BBQ Fanatic

Pitt Cue Co – Va Va Voom

2012-01-12T14:11:00.001-08:00

Restuarant: Pitt Cue Co
Location: The corner of Ganton / Newburgh street, Soho

On Monday evening Ben and myself were privileged to be invited to a preopening night at Pitt Cue Co’s new home (and its not a van under a bridge). On first impressions, let me just say, Barbecoa, Bodeans, best to pack your bags and ship out, there's a new BBQ Sheriff in town and its called Pitt Cue Co…. bang bang.

On entering the restaurant we were greeted to a polished concrete floor and a tricked out bar with all the Rye and Bourbon a man could ever want. The selection of ales and whiskey could lead to some seriously long and dangerous evenings propping up the counter. While sipping on our ales, the allure of sweet smoke beckoned down the stairs to the basement restaurant below. We couldn't resist and plunged downstairs to be seated in a compact, but comfortable restaurant.

We quickly jumped into some sides whilst making our decision, and sampled some smoked crispy chicken wings that were tasty and drenched in a fine home-made tomato-based wing sauce. The wings needed a tad more crispiness and could have done with a bit more time in the smoker to become more tender, but were dispatched shortly. The little surprise was the pickled celery, something of a flavour sensation. The other side was the crispy shiitake mushrooms. These bad boys were pickled, bread-crumbed, then deep fried and served piping hot… and were incredible, frankly.

After reviewing the menu (well laid out with nothing over £9), we decided to go for one of each of the meats. The menu dictates you can choose one meat and one side, but for additional sheets you can get additional meats and sides. Great concept, more meat. On the back of this we decided to go for a taste of all the meats (St Louis Ribs, Pulled Pork, Brisket and Beef Ribs). In addition we sampled the Burnt Ends Mash, Beans and Slaw. The food was quickly served, delicately laid out on plain white platters. What took us by surprise was the quality of the presentation, which was stylish (BBQ restaurants of London, time to sit up and take note….). This was short lived, the food was too good to stare at, it needed to be devoured.

St Louis Ribs – The ribs were tasty, had a good bite through and were sweety and sticky. The kicker for me was the slightly seared skin married to the beautiful glaze. However, the ribs were let down by too little smoke flavour. But as the team pointed out they are still working on the recipe and getting to grips with the new kitchen. For the majority of BBQ Punters, these will be better than anything they have tasted.

Pulled Pork – The pulled pork was well pulled and drenched in a beautiful glossy sauce that really brought the flavours to the forefront. We would have loved some bark, and the pork lacked texture, but it tasted beautiful and definitely hit the mark; it's the best we've tasted at any BBQ restaurant this side of the pond

Brisket – The brisket was classy, had a great smoke ring and the flavour was excellent. Not competition brisket in that it was too tender, but on the tongue it was moist, flavoursome and we will definitely be back to sample this on a bun with 'slaw

Beef Ribs – The best I've had, full stop. These were the highlight of the evening for us. If they were being served in the Midwest, there would have been a queue down the street and all the way up Carnaby street. Rich, sassy, bold and melt in your mouth ribs… Quality meat, cooked perfectly with just the right amount of smoke. Double order next time please…

Tom, Neil and the rest of the team also served up some quality accompaniments to the BBQ which was a bit of a revelation to the taste buds. These guys are stars at pickling, and the pickles absolutely popped. The flavours marry so well with the BBQ and the rest of the sides. The beans lacked flavour and were a tad on the dry side, we prefer our BBQ Beans struggling to stay afloat, swimming in a decadent bath of brown sugar, BBQ Sauce and burnt ends. However, the lads had another trick up their sleeve. The BBQ Burnt End Mash was something that created the perfect matrimony of both side of the Atlantic (ie a George Clooney and Keira Knightley kind of marriage), dirtyliscious crispy burnt ends, sweet, tender, delicately placed on a cloud of the velvety mash laced with Montgomery's Cheddar. Yes – we will be back for you!

