Golden State BBQ Championship

Meat, Inc. competed in the Golden State BBQ Championship this weekend. The event was in Hesperia, CA and it was WINDY. During the day it was sunny and warm but the wind did not stop - ever - at all - not once. At night it was downright cold. Thankfully Joe brought his trailer so we had a place to get out of the cold when we could.

Team members attending this event were Aaron, Ryan, Noe, and Joe.

Ryan setting up.

Sunrise after a very cold and windy night.

Aaron making breakfast for the crew. A new tasty dish was invented when Aaron didn't follow his mother-in-law's recipe. Carne Asada Chowder is now the official breakfast of Meat, Inc.

Carne Asada Chowder - a soupy, potatoy, cheesy, two kinds of potato and topped with carne asada - It was out of this world!

Aaron being a super geek and taking logs of the cooking process.

This was the first time we did this event and it was well run and pretty fun. It was an IBCA event - the first time we have done a non KCBS event - so we didn't have to make the fancy turn in boxes, we used Texas Lettuce (foil) so the turn ins went quickly and with about 30 seconds of prep. I liked not having to worry about the box prep. The competition was held at the Hesperia Civic Center / Park. There was also a Cancer Walk and a bunch of Historical Cars so there was a ton of people. We got to vend tastes to the public so we got to meet a bunch of really nice people! We also did a live demonstration of how we cut and prep our pork and brisket for about 10 people per meat. It was cool to pass on some information to the crowd and I think they really got a kick out of it. We might have to do this again. I doubt many teams want to do this because it is a stressful time and you are against the clock but at this competition we had an hour between turn ins instead of the normal 1/2 hour and we had to walk about 30 feet to the judges tent so it worked out great. The two other differences were we had to turn in a 1/2 chicken and we had to turn in spare ribs. All this turned out fine too.

A few of the many hot rods. The ghost red paint job on this car was incredible.

We did pretty good in this event with a 4th place finish in chicken and an 11th place finish in brisket. We finished 14th overall out of 32 teams. Overall a good comp and we all had a blast!

Here's the link to the official page:

http://www.cbbqa.org/wiki/index.php?title=2nd_Annual_Golden_State_BBQ_Championship

4th place 1/2 chicken - it was so tender and juicy we didn't even use any sauce.

Noe turning in the chicken.

Aaron pulling the ribs out of foil and getting ready to cut them up for turn in.

Rib turn in.

Joe helping out. Can you believe he's out of his chair?!?!?

Pulled pork turn in. No sauce was added and this probably hurt our score a bit because apparently the judges like sauce flavor to hide the incredible goodness of perfectly smoked pork butt!

Turn in Brisket was good for 11th place. A pretty solid finish for us. It was a bit overcooked but the judges must have liked Ryan's secret ingredient in our sauce!

Some of our new friends!

Grill Review - Char Griller Super Pro

Grill Review - Char Griller Super Pro with Offset Side Fire Box option added.

This is an unbiased review of this grill. The purpose is to educate and assist my fellow BBQ enthusiasts on different grills / BBQs I have used in my back yard or at competitions.

I do not own this grill. Meat, Inc. BBQ Team member Colin owns this particular grill.

First impressions: When I first saw the grill, I thought it was good sized. Looks like you can put a lot of meat in it. This is true if you are cooking for a back yard party or a small group of friends. The grill surface area is 580 square inches. This is about 50% more cooking area of a Weber WSM 18.5" or a Traeger Lil' Tex. The unit also looked structurally sound but upon further inspection, it was clear this grill was made for back yard use and not meant to be hauled around to competitions. The Offset Fire Box was an option that Colin added on to allow indirect heat or smoking.

Fuel Source: This grill uses charcoal briquettes or lump and wood can be added on top of the charcoal in the offset for smoking. One of the cool features about this grill is you can place charcoal in the main portion of the grill and get a really nice, hot direct cooking area for steaks or hamburgers. The offset adds the option of indirect heat and the possibility of throwing in a split of your favorite wood for smoking. The offset connects to the main grill where a prepared punch out section of the main grill body is removed when you bolt on the offset fire box. The downside of this added option is the hole between the offset fire box and the main grill is HUGE. There is no real way to tune this grill to even out the heat generated by the offset so the right side of the cooking area is way hotter than the left side. This kind of reduces the effective cooking area of the grill if you are smoking something. The upside is if you want to slow smoke something medium sized - like 3 tri-tips or a medium sized brisket AND you want to cook some chicken or jalapeno poppers using the higher heat on the right side at the same time - you can.

