May 26, 2008

Experiment: Spelt Starter

A few months ago, I got another starter from Mom’s friends in Port Townsend, Washington. It was a little different than mine. While there, I baked a loaf of bread with it. It might be slightly faster acting (not by much). Flavor is a little different. Degrees of subtleness. Purely a matter of opinion, but we both thought my starter is slightly better in flavor. For the baker, it wasn’t more difficult or less difficult or much faster or much slower.

I also scored some Spelt. My sister-in-law got a new grain mill (and the whole grain baking “Jones” needed to grind your own) and she gave me a quart or two of whole grain Spelt flour. I took it home and used my starter for a 50/50 spelt/white loaf. It was OK. A little heavy to work with (it’s whole grain). It tasted OK. Not better enough to trigger my “must explored deeper”. I put the remaining spelt flour in the freezer until inspiration strikes again.

Today, I thought about the other possibility. If it was whole grain, there is going to be yeast in that flour along with all kinds of other microscopic critters that survived the milling. Can I make a sourdough culture? My starter was built out of frozen Rye flour of unknown origins so it’s highly possible.

1 tsp of splet flour. 2 tsp of water. A bit too wet, it’s more a like a slurry. No big deal. The plan is to add a TBL and some amount of water tomorrow. Let that sit, covered, on the counter for another day. Throw half away the next day and replace that with more spelt and water and repeat until it starts to ferment. That might take days or weeks. Then introduce wheat bread flour instead of spelt. If it ferments the wheat flour, then continue to feed the culture with more wheat flour and water.

That’s a lot of ifs. If I get a culture will it be better or worse? I can’t know if I don’t try.

By day two, there was bubbling in the mixture and smelled something awful (I remember my Rye starter at that stage - nasty) On day 3 and 4 it ate a table spoon of spelt, and then later in the day a TBL of AP white wheat, and then another. The replacement of half the previous spelt mix with new wheat helps the smell. Thats normal and encouraging.

Time to get accurate. I removed enough of the mix to leave 2 oz. Added 1 oz of white bread flour and 1 oz of water. A few more days of I tossing half (or more) and replace with equal amounts by weight, then I’ll have, uhm, ah, I’ll have something that’s close to 100% hydration and propagates.

[June 1, 2008[
When I got up this morning, it looked to me that the last feeding might have killed it. It hadn’t swollen liked you expect and no visible bubbles to speak of from looking at the outside. So I left on the counter. Another no show starter. Then I read some stuff that suggested I wasn’t feeding it fast enough. Never to old for some book learning, but dead is dead, I’ll move on. Hours later when it came time to dispose of it in maw of the sink I noticed a thin layer of clear fluid.

Hold on! That’s much different! That’s what starters do when they need feeding. I took a little whiff. Hooch. Yeah! Most of the yucky smell was gone. Consistency of the mix shows that the flour was eaten and broken down. Based on my research I should have used AP instead of bread flour and refreshed it more often. So that’s what I did. I don’t know if it’ll raise bread (CO2), but it eats flour and leaves hooch. That’s a good thing.

I have no idea what “day” it is. I think I fed (not refreshed) the starter with AP flour yesterday. It didn’t look promising and it didn’t smell right enough. I decided feeding was easier than washing it away. Next morning the top of the little jar was laying on the counter like it might have been blown off from CO2 while I was sleeping. Texture was ropy. Smell wasn’t awful. That means there’s yeast in there. They and the lacto-bacillus are finding balance. I removed half of the starter, maybe more - a tsp or two left. I fed it a stiffer mix of AP flour and water (rumor is that makes it more sour). It does smell different from my go-to starter and Captain Ted’s so maybe I really have a new culture from the splet. Too soon to say.

– Nearing the end –
Now it is later by a few days from the above words. I made bread with it. Tastes fine. Sadly, no better than my normal starter and no worse either. Not faster nor slower, nor more sour or different in taste. I wanted a “new” starter with different characteristics. But if you have Spelt flour instead of Rye flour, you can make a sourdough starter. Nothing wrong with learning that.

May 5, 2008

Hillybilly Tasso

It’s been a while since I posted here. Mostly because I haven’t done anything new food wise that’s interesting or dangerous or out of my comfort zone. Now it’s spring and hormones are running and “why not” my companion. I dissected a 8.75 lb pork butt into 4, 2, and 2. Six of that for the freezer and 2lb for a cured bacon or ham like product.