We finished off with the Snickers Mess dessert, an amalgamation of snickers bar, cream, toffee, chocolate, peanut butter and meringue (and it seemd like a whole lot more!) that creates a dessert explosion with every mouthful. First class… how can you go wrong.

Rating – 4 out of 5, the only thing holding it back from a perfect score was a stronger kiss of smoke. To be fair it was the teams first serving and we are being a bit harsh. Would we go back again? Hell Yes. Real Q’ with great portion sizes and good prices. Go go go!
Value – Excellent, no dish over £10. Expect to pay £20-£30.
Comment – We will be back, very very soon. The best BBQ restaurant in London! Tom, Neil and his team are BBQ heroes!

BBQ Fanatics very first Sponsor!

2011-12-14T13:59:00.001-08:00

Sponsor Westlands Rare Breeds (Paul Robbinson)

BBQ Fanatics need to share some fantastic news; Paul Robbinson, the owner of the Westlands Rare Breed Farm have agreed to sponsor Pork shoulders from their farm for the 2012 BBQ season. Paul and his family are avid believers of sustainable rare breed animals providing exceptional quality meat. The farm is based near Gatwick and they focus on a number of animals, primarily KuneKune (From NZ, means 'Little fat pig') and Pedigree Saddlebacks pigs. In addition Paul also breeds lambs and turkeys. If you are looking for a last minute Turkey, please contact Paul directly, for hand reared, free range birds....

Please support your local farmers and support our sponsors on Facebook. Alternatively they can be contacted on -

Email - westlands-rarebreeds@hotmail.co.uk
Phone - 01293771771
Contact Details Westlands, Antlands Lane, Shipley Bridge, Horley, Surrey, RH6 9TE

Meat Liquor–Burger Heaven

2011-12-03T04:34:00.001-08:00

Restaurant: Meat Liquor
Location: Corner of Wellbeck & Henrieta - Bond Street
The burger: Dead Hippie

We’ve learnt that its wise to follow Nick Andrew’s advice recently. And so to Meat Liqour, near Bond Street tube. I don’t know why all these incredible, dirty, greasy, beefy burger joints are starting to appear in London but we are beginning to become obsessed.
Meat Liquor has a no reservation policy, which is very annoying for someone who likes a plan, and very convenient for the restaurant, which has a 40 minute queue out of the door at all times. We joined the queue in the rain, but I have to say just got more and more excited by the sweet smell of seared beef fat.
Finally we were allowed in. Inside its pretty cool, it has a whiff of the cro-bar about it (my favourite spot in Soho). With writing on the wall, metal/punk themed decor, red lighting and loud music, the place is achingly cool.

Once in we realised we had to join a different queue – the queue of people drinking at the bar waiting for a table. The bar serves bottles of beer (Meantime brewery is well represented) and an extensive selection of cocktails, ice for which is hacked off a gleaming berg in an underlit butler sink with a Wickes wood chisel – nice touch.

We went for a Donkey Punch (I googled this and every recipe is different – this had absinthe and ginger beer as well as other stuff in it – nice and refreshing, I love ginger in cocktails) a Paloma (tequila and grapefruit – simple and refreshing) and an awesome recipe which we have had before (Using Sazerac - @ Barbecoa), called a "St Lawrence", using Woodford Reserve bourbon, maple syrup, fresh lemon juice, bitters and ice. As you can see, its all served up a little differently, in this case a, er, jam jar.

These were incredible! Between three of us we had eight of these over the course of the evening. Yes, eight - but Cuan had four and was happy to have more!

Finally we got to sit down and order. We were making our orders a grand total of 100 minutes since we joined the queue. Plan ahead – do not go there already starving because you will be driven insane by the time you get to eat.
We were just saying (bellowing, actually, over the music) as we waiting at the bar that the place needs bar wings – 48 wings, blue cheese and ranch would have made the wait a bit easier definitely. We found them on the starter menu so ordered two portions and a portion of deep fried pickles (large gherkins sliced on the vertical, battered and deep fried).