Temperature Range - Efficiency - Holding: The unit has adjustable vents on the offset firebox and a baffle on the smoke stack. I was able to hold a pretty stable temp of 250F throughout the cook without constant adjustment of the vents / airflow once I had the temp I wanted. When I wanted to crank the temp up to cook some other things - like peppers - it was tough to exceed 275F. I didn't really push the temp by adding a bunch of fuel but it seemed like there was some heat loss from the top of the offset. The material of the entire grill appeared to be 1/8" thick so this was probably the case. Since I'm comfortable smoking meats at 225 - 275, this isn't really an issue for me. This might even help some inexperienced cooks not ruin or burn some meats. When the temp dropped and additional fuel needed to be added - it was a snap - just open the offset door, throw in some more charcoal, and the temp was right back up to 250 in minutes. The rate that fuel needs to be replaced during long cooks will be determined by ambient temperature and type of fuel. The fuel seemed to burn slower than a kettle but probably because I kept the vents partially closed to control the heat.

The lid temp shows 195F, the right side at the grate (closest to the offset firebox) shows 280F, and the left side at the grate shows 215F. I was opening the doors quite a bit so the lid and the left side were off more than typical - I usually saw about a 50F drop / shift from right to left.



Overall Value: At the bottom of this post are the links for the main grill and the offset option. The total price comes out to about $220.00. Reasonable for a starter smoker AND a direct heat charcoal grill.

The tri-tip and the peppers came out awesome!

Links:

http://www.lowes.com/pd_44754-49769-2121_4294857761_4294937087?productId=3033621&pl=1&currentURL=/pl_Charcoal%2BGrills_4294857761_4294937087_?cm_cr=Grills%20$%20Outdoor%20Cooking%201.2-_-Web%20Activity-_-Grills%20and%20Outdoor%20Cooking%201.2%20A2%20Activity-_-SC_Grills%20%20Outdoor%20Cooking_Area2-_-17106_2

http://www.grillsdirect.com/barbecue-smokers/smoker-accessories/chargrillersidefirebox.cfm

Smoked Chicken Alfredo - from scratch!

This is a really simple recipe. No one wants to use Alfredo sauce from a bottle when you can make it from scratch - AND - this recipe is so simple - anyone can do it. I learned this from my Aunt Sandra. She has some serious Italian roots - so deep I'd have to kill you to tell you the whole truth so forgettaboutit!

So here's the recipe - make it yourself and impress the ladies! Never buy Alfredo Sauce from a bottle again!

Here we go:

Smoked Chicken:

• 2 - 3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
• Your favorite rub (I used tarragon, mint, garlic powder, and marjoram). Some rosemary could also be nice.
• Smoke the chicken until done, wrap in foil and rest until the remaining sauce and noodles are done.

Alfredo Sauce:





Grate a wedge of Parmesan cheese.

• 2 tablespoons of olive oil.
• 1 tablespoon of minced garlic (I use minced garlic from a jar - it's so much easier)
• Couple of splashes of cheap white wine

Sautee this on a medium heat until the garlic is browned.




Get the noodles started - you can use spaghetti or angel hair - whatever you prefer. I add a splash of olive oil and salt to the water - the olive oil helps the noodles NOT stick together and the salt raises the specific gravity of the water for a higher boiling point so the noodles cook hotter.

You can see the garlic turning a bit brown as they cook.


Add in about 1 cup of Heavy Whipping Cream - that's right - Heavy Whipping Cream. This is a low fat recipe.

Once the Whole Whipping Cream comes to a boil - start adding in the grated Parmesan cheese - SLOWLY. Wait until the cheese you've already added in is already melted into the sauce before you add more!

The noodles should take between 8 - 10 minutes to cook and the sauce should finish up around the same time if you started to make the sauce as soon as you've added to noodles to the boiling water.

Go ahead and dice the chicken into small cubes while the sauce and noodles are cooking. Make sure someone is continuously stirring the sauce!

Nice sized pieces - not too big - not too small. Nice dry rub on the meat - this will add some flavor to the meat in the meal.

Noodles, meat, sauce - Oh Boy! Now that's some good eatin'!

Stuffed Bell Peppers

Stuffed Bell Peppers.