Two pounds is not a lot by many standards. There’s not many of me. I’m going to cure that 2lb’s of butt in a spice rub that might be close to Tasso Ham. A week or so from now I’ll put in on the smoker and we shall see. As always this isn’t going to be exact, just my guess on the amounts I added. I’m using some old spices the TV cooks want you to through away after a year. Some of mine are much. much older. I mean like a lot older. I started from another recipe of course but my substitutions are rampant.
2 lb Boneless pork butt, one piece. Or Shoulder or whatever. The cure/rub:

  • 1/8 C Mortons Tender Quick — that’s the cure part. 1.5T for me. Seemed like the right amount to me.
  • 1/8 C Celery Salt. (Interesting, that’s a lot)
  • 1/8 C Packed Brown Sugar (I might have used a bit more)
  • 1/8 C freshly ground black pepper (see note below)
  • 1 Tbl of Garlic powder.
  • 2 Tsp Paprika cause I didn’t have 1 tsp of Cayenne and 1 tsp of Cayenne looked a little heavy for me.
  • 2 tsp of old Poultry seasoning. (or 1/2 tsp each of sage and thyme)

Rub it all around the pork, place in a plastic bag and add the rub that didn’t get absorbed. It will. The curing agent will suck in the spice, then weep “liguid” and you turn the bag over every a few days for 6 to 10 days. That’s my plan.

What happens may be something else. The relatively high amount of celery salt is interesting as is the levels of sage and thyme. Much more a sausage recipe than ham or faux bacon.

Black Pepper Notes:
I’m not going to hand grind an 1/8 cup of pepper corns but I do like peppercorn bacon. I smashed up a Tablespoon of pepper corns with a mallet. That’s cracked pepper. Then I ground some pepper in the hand mill and got bored with that so I added some mega mart “cracked” pepper (aka “course grind”.

[5/15/08]
Call it what you like but it’s pretty tasty. I chose to smoke it to 160F. That only took 2 hours on the smoker running at 235 to 250. That’s the nature of a cured meat (the Tender Quick). Since it’s pork butt, it’s a little fattier than ham so it can be used everywhere ham would be. That’s OK. I’m pleased.

[6/11/08]
This is good stuff. I’ve used several slices out of the freezer on recipes where you’d use bacon or a spiced ham. If you fry it up and taste a chunk, you may not stop sampling and then what will you do?

January 1, 2008

Steak Sauce. Diane? Call Me

I’m not really stealing this from Cooks Illustrated/America’s Test Kitchen. I’m ambivalent about them. Pretentious Pricks in Print. Not so bad on TV though. I’ve used enough of their hints in the last year to know they know more than me. They also have have a pay wall between them (CI) and their PBS series (ATK) site. Your cookie expires in days and it’s all over when the new season starts.

This isn’t their recipe because I’ve adapted it, didn’t measure, didn’t follow their exact steps and they can’t tell a court they didn’t rip off older recipes that they don’t credit.

This is a sauce for a steak. Just a few tablespoons will do you. Like A1 only way, way better. I think it’s called a reduction. Here’s what I did and don’t worry if your ingredients don’t match mine. To be true to the ATK spirit, I will expound the details like they might.

Sauce Base
1/4 big red onion, small dice.
1 whole small near it’s time carrot, peeled, small dice.
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 bottle of used Australian red wine that’s left that’s been in the fridge for way too long. A Cabernet perhaps?
1 C homemade chicken stock. Might have been 1.5C. I did make it though.
1 14.5oz can Swansons Beef Broth.
1 Tbl more or less of Tomato Paste. Generic store brand (you can wrap and freeze the other 6 tablespoons in the can).
1 dried bay leaf from the huge container from the restaurant supply.
1/2 tsp dried thyme you bought on sale yesterday. No shortcuts, K?

Completely ignored until later.
Some flour for thickening and water for thinning.

Saute onion and carrot in some butter or olive oil for a half or full dozen minutes. Medium low on my burner .Add the tomato paste and cook mix it up with veggies and when it’s all kind of light brown, Add garlic for a few seconds while opening the can of broth. No more or less than that length of time. The can should “pop” as you open it. That’s a fresh can!. Dump in every else. Add some whole black peppercorns. Barely simmer on the lowest setting you can get. Reduce by one half or more as thr French say.

Strain the sauce. Yes, it’s a pain but you’re way into it now so why not?

It turns out that this is a fair amount of really good protein juice. You can probably save half of it in the freezer. I did. Sauce base for another day.

From base to Sauce:
Mince up 1/4 of that red onion (or a shallot).
In a medium to medium low skillet melt, 1 Tbl of butter and maybe some Olive oil if you think it’s needed. Add 1 Tbl of mega mart brand generic AP flour and make a light roux. Whisk in the sauce base, some water if needed and one or two slight shots of crap brand Worcestershire. Taste and bow to the lord for his bounty. Adjust seasoning.

In my case, I happened to have a Fillet Mignon (search for YummyMeats) which I seared off in another pan on both sides, stuck my thermo probe into and baked in a 375F oven until 135F while I fooled around with the sauce. Add some water if it seems to thick, eh? Both the steak and sauce were winners. Serious good. I’ve got a few tablespoons of sauce left in the fridge. I’m thinking meatloaf about a meatloaf. Yes, even better than that. I’ve got a cup or two of sauce base in the freezer, so I’m ready for more roux.

If you have web access to read the ATK recipe I started from, you’d know I took a few liberties and did things out of guru order. Let’s not kid anyone either. That steak has been in cryovac for almost two years. The dried herbs might be fresher than that. Might not. I’ve had a lot of expensive beef in my life and exotic sauces and presentations. None better though.

I’m not going to link to Cooks Illustrated or Americas Test Kitchen until they take down their pay wall.

November 13, 2007

Refiguros - Eggs, Bacon and Beans

Sometimes good things happen or I get lucky or maybe I learned something.

I had a some leftover refritos in the fridge, some crap brand bargain bacon and a hankering for eggs. That’s enough for a meal but could I use that green pepper and that big ass green onion that will go bad soon and the commercial beef stock in the fridge. The result turned out surprisingly good. Better than good.

Cook the bacon in a medium (or med-low) skillet until done, Remove bacon and drain off most of the fat but leave a tablespoon or so. Reduce heat to medium low. Add 1/4 diced bell pepper, and one to three chopped green onions (mine was huge). When the veg softens, add the re-fried beans. Mash the beans more, adding beef stock as needed to keep it the consistency that you can eat with a fork. I might have hit it with a shot or two of chipotle hot sauce in the cooking.

Fry an egg or two or three, spread the bean puree on the a plate, then the bacon strips on top of that, and the eggs on top of that. Add some chopped green onion tops and be amazed. It was better than acceptable, it was really good. If I’d known it was going to be that good, I’d have made tortillas.

Serves one. Without left overs and minimal amounts of cookware.

I didn’t invent this dish because it closely resembles something I saw on Rick Bayless’s TV show on my PBS station a few weeks ago and is in many of the cookbooks I own. That technique is to thin the bean paste even more, to a sauce. Soften your tortillas by your preferred method, dip them into the bean sauce to coat, fold twice (into quarters) place 2 to 4 of them on the plate. Add some more bean sauce to the top, some fried chorizo (or bacon or eggs) some veg for color and crunch, salsa if you want.

I guess I have to give it a name or I’ll never find it here. The title is lame.

October 17, 2007

Kielbasa Goulash

Sausage Goulash

I’m not really making this up. I found a recipe sort of like it but I changed everything so I guess it’s mine. Exact amounts don’t matter and should be adjusted to your tastes and what’s on hand. Serves 2 probably.

1/2 lb cheap Kielbasa (Polish) sausage, cut into smallish chunks, 1/2″?
1 strip of bacon.
1/2 Large White onion (it’s what I had) sliced
1/2 Green pepper, sliced into strips [optional]
1 small glove garlic chopped.
1 Big squirt of catsup (1 or 2 Tbl)
1 Tbl Worcestershire sauce
1/2 Tbl brown sugar
1 Squirt of prepared mustard, (1 tsp?)
1 tsp to 1 Tbl. Paprika. Depends on your paprika.
1 1/2 cups broth or stock, beef or chicken.

Dice bacon and render in a pot over medium heat. Remove bacon and brown sausage in drippings. Remove sausage, lower heat to around low and saute onions and bell pepper until onions are soft. 10 Minutes or so. Add garlic and saute for a minute or so.

Add stock to cover and bring to a simmer. Adjust seasonings (add cayenne or pepper sauce, salt and pepper, more paprika etc — what ever you need to save it). Simmer on low for 30 minutes adding water or stock as needed.

If your making my bread dumplings, you’d add them pretty soon (may need more stock or water and increase the heat on the pot to a hearty simmmer and conver] Remove dumplings and keep warm.

One can thicken the sauce with a flour or cornstarch slurry if the dumplings didn’t thicken it. It should be a thick sauce like North American Chili

That’s the plan. What happens will differ and results will be discovered.

[Much Later]
Call it just OK. Won’t kill you but you’ll stare at the left overs and wonder what you can do with them.

September 6, 2007

Frugal or Cheap?

I’ve got a Winco not that far from me. That’s a NW food chain with slightly more charm than a WalMart. They cater to the thirfty and our hispanic population so they have cuts of meat you don’t find in the big chains and of course low low prices and mostly second brands you recognize. I went looking for some boneless pork butts. They didn’t have them (I probably could have asked). I’ve shopped there before but just occasionally and usually for things I know they have or had once.

No butts but some nice lucking chuck roasts but that would be outside the plan (might go back). So I browsed. I don’t browse, usually. I should learn. I compare prices, I know the prices of my favorite go-to’s. Holy Crap, there’s serious savings on staples and my kind of food depends on staples. I have my favorite brand of hot dogs, Falls Brand 1/4lb per dog. It’s a local company but it fits my habits and tastes well. A pound of them was $1.58 and if the mega mart still carried them it was $3 or $4.

I previously beleived Frito Lay controlled the price of Doritos (the perfect food) and I buy when the bag costs $2.50. I know they will sell it for that at the mega mart if I wait. How about $1.98? Percentage wise, my head is spinning in grinchiness and those are the obvious. Dried pasta? Maybe half the price of the mega marts “sale” price.

It’s got all the warm feeling of a Walmart or Costco. The parking lot is “fun”, the customers don’t smile as much and everybody is inbetween you and what to you want to look at, and you between them. That means nothing to serious browsers. 25% off? I may have to suffer that more often.

I don’t buy veggies and fruit there. Yes, prices are better but they don’t keep well which is a big deal for a single person who counts pennies properly. I’m very sensitive to price and self life of green onions and bell peppers, both red and green and half priced price produce isn’t always what a single person needs if the other half rots.

Most pleasing, Winco doesn’t require a “card” or membership fee or hide behind two for one promotions and jack up the price for one. Or 6 for $2.50 games mental arithmetic games. If I was feeding a crowd every day, I’d get my veggies there too, but I’m not. I stopped at the mega mart on the way home to get some Italian Sausage for tonight’s dinner. $3.98 at Winco, $3 at the mega mart.

You gotta know and care about the prices to find a bargain and what you’re going to do with the bargain after you browse across it.

July 29, 2007

Spread? WTF is Spread?

I haven’t written much here in the last few months. That’s because I haven’t done or discovered anything all that news worthy.

I’ve pretty much dialed in my sourdough bread. No doubt someone does better and good for them. Mine’s what I like (or vice versa). I play around with hyrdaton and shaping and stuff but it’s all good enough for me. I bake weekly, more or less — that’s all the bread I need. It’s a plateau in baking that I’m happy with.

Likewise I haven’t done much in the meat and carbs area. A recent experiment of use all the left overs in a tortilla quiche like egg pie. Didn’t suck but not really good enough to bad enough to write about. I ate the left overs two days later so it didn’t suck. Just not worth writing about.

I did discover something which I hope to remember. A long time ago I asked for suggestions on turning a 3 for $1 box of Mac and Cheese into something tasty for adults. There’s a big difference between your $0.25 and $0.33 and the Kraft (my standard just because it’s my standard). Anyway, there was a sale at the mega mart on the Kraft - yup 33 cents a box so I bought a box of white cheddar flavor and I made it tonight (enhanced) and you could do a whole lot worse and I have, making your own from scratch.

White cheddar may not appeal to the kids but I’d used up my Cougar Gold block on that quiche thing and this Kraft box was pretty close. Yummy. I goosed mine up with a 1/2 cup ( after grating so maybe 2 oz) sharp yellow supermarket brand chedder and maybe a 1/4 (after grating )of decent parmesan). For flavor or texture or those other foodie terms. It was pretty damn good. Watch for a sale. Get some.

I don’t make box brands often enough to dial it in without looking at the instructions so I read the directions and I was stunned. Four table spoons of “spread” with a little picture or icon suggesting that would be a half stick of butter. Butter I have and the use by date is approaching fast. I have no idea what “spread” is, it’s probably not going to save the planet whatever “spread “is. Not to use my butter would be wasting resources, no? That’s a lot of butter. I used whole milk, and the cheese additions (not really a lot) and It really was good. If I had added a touch of nutmeg and ground pepper, and a crumb topping and browned it, you’d be hard pressed to tell it apart from your scratch recipe. Es Verdad. It’s not going to save you any fat from the traditional.

I wonder if there are adults in PC America who think “spread” is something other that butter. How very sad that we let that happen. Shame on us. You could boycott Kraft for that pandering but stock up on their white cheddar boxes when on sale first. Yes, everything is going to taste good with a half stick of butter. Don’t eat it all at once. I saved some tor tomorrow.

A finely diced onion, garlic, more butter, some flour and milk and a bit more cheese. Maybe one of those shallot things in the garden instead of the onion.. That’s a lot of sauce. I have bread. Might want more cheese. And some refried beans for the tortas. Beans, bread, cheese sauce which might have macaroni in it. Touch of hot pepper sauce in the cheese sauce perhaps. Whatever raw veg in the fridge chopped up across the top, Sounds good now.

May 22, 2007

Chipotle Chicken Rolls

Sometimes I just make stuff up and this is one of those times. Heres the plan. It’s not a recipe yet until I do it and report back in [brackets] and remove this disclaimer. I also need a catchy name in case it’s good. It’s original to me, but that doesn’t mean it hasn’t been done before. What to call it? What if it’s really good?

Serves one or two with another chicken breast, even more depending on your sauce needs but I like gravy poured over starches.

[more than enough paste/pesto for one chicken breast, might handle four]

Ingredients:

1 boneless skinless chicken breast
1 can of Cream of Mushroom or Cream of Chicken soup.
Milk.

Veggies for stuffing paste
1 glove garlic, minced
1/2 small yellow onion, sliced into half moon rings.
1/4 bell pepper, sliced in thing strips, halved across.
1/? can of black sliced olives
2 Tbl chopped fresh parsley
2 dried small Chipotle peppers

2 Tbl Bread crumbs
2 Tbl Olive Oil (if needed)
1/4C Grated cheese (parmesan or your favorite)
Salt and Pepper

Procedure

  1. Reconstitute dried Chipotles, Rinse canned chipotles. Remove seeds and stem.and mince
  2. Lightly saute the veggies over med-low heat in olive oil or butter until the onions and peppers soften. Let cool a bit. In a mini food processor, make a paste out of the
  3. Mix with breadcrumbs, grated cheese (parmesan or Cougar Gold for me) add olive oil if needed to make a spreadable filling. Let stuffing cool a bit. .
  4. Flatten chicken breast as thin as possible. [I don't do that well]
  5. Spread stutffing across chicken breast, roll up and toothpick the seam. Don’t get anal about it.
  6. Mix 1 can of cream of mushroom soup plus half can whole milk ( maybe more milk) in baking dish.
  7. Add chicken roll to backing dish and any left over stuffing stuffing.[I had enough pesto or paste or whatever for another meal and the chicken roll is spilling stuffing out all over so I didn't do that]
  8. Bake uncovered at 350F for 20 minutes. .
  9. Add some frozen peas and reserved veggies, [if any] Bake for another 25 minutes or so. \

Serve with rice or mashed potatoes or pasta or over bread/toast, something that needs gravy. Home made gnocchi would be fun or my dumplings maybe.

Actually it is cheap cooking if you have the veggies in the fridge and the olives are waiting to get tossed out for age dating. Not to mention the milk that going unused and the cheese that goes green if you don’t use it soon. Sunk costs. I wouldn’t run out to buy those ingredients just to make this.

[ It sort of didn't suck. I forgot the olives in the stuffing/paste - that was wrong still, the paste was tasty and might serve as a kind of pesto or tapinade or marinade.

The meal was good enough for me to eat it all so it wasn't bad, just not what I was thinking it should be]

May 17, 2007

High Heat Smoked Brisket

All the cool kids are talking about smoking brisket in 5 hours instead of the 10 to 12 hours. I’ll try one too. Here’s the plan and reality will just have to be discovered.

Night before, trim brisket a bit closer than normal, apply rub, cover and fridge overnight.

Light a full chimney (around 40+ briquettes)
Remove brisket from fridge

Fill ring with charcoal. add lit charcoal, (30 to 40 minutes from lighting charcoal
Assemble smoker - foiled but empty water pan.
Add brisket with temp probe
Add smoke wood.

Target cooker temp is 325 to 350 so all vents wide open. (can turn door upside down and prop it open a 1/4 to 1/2 inch if needed)

When briskets reads 165 to 170, wrap in foil with probe and return to smoker. Expect a 2 or 3 hours to get here from putting the meat on, longer depending on smoker temp.

When briskets gets to 190, start checking for tenderness - slight to no resistance to probe or fork. This phase may take a couple of hours.

Remove brisket from smoker. Remove probe.
Drain the liquid in the foil into large measure might be +3C in there.
Reserve the liquid.

630 PM. Separate point from flat (if you can, or care too and return the point to the smoker and cook another hour, unwrapped - i suppose, probably at a lower temp? )

Double wrap brisket in new foil and add enough reserved liquid (or add broth) to make 1 1/2 C. Wrap in towels and put in microwave or cooler for an hour or two. Unwrap 10-15 minutes before slicing.

Thats the plan. Here’s how it went.
1:30 PM Light a full chimney (around 40+ briquettes)
2:30 All lit, assembled the smoker as above. 3 good size chunks of Apple and a handful of loose little chips. Meat on

Time Lid Temp Probe
2:45 PM 300 47
3:00 PM 325 84
3:30 PM 350 133
4:05 PM 360 165 probe off??
4:15 PM 360 165 foiled, vents 50%
4:30 PM 350 178
5:30 PM 325 201
6:20 PM 310 ?? pulled it out.

I’m a little surprised the smoker got that hot that quickly but you go with what you’ve got. It’s didn’t take that long (90 minutes) to get to 165 on the probe and it hit 190 a half hour after the foiling step. I was warned your have to pretty much ignore the probe at this point. It’s all touch now. It’s done when it’s tender. I decided to wait for another hour before testing for tender and eventually decided that it was “about” right, I guess.

Basically it’s braising in it’s own juice after it gets the smoke treatment, it’ll taste good.

I was a little worried about handling the hot foil package with all that juice (2 Cups for me) but it was no problem. I even managed to get the point off the flat with without too much error. The liquid left doesn’t have a lot of fat separating out yet. It seems a shame to toss it. - it’s got to be full of beef and rub flavors, although it might be too strong?

Here’s a picture of the brisket as I started to cut the point off before going into the cooler.

That camera batteries ran low when it came time to shoot the picture of the smoke ring in the slices and I was too hungry to refill. Not much of a smoke ring, 1/8 ” inch maybe a 1/4″. One wasn’t promised. Tender was promised and that promise was delivered too.

Perhaps as moist and tender a brisket as I’ve had. Plenty of beef flavor. So, the recipe performs as claimed. The downside is the bark and the rub just kind of vanishes in the braising liquid (and yes, the liquid is too strong).

I don’t know if I’ll do this again or not. If I do, I’ll try to keep the heat around 325F for a slightly longer cooking time and use a less complex rub. If I had that old Electric Brinkman this would the technique to use.

May 2, 2007

Smoked Turkey Breast

I tried the Weber Smokey Mountain (WSM) on another high heat smoke. I tried it last year and although it was good I had a hard time getting the heat up and running it high (320+). That time I was supplying food for party and couldn’t be so cavalier with “it’s done when it’s done” timing.

The trick is you need a lot of burning charcoal and an empty water pan. At least two full chimneys of hot charcoal. That’s a bit tricky if you only have one chimney. From lighting the first chimney to full temp it’s going to take at least an hour. I thought about doing it the Weber kettle but I’ve done that before, I want some WSM skills.

I was running 325 until the shade covered the smoker. If I have to finish in the oven, I can do that. I’m not going to be al purist about it. In fact, this was some bargain brand, enhanced bird - so I didn’t bother to brine it or even apply a rub. I’m not a fan of the skin either so I won’t worry about that either. Actually, it cooked the turkey to 165F internal in an 1.5 hours which is what I would have guessed. (I Did guess., didn’t?) I foiled it and put in n a cooler for a while. Maybe an hour. It was just right for slicing.

There wasn’t a lot of liquid in the foil. Hmm. Not much in Smoker’s drip pan either. Most of the meat was moist enough. Of course it tasted fine, all Q tastes good. Now I know, I should have brined. A light smoke flavor which is exactly what I wanted. It’s a win on technique and there’s nothing wrong with the bird. Just might have needed some extra juice. I’ve got a summer’s worth of turkey sandwiches. That’s not a bad thing.

Remember. All things BBQ here are variations from the fount of BBQ wisdom at the Virtual Webe Bullet. See the cooking topics, and then the forums. I never Q without looking to see what’s new or checking their recipes for the starting point.

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