingsford, however. It was HEB Grand Champion Hardwood Briquettes. HEB is a HUGE Texas grocery chain. The label indicates "made from 100% natural hardwood lump charcoal" Well, I'm going to buy that characterization based on the performance. In fact, the notion of perfectly homogenous shaped and sized lump charcoal has a real appeal. You know we have talked before about dumping out our bags of lump and sorting it by size. Pain in the ass that. Having a full basket of all identically sized pieces of charcoal is very satisfying. Lump somehow finagled in to briquettes form? I like that. I mean we use extruded coconut in those weirdo hexagonal tubes, so why not fashion lump in to reproducibly sized briquettes? My go to since day one with my KK has been Royal Oak Lump, supplemented with some smoking wood chunks when the notion strikes me. However, I will be trying this HEB briquette product again. I'll upload a 13 second video of the finished product tug test ASAP. BTW, I always separate the point from the flat and remove ALL the fat before slicing. You'll get high praise for that presentation, sliced and plattered up that way. I reserve the point out in the kitchen, and once everyone is seated, I slice it up, keep some for myself, and then walk around the table serving up a little to each persons plate, explaining "This is the best part, the Brisket Reserve". They don't know there is a flat and a point, or what the difference is, all they know is this "Brisket Reserve" is the bomb!!! And they will let you know. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mguerra Posted April 27, 2020 Author Report Share Posted April 27, 2020 (edited) Mrs. Guerra draping that noodle tender brisket over her finger and then doing the tug test on the HEB briquette brisket: https://youtu.be/ms8WsEIYfZI Edited April 27, 2020 by mguerra 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tony b Posted April 28, 2020 Report Share Posted April 28, 2020 23 hours ago, mguerra said: HEB Grand Champion Hardwood Briquettes That one snuck by Naked Whiz. No mention of it in his database. I used to like Weekend Warriors briquettes in my smaller Grill Dome, until they basically went out of business. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tyrus Posted April 28, 2020 Report Share Posted April 28, 2020 Well, today Kingsford markets a number of briquettes mixed with assorted wood to add a smoke flavor to your cooks and I will generously use them when I smoke a batch of Jerky along with other chunk woods in my offset. Unfortunately, the HEB isn't offered here, I wish it was...to try. The addition of briquettes adds a somewhat of a (nostalgic, forgotten romantic flavor) otherwise less limited to lump. Yah, a very good mix..one to pursue. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mguerra Posted April 30, 2020 Author Report Share Posted April 30, 2020 Royal Oak also offers briquettes made from their American 100% hardwood lump charcoal, different from their "regular" briquettes. Those are nationally available. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mguerra Posted April 30, 2020 Author Report Share Posted April 30, 2020 The 8.3 pound bag of HEB Grand Champion Briquettes for about $4 is available for delivery, at the HEB website. The big 18 pound bag is curbside pick up or in store only. So if someone was curious about it, you could order it. https://www.heb.com/product-detail/h-e-b-grand-champion-charcoal-briquets/1480554 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