I'll be the first one to admit that Stuffed Bell Peppers sounds like something my mom used to make. Chop the top off and stuff with some type of rice and hamburger mixture. This recipe updates the idea a bit and although not super manly - every once in a while - you have to cook something for the ladies that isn't just meat stuffed with more meat.

I'll spare you a pictures of prepping the mix because it's pretty boring but here's a list of ingredients.

• 3 large Bell Peppers
• 2 (previously smoked) chicken breasts
• 1 bunch (about 10) quartered radishes
• 1 bunch of cilantro
• 1 can of garbanzo beans (it's what I had in the cupboard)
• 1/2 cup of sour cream
• 1 cup of shredded cheese

Spices included some black pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, chili powder and a dash of garlic salt.

You can modify the ingredients if you are trying for a specific flavor profile - for example you could use feta cheese , yogurt (instead of sour cream) and add some fresh mint and rosemary for a Greek type flavor.

I cut a triangle shaped opening out of the top of each of the peppers and diced the removed piece and added it to the mixture.

I smoked these at 250 F for about 45 minutes. Since all the ingredients are already cooked there is no internal temp goal. You just want all the cheese to melt and the flavors to mix up. Even after 45 minutes, the pepper itself was pretty crunchy and the garbanzo beans also added some crunch.

You can cook this on a gas grill by turning on the hot side flame as LOW as possible (you know where the hot spot is) and put some foil on the side as far away from the hot side as possible. Put a little olive oil on the foil so the pepper doesn't stick to the foil. If you have a temp guage on the hood of you grill, see if you can get it around 250F. For the last 10 minutes, put the peppers directly on the grate in the middle of the grill but still not direclty over the hot spot / flame on portion - so you can get some grill marks and soften up the pepper shell a bit. Put the bread direclty on the grate that you just removed the foil from (the coolest portion - furthest away from the direct flame).

I threw in a baguette with some garlic and butter for the last 10 minutes to go with the peppers.

You can see the colors came out pretty nice and the fresh cilantro diced and radishes chopped into the mix really added some nice flavors.

You can serve this split open with some bread. Look pretty nice!

Fatty - aka Bacon Explosion

Many people have attempted to smoke the perfect Fatty - now you will know how too!

Ingredients (per Fatty):

• 1lb of Bacon
• 1 pack of uncooked sausage (5 - 7 links)
• Vegetables (if you are a girl)
• 1/2 cup of Cheese (if you are a man)

Get 1lb of bacon.




5 - 7 links of uncooked sausage - now this can be Italian or breakfast or whatever - depends on if you are making a breakfast or spicy fatty!

Slit open the casings and remove the sausage meat and place in a bowl.





Start the lattice of bacon - I lay out 5 - 7 strips of bacon as close together as possible, then start at one end and peel back the strips the cross trip is going under. Keep this as tight as possible!

Keep it tight!

Now - I usually end up with 2 more strips across than I have tall but end result should be a sqaure - or as close to it as possible.

Then sprinkle some dry rub over the lattice:

Now place the sausage meat onto the lattice about 1/4" thick and leave about 1" from each edge without sausage:



This picture might have the sausage too close to the edge - but it still worked out OK.

Now put a thin layer of your favorite BBQ sauce over the sausage meat layer.

For Girls Only: This is where you would add some type of vegetable.

For Men Only: This is where you add 1/2 cup of cheese - some type of soft cheese the melts easily is best - I use Colby - Jack.

Here is the MOST important tip of the whole recipe:

Roll the sausage meat and whatever stuffing you use FIRST. Leave the bacon lattice on the cutting board. If you attempt to roll the bacon and the sausage meat all at once - the lattice will burst or your fatty will look like Jabba the Hutt.





After you roll up the sausage meat / stuffing, place it in the middle of the lattice and roll the bacon around the stuffing:



Note: Beer can is for visual size reference only.

Now - there may be some extra sausage meat and bacon strips left - what to do?!?

I call this "Rolling a Blunt":

Lay out the remaining strips - slightly overlapping.

Place the left over sausage meat on the end.

Sprinkle with rub and drizzle some sauce and roll tha that thing up! Now you have a Fatty and a Blunt!



Dust the outside with more dry rub and you can add some more BBQ sauce if you want:

Place on the smoker:



I cook mine at 250 - 275F for about 2 1/2 hours or until internal temp reaches 165 F.

Now that's smokin' a Fatty (and a blunt).



Pull and slice. I would have shown you pictures of these sliced but by the time I got back with the camera, they were both gone!

Good eating!