The food comes just on big baking sheets (standard catering aluminium baking sheets) and all the starters came on one sheet for all three of us – a pile of wings drenched in franks hot sauce and a small pile of fried pickles on the side, blue cheese and ranch sauces.

The wings were outstanding, easily the best we’ve had in a restaurant in the UK, I’d say as good as Willies in Kansas City (although Cuan would not agree), but probably not quite as good as my smoked and deep fried wings (but they’re a labour of love). I’d go back just for these - especially as they are using Franks Red Hot. The deep fried pickles were a destination event – I’ve read about these many times but never believed they were going to work if I tried them and never seen them in a restaurant. They’re like vinegary onion rings a bit – the batter/filling relationship is a bit like that in a deep fried dessert, where its kind of soggy on the inside but crisp on the outside. Very compelling actually, I’ll be revisiting these.
Onto the burgers. These came on a large baking sheet, three of them, two piles of onion rings and a couple of portions of fries. We all went for the dead hippie – a double cheese burger with lettuce and coleslaw, more sliced gherkin and a big mac style sauce. Good lord they were incredible.

Proper shiny buns, small, beautiful patties of really beefy, beefy beef. While I was posing for this photo (waiting for Cuan to operate his phone camera) the grease was just running down my hand. Oh god I’m hungry.

Cooked medium rare this is a celebration of what is best about burgers – beef, lots of topping, cheap American cheese, and soft brioche buns. You can see the onion rings in the background – they were massive and well executed but not in the same league as everything else we’d had. Somehow with the high street staples (GBK, etc.) we’ve ended up with dry, very fat patties and chilli sauce and weird stuff like that (Byron’s is better but not that great). This isn’t what burgers are supposed to be like. I should be able to have two patties and have beef grease dripping down my hands but not feel like I’m just chewing through a load of dry Sainsburys mince. And have proper attention to the toppings and the bun – each mouthful here is an explosion of beef, salad and mayo, onions and pickles and all framed by a proper, soft, bad-for-you bun. Glorious.
We rolled out of Meat Liquor each fifty quid lighter (remember we had ten cocktails in total) but extremely impressed. I can’t wait to go back – just make sure to establish your queuing strategy ahead of time.
Verdict: Outstanding.

Diablo Burger @ The Diner in Soho

2011-10-27T15:17:00.000-07:00

Restaurant: The Diner
Location: Ganton Street, London
The burger: Diablo

Suffering from a serious lack of BBQ in the off season (ie Winter), myself and Mr. Cops headed down to "The Diner" on Ganton street for some dirty, meaty fun on the back of some amazing reviews. In particular, a brave researcher whose blog we have fallen in love with at Burger-ME!

We went staight for the Diablo, a special created for Halloween. The highlight of the menu in my opinion and £1 cheaper than 10 sheets. This is the kind of burger that would put GBK on its back and make Byrons fall to its knees and start weeping like a child that has come 4th in an egg n spoon race with 3 competitors.

A brioche style bun with 8oz of medium rare rib, sirloin, fillet and chuck, served smothered in a pepper style cheese finished off by crunchy pickles and a spicy tomatoe relish. It was messy, juicy, tasted incredible, had a good crust and is definately worth a vist. What's next Burger-Me?

BBQ Fanatics Award Winning finishing sauce

2011-09-14T11:52:00.000-07:00

Recipe: BBQ Sauce

This outstanding finishing sauce is used to paint onto meats in the final 20 minutes on the smoker; heavy with sugar and corn syrup it gives a rich glaze to ribs, pork and brisket. Its a combination of Cuan's incredible BBQ sauce (adapted slightly) and the corn syrup and was influenced by our time at the Royal in Kansas City in 2010. Props to Cuan for developing this, its just fantastic.
I've split this into a base and then a finisher - you can experiment on top of the base with other flavours you're after. I've given our finisher for pulled pork here which uses apricot preserves and is inspired by APL's (Famous in the US but known in the UK due to his ties with Jamie Oliver and their joint restaurant Barbecoa) pulled pork sauce.

I highly recommend investing in a chinoise for this! You'll be pushing the sauce through a sieve 3 times to get the consistency and smoothness and its painful without a proper tool for it.

BBQ Sauce Base
Makes 2 quantities
Adapted from Cuan’s recipe.

Ingredients
2 dried chipotle chiles, split and seeds removed, rehydrated in boiling water and minced
2 white onions, chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely sliced
2 142g cans double concentrated tomato puree
2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp onion salt
2 tsp tamarind pulp
2 tbs tamarind extract
1 cup cider vinegar
1 cup light brown sugar
½ tsp ground cinnamon
½ tsp ground nutmeg

Method

Step
Fry the chilies, onions, garlic and ½ tsp of coarse salt in olive oil gently, until soft but not coloured
Add ½ cup of water, tomato puree, ground black pepper
Add garlic powder, onion salt
Add tamarind pulp and extract
Simmer gently for 10-20 min, do not boil
Push through a sieve
Add vinegar, salt and pepper to taste, sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg
Simmer for 10 min, do not boil (take off the heat if bubbling). Stir frequently.
Push through a sieve

Apricot Finishing Sauce
Used on pulled pork

Ingredients
1 quantity BBQ Sauce base
1/2 cup apricot preserves
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp soy sauce
1/4 cup corn syrup

Method
Step
Combine ingredients + more ground pepper
Simmer gently for 5 minutes
Push through sieve

Basic BBQ Rub

2011-09-14T11:51:00.000-07:00

This rub comes courtesy of Adie from the bite the bullet championship BBQ team.

Cheers Adie!

Smaller amount

½ Cup	Sweet Paprika
2 Tablespoons	Dark Brown Sugar
2 Tablespoons	Granulated Sugar
1 Tablespoon	dried Rosemary
4 Teaspoons	Salt
1 Teaspoons	Cayenne Pepper
2 Teaspoons	Ground Black Pepper
2 Teaspoon	Dry Mustard
2 Teaspoon	Garlic granules
2 Teaspoon	Onion Powder
2 tsp	Mild red chilli powder

Larger amount

1 cup	Sweet Paprika
1/2 cup	Dark Brown Sugar
1/2 cup	Granulated Sugar
2 tbs	Dried Rosemary
1/4 cup	Salt
2 tsp	Cayenne Pepper
1 tbs	Ground Black Pepper
1 tbs	Dry Mustard
1 tbs	Garlic granules
1 tbs	Onion Powder
1 tbs	Mild red chilli powder

Recipe: Blood Clots

2011-09-02T16:26:00.001-07:00

These went down really well with the 10:20am frozen bourbon shots at the last BBQ competition so as promised here is the recipe!

Ingredients - makes 4 so multiply it up for more:

1 slice black pudding (I use Bury black pudding)
5-6 sausages (I use Porky Whites). Probably get away with 5 if you’re making a lot of them or you can make them thin and retain cohesion. The black pudding is the star here.
1 tbs BBQ rub (I use a standard, not too hot BBQ rub that includes dried rosemary, recipe here)
4 rashers unsmoked streaky bacon
BBQ sauce for painting. Something sticky and shiny, a finishing sauce; for example blues hog mixed with something with flavour, or the BBQ fanatics finishing sauce (recipe for ours is here)

In my humble experience, making smoked sausage and bacon things requires good sausage and good bacon so I use a good sausage and the best streaky bacon I can buy, but this particular recipe is actually relatively tolerant of using cheap ingredients. The point of this dish is the soft, creamy black pudding in amongst the firm, salty, smoky sausage. Also, this is ideally a breakfast delicacy and so is probably best put on just before you go to bed at a competition or smoked ahead of time and heated up later (either in an oven, microwave or indirect on a kettle). It keeps very well, probably benefits in fact, frozen and vac packed. Defrost before reheating.
Method
Remove the sausage from the skin and add the rub

Mix thoroughly with a wooden spoon

Cut the black pudding into quarters, and each quarter in half

Stack each eight on top of its larger neighbour to created roughly cubic lumps

Take a patty of sausage mixture and press a black pudding lump into it

Cover the ball with another piece of sausage mixture and press together with your hands, patting to form a tight ball. Ensure that no black pudding peeks through the sausage. Try to get the pudding right in the centre of the ball - I've done these far too much to one side because I was trying to use up some leftover sausage.

Repeat for all remaining black pudding lumps and sausage

Wrap each ball in a strip of streaky bacon and secure with a skewer. A wooden skewer is fine or a metal skewer will do too, main thing is to keep the bacon strip on the ball while smoking. Probably add a dusting of rub at this stage too if you're feeling like it.

Place on the smoker at 250F and smoke for one hour.

After one hour, turn each ball to smoke evenly.

After 3-4 hours total, paint with the BBQ sauce and smoke for another 20-30 minutes. Then remove and rest.

Remove the skewers – slice and serve

Verdict: Filthy. But great.

Pitmasters Points Chase - 2011

2011-08-01T14:43:00.000-07:00

The July 2011 competition saw BBQ Fanatics take 2nd in chicken... but no kickers. 5th overall to make a solid performance so far this season (we had the same in May).

We had a great time and learned loads as usual. Plus my new smoker performed amazingly - more details on that in a later post!

Good work team.

Nemesis Defeated

2011-05-30T04:40:00.000-07:00

Event: Mayhem in May @ Tongham, UK
Overall: 5th Place

BBQ Fanatics competed in their 4th tournament to date. A weekend of high wind and copious amounts of Hogsback Tea was still successful for the team. After many attempts and some tips from our friends across the pond, we finally managed to crack the formula and defeat the mighty brisket. The end result was 1st place! We also picked up a 2nd in Sauce's, our second placing in this category.

It was a fantastic weekend and there was significantly more competition this year, with an additional 8 teams (19 in total). A massive thanks to Toby Shea from the British BBQ Society for arranging everything. Without him, this fantastic event would not have been possible.

BBQ Fanatics - Global Supporters Club

2011-03-06T04:31:00.000-08:00

Location: Melbourne, Western Australia

Friends and supporters of the 'BBQ Fanatics' have gone global. Long time chum and groomsmen of our very own Cuan Brown is Michel Mamet, seen here sporting the latest in 'BBQ Fanatics' styling. Good news is that Michel breaks with standard aussie tradition and uses charcoal over gas. Apparently his wife told him they were out of beer and shrimp.

iGrill Review

2011-02-23T13:01:00.001-08:00

BBQers are obsessed with temperatures. When we were in Kansas City, there was surprisingly little talk of sauce or rub recipes, it was all about what gear you had and how you knew it was at the correct temperature.
The iDevices iGrill is yet another device that panders to our desire to continuously monitor temperatures without lift the lid/opening the oven door. It’s a dual probe thermometer and alarm with a bluetooth link to your iPod touch/iPhone/iPad. A free app runs on these devices and shows a display with one or two temperatures monitored. Its a pretty nice looking app (screenshots from my iPad);

The timer on the right gives you a countdown and a visual indicator. When the timer fires, you hear a puny ringing sound… so you won’t be using the timer. The temperature gauge on the left shows one or two temperatures using the dial. There’s no option to change the visualisation or look and feel here so you’re stuck with what’s on the screen.

At the top left you can see the current temperature and target temperature. If you click on “cooking…” you can pick your meat and desired done-ness, which links directly to a target temperature. That’s quite cool. The next icon down, the stopwatch (time left until the target temperature is reached) basically doesn’t work. It kicks in about 30 seconds before time is up and usually just shows “—“. When the target temperature is achieved, the screen judders into a fade to blue, and a pop-up declares “times up” or something. The puny bell rings again.
At the top right you can see a graph of temperature against time. That’s really cool.
The top bar pulls down a menu that shows you some recipes and how-to guides. You won’t be needing that.

Things look slightly different with the (optional) second probe attached. Two sets of needles on the dial, two sets of temps and a shrunken graph.
On the remote unit itself you can see both sets of temperatures (one after the other) when you push the button, and you can set an alarm to go off on the remote itself. The alarm is a little louder on here than the iPad but clearly useless for BBQing. The unit is decently made but not weather sealed at all, and not intended for outside use.
The system itself works very well for the use its intended for – cooking meat in an oven. The range on bluetooth is very decent (as usual for bluetooth), and the temperatures update fine. That’s all it does and it does it ok. I’ve used it a couple of times cooking roasts and will continue to do so. I’ve heard that the bluetooth drops out sometimes with the iPhone but haven’t seen it on the iPad ever.
The iGrill software itself is a bit of a wasted opportunity. Its a bit poorly thought through in terms of the alarm and the timer. The software resets if you run another program (so if you look at your email, or a recipe out of the in-app browser) – you then lose the graph history (resets the graph) which is practically the coolest bit, although the target temp remains. If you want to see that graph over time you literally have to use your iPad, etc. for nothing else. Its definitely a wasted opportunity for BBQers. We could have the following functionality with a tiny bit of development;

One probe monitors smoker temperature, the other the food so we want to see at a glance (on that huge iPad screen) both figures. We look at it about once a minute for about 13 hours! So really two big dials which we could change the range on or simply big numbers.
Alarms at different temperature ranges. If the smoker goes below a certain value, or above a second value; alarm. If the food goes over a certain value (but not under); alarm.
Big, long graphs of temp against time. I love the graph but it’d be great to tap it and see it big, and set the scale. “This was the time at 3am, you can see where the fire went out, this is what happened to the meat temp during this time”. Ability to export this data say as a CSV file. Imagine being able to save the temperatures automatically for meat and smoker for an overnight smoke, and cross reference these over the season against tasting notes! Amazing! Its not in here.

I’m sure someone could write an app to address these – I’ve asked iDevices for some info on the API or how to code against their bluetooth data but they’re not sharing. Oh well.

Verdict: Fun and decent enough for indoor roasting. Stick to the Mavericks for BBQing until someone sorts the software out. Cuan's review of that is here.

BBBQS Mayhem in May 2011

2011-02-04T04:16:00.001-08:00

Start your engines!

It seems like a lot more than a year ago that we nervously signed up to take part in the British BBQ Society Mayhem in May competition. Its now Pitmasters – and we just can’t wait to get back into the fray for the new season. Last year we came back with a few bits of glass – a couple of 2nds and 3rds, but didn’t bother the top spots at any point. But that’s ok, at BBQ Fanatics we’re about doing it from scratch and having fun – with real fires, wood, simple equipment and crap tents.

Now remembering our nervousness, a note to readers who are thinking about taking part. Just go for it – the meat is part of the entrance fee (£150) and the site is well provisioned for the competition, the people are really friendly, its even family friendly and there’s loads of good BBQ going on.

See you there!

Maverick ET-732

2010-12-24T16:40:00.000-08:00

Unit: Wireless Remote Thermometer ET-732
Manufacturer: Maverick Industries
Retailer: 5-0 BBQ

I was lucky enough to be able to source one of the new Maverick ET-732's. This is only due to be released in the new year, but my new chums at 5-0 BBQ (or their facebook page) in the states were kind enough to arrange for a unit to be delivered to me while I was in Philadelphia.

I was itching to test out the new unit (which is a replacement to my aging and now well damaged Maverick ET-73) and the opportunity presented itself whilst I was in Toronto on an original Bradley electric smoker. I tested it on a full smoker of Ribs and chicken wings in -5°C (+- 20°F). The Bradley struggled in the cool weather but did a sterling job. It was easy to sync the units and even easier to get them up and running.

On first glance the unit is remarkably similar to the original units, however, they now sport a nifty aerial which allows for greater wireless distance (I tested to about 150 feet, line of sight, with no issues. The max distance is around 300 feet). The next noticeable difference are the waterproof buttons which addresses the biggest gripe about the original ET-73. Both remote transmitter and the remote receiver have waterproof external (yes, no more pulling the battery component off the the transmitter) buttons. I have not had time to review all the software features, but it seems like its the same as the original unit.

The probes have been uprated to support in excess of 600°F (which is about 200°F more than the original probles). The Remote Transmitter has the nifty clip and now has the prob mounts on the side of the unit rather than the back. On the whole (and after first usage) this is a worthy replacement to the original ET-73.

Recommendation: Buy Now!

Oklahoma Joes, pulling pork

2010-12-18T15:32:00.000-08:00

Finally got round to encoding this vid for youtube - this is one of the chefs at Oklahoma Joe's showing us at the recent tour, how he pulls a whole pork shoulder in under a minute. I think he's done it before....

Barbecoa My BBQ

2010-11-14T05:21:00.000-08:00

Restaurant: Barbecoa
Date: 12th Nov 2010

Recently myself, Ben and some chums visited Jamie Oliver and Adam Perry Lang (famous for Daisy May's, one on NYC's finest BBQ restaurants). We kicked off with a serious whisky cocktail made with Sazerac (famous for being voted one of the most highly rated whiskys in the world from Buffalo Trace Distilleries). Then it was time for the serious business.

While we waited we had pork crackling with a chocolate spicy mole. Cracking was good but the star of the dish was definately the Mole... rich, sassy and oh so moresome.

The lads decided to order and share so we kicked off with the Hot Wings (sauced with a honey, soya and sesame seed - excellent, but definately not hot), fall off the bone, melt in your mouth chicken wings. The baby back ribs were a good shout, nice sticky sauce, well smoked, a touch over done, but with excellent flavour. We also had a side of seared chillis (hot but very popular) and probably the best of all the starters was the pig's cheek. I give it 5 thumbs up, packed with flavour.

We had a NZ Pinot Noir (Moko Black) very quaffable and certianly maintains my passion for New World Wines. Onto the mains and I believe this is where the team at Barbecoa really shone. We orderd 2x short ribs (basically a beef rib slow smoked till it literally falls off the bone. A rich beef flavour and possibly the best I have ever eaten) covered in a sticky spicy glaze over a bed of irish mash. MMMmmmm.

Beer Butt chicken, smoked and grilled. A little tip, if you enjoy sucking the bone, ask the team to leave the chicken on the table instead of them preparing it for you. It was well flavoured, juicy and had a sublte hint of smokiness. There was NOTHING left over. The chicken came with a side dish of black beans cooked and smoked in treacle. I thought the beans were the weakest dish of the evening. They had been cooked in treacle, and personally I felt they had been overcooked and as a result had become very bitter.

The final dish was pork belly, that was tender, juicy, not too fatty, well crisped skin with a lovely touch of aniseed on a bed of sauted apples... could life get any better? The meals were topped off by shoestring fries and mash.

To finish it off there was a round of whisky's and decadent knock your socks off 70% coco chocolate cake kissed with orange zest and a good selection of cheeses.

Rating - 5 out of 5 for food, ambience and definately worth a visit
Value - Medium to Expensive, expect to pay £40-£60pp
Comment - Fine dining, Michelin star BBQ.... there is irony in there somewhere? But I will be visiting again

Photos from the American Royal

2010-10-20T14:04:00.001-07:00

My photos from the American Royal are now on Flickr. Enjoy!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/copsey/sets/72157625184800032/

Oklahoma Joes BBQ Restaurant, Kansas City

2010-10-20T12:14:00.001-07:00

Just off the south bound I35 running out of Kansas City you’ll find an unassuming petrol station. If you don’t need to stop for fuel, you’d drive right by. This green and white, no name fuel station sitting on 3002 W 47^th Avenue, gives away its true treasures by the faint whiff of smoke, a parking lot filled with a cross section of society (RV’s, 4x4 and bankers beamers) and at lunch, a queue all the way out the front door. We found a spot, piled out and ambled into the hallowed ground, that is now known as the home of ‘the’ BBQ restaurant, Oklahoma Joe’s BBQ. This hidden gem, was made an international name by the ever popular Chef Anthony Bourdain in his article "13 Places to Eat Before you Die", published in Mens Health.

This Mecca for top quality BBQ was born in the 90’s by the Slaughterhouse 5 BBQ team, namely Jeff & Joy Stehney and Joe Davidson (The Joe in Oklahoma Joe’s). Shortly after, Joe sold up leaving Jeff and his wife to take the reigns.

One of our party had contacted Doug Worgul, head of marketing at Oklahoma Joes and formerly editor at the Kansas City Star (more recently as author of the excellent “Thin Blue Smoke”). Doug met us as we entered the restaurant and we were clearly already overwhelmed by the massive queue, buzz of conversation and intoxicating smell of BBQ. Doug was kind enough to take time out of his busy day and give the The British BBQ Society team members a personal tour of the restaurant.

The tour kicked off at the business end, with a visit of the final preparation area where we were greeted by a member of the team slicing wafer thin pieces of brisket in preparation for service to the patiently waiting masses.

It was an impressive sight, racks of cooked brisket, wrapped in clingfilm to keep the juices from running out. In excess of 60-70 large briskets go out the door in serving. Whichever way you look at it, that’s a lot of cow!

Of all the brisket dishes, our favourite was the Z-Man sandwich: Brisket delicately placed on a soft, white Kaiser bun, smothered in smoked provolone cheese, 2 onion rings and BBQ sauce. As an interesting aside, the name Z-Man was due to a DJ who was running a competition on air to name the new dish. During the advertising, people came in and asked for the sandwich that the Z-Man had been trying to name - "gimme that Z-man sandwich". The Z-Man was born... and the world is a better place for it!

Doug then took us into the heart of the restaurant where the real magic happened. To be honest, there is no magic, just three massive, thick stainless steel walled smokers large enough to contain 40-60 massive slabs of prime ribs each, powered by the subtle flavours of white oak. In the centre of the room was a trolley containing 40+ slabs being prepped for cooking.

On the door of each oven one of the pitmasters had written the contents, showing the cut of meat, time it went in and; the quantity.

The scale is quite impressive, with the restaurant capable of pushing out over 1000 racks of ribs (each rib is capable of feeding 2x normal humans or 1x large hungry man) in a day.

All three smokers were powered by the same burner, playing over the oak logs to give that distinctive flavour.

Out of the smokers and off to another preparation room. We discovered the team working on preparing dozens of butts of pulled pork. We watched as each dripping pork shoulder was torn apart with 3-4 deft slices of the hand. The sheet of fatty bark from the top of the butt was then squeezed over the remaining pork (“squeezing out the love”) and then mixed through. The result was a plate of juicy, moist pulled pork, slowly steaming away in its own juices, waiting to be consumed (preferably with spicy ‘slaw). The team fell into a hypnotised silence as they watched each cannon ball of pork being dealt with in a matter of seconds by a man whom clearly had oven mitts for hands.

The final stop of the tour was to visit the BBQ Beans station. The beans were being cooked in a massive steel bath. Each precious little bean exuding the heat absorbed during their growth from the mid-western sun was swimming in a beautiful honey brown pool of sugar, spices and tomatoes. As beans go, they had clearly arrived at the top of their game.

Doug then proceeded to finish off the tour by giving us some history of restaurant, the people and some interesting anecdotes. This included some background into London’s very own BBQ restaurant chain, Bodeans. The owner of Bodeans had approached Oaklahoma Joes about 10 years ago for advice when setting up the one of the only proper BBQ restaurants in the UK. He toured the restaurant, much as we had, and picked up tips on how to produce BBQ on that scale, what smokers to buy (Bodeans still use the Ole’ Hickory smokers used by OJs) and how to run a BBQ business. Both restaurants display the same pink, neon pig sign with BBQ in the middle in the front window. They even stole one of the young pitmasters, bringing him over to work in the Soho branch in the first days of the restaurant. