Chuck Wagon is rollin'

[Firemonkey]

Here we go! The Chuck Wagon is leaving the station. I picked up a 23.15 pound chuck roll from the local warehouse club, and I am going to celebrate my country's independence by sacrificing it to smoke and fire.

This thing is one big slab of meat! I went with a slather of mustard and brown sugar, then hit it with a nice rub.

Mustard goop:

• 1/2 C mustard - I mixed 1 part Dijon to 2 parts yellow

• 1/2 cup dark brown sugar

Rub:

• 4 tablespoons paprika

• 3 tablespoons garlic powder

• 2 tablespoons salt

• 2 tablespoons packed dark brown sugar

• 2 tablespoons ground cumin

• 2 tablespoons pure chili powder

• 1 tablespoon celery seed

• 1 tablespoon onion powder

• 1 tablespoon granulated sugar

• 1 tablespoon dried oregano

• 1 tablespoon dried thyme

• 1 to 2 tablespoons ground pepper – I used tricolor fresh from one of Cozys mills

• 1 tablespoon cayenne pepper

With a slab of meat this size, I am planning for a 24+ hour cook, so I took care in loading the lump to make sure my fire lasts this long.

I had a mishap with a sudden thunderstorm, and my lump trashcan last weekend, so I already had about 35 pounds of mesquite lump spread out on a big piece of cardboard. I had been drying it in the sun all week, and dragging it into the garage for the daily thunderstorm

So I loaded up really large pieces into the basket, then a bunch of fist or smaller pieces. I also mixed in about a 1/3 of a bag of Royal oak, and a whole bunch of hickory chunks. Then, scooped probably 4 pounds of fines from the cardboard, poured them over the lump, lit several spots with my torch, and gave it a few pokes with a stick to settle everything in. When I was done, the pile was about an inch above the basket handles, and level all the way across, except maybe an inch around the outside of the grill. The heat deflector is sitting on top of the lump right now, but will settle to the basket handles as some of the lump burns off. I think I have about as much lump in the grill as I can fit and still use the heat deflector. I should be good for the duration

It hit the grill at noon today. I am planning on cooking at 275 until the plateau, foiling it over and going until 200 before pulling it. The meat is cooking on a rack in a roasting pan, to facilitate easy foiling, and collection of the juice rendered in the plateau. I may need to revisit my setup depending upon how much liquid renders out of this thing. I dont want it to start stewing

Ill update this thread as the beast near completion.

[Sanny]

The people in the cubbies next to me are peering over the walls, wondering why I'm moaning in here. (Honest, my hands never left the keyboard! But I'm drooling onto my strand of pearls.)

What lovely food porn, Firemonkey! You do do us up right, huh?

Magnificent... :swoon:

[mungeti]

Oooo ahh ahhh ahhh oooooo ah ahhh ahhhhh

Firemonkey,

Talking my language big boy... Looking forward to seeing how it comes out... I am liking the mustard goo... My first cook I just used plain mustard and my thoughts were a bit mixed on it... Your combo of ingredients looks good. Tim

[Firemonkey]

We'll see how the mustard goop works together. I usually dont bother, and just put the rub right on the meat. This is the first time I have ever used mustard before a rub at all . So I am curious to see how this comes out, though I dont have one without the mustard to compare it to

[DavidS]

I like using a mustard l slather, it holds the rub on and adds a little extra layer of flavor. The three chuck rolls I have cooked there was quite of bit of grease. There seemed to cook a little faster the butts.

Nice job my 2 cents worth.

[Firemonkey]

Update - The beast is resting

Well, I planned for the worst when i loaded the lump, but I didnt need to go nearly that long. I just removed my hunk of beef from the grill, right at the 18 hour mark. The nibbles I picked off of it were outstanding

It is currently wrapped in foil and packed into a cooler, awaiting its final glory - pulling it before serving!

Here are a couple of pictures of the final product:

I never did foil it as I had planned. About half way into the cook, when the meat was at about 158* I checked the pan and found a bunch of sugar and rub that had melted off, and was burning in the bottom of the pan. Still expecting that there may be a significant amount of juice (not fat) to render out of this thing, I took the roast out of the pan, cleaned the pan, and put it back. At the end of the cook, there was nothing but fat in the bottom of the pan.

No separation going on here, but no worries, plenty of moisture still in the meat!

[Sanny]

A thing of beauty, Firemonkey!

Excellent. Let us know how delicious it is, when you and the vultures set to it.

[U2PLT]

Firemonkey's Pepper Corn Mix

You need to check for gumming from the 3-Mix, because some of the pink, or white pepper corns can be gummy inside. You can undue the bottom adjuster and clean out the grinding system. I made a set of Mills for my daughter and her husband and he told me he couldn't get any grinding out of the pepper mill. I asked him if he was using one of the mixes that has different pepper corns, and he said yes. I told him how to clean his, and now works fine.

[Sanny]

Speaking of Cozy's mills...

Just a shameless plug here.

I receive almost weekly compliments from the happy recipient of your mills, Cozy. When I go there, the mills are prominently displayed on the kitchen counter - to be USED, not merely admired.

Anyone who hasn't seen/tried, you just HAVE to!! Required purchases for your KK ensemble: Jammies, and Cozy mills.

* We now return you to your chuck roll, already in progress....

[Firemonkey]

Conclusion

The chuck roll came out excellent, with only a couple of minor reservations. First, the flavor and tenderness were both outstanding. My only real complain is with the amount of fat, which may be due to the size of the cut as much as the cut itself.

You can see the drippings from the pan in one of the posts above. There was also another 1 to 1.5 cups of fat that I drained mid way through when I cleaned out the drip pan. Let's call it 4 cups of liquid fat. Fat that has rendered out is the best kind, its all of the remaining thin layers of fat that I wish I could have avoided.

While pulling, there was probably a pound and a half of "yucky fat" layered between the various individual muscles, that had to be removed before pulling each section of meat. It was not hard, but its not something you would want to do in front of your dinner guests, either.

The next time I do a chuck roll, I am going to open it up and trim out most of the internal fat seams, and then just retie the individual muscles together, or possibly just cook them separately. FWIW, there are some good how to guides available in the link below, that detail the various individual muscles that make up a the chuck roll, their best uses, and how to trim them out. For those with a smaller family, or who dont really need 15+pounds of pulled beef in the freezer at a time, there is excellent value in this huge cut, and you could butcher it at home for multiple uses without too much difficulty:

http://www.beefretail.com/prodChuckRollCuts.aspx

On the other hand, if you do want to go all out, here is what you can expect

BTW, The majority of the posts on the BGE forum propose foiling for a few hours, and even cooking in sauce for a few hours after you pull it. I had planned on foiling it as they suggest, but did not. And after seeing how moist and "just right" the meat was, I will not even consider it the next time.

[Firemonkey]

Re: Firemonkey's Pepper Corn Mix

You need to check for gumming from the 3-Mix' date=' because some of the pink, or white pepper corns can be gummy inside. You can undue the bottom adjuster and clean out the grinding system. I made a set of Mills for my daughter and her husband and he told me he couldn't get any grinding out of the pepper mill. I asked him if he was using one of the mixes that has different pepper corns, and he said yes. I told him how to clean his, and now works fine.[/quote']

Thanks for the tip cozy, no problems here. Everything is free-flowing

I use your mills whenever I need fresh pepper for a recipe, simply because of the volume I get per twist! Much faster than my other mills. The ceramic crush grind works wonderfully from coarse to fine!

[Conodo12]

Nice work FM - That truly looks awesome!!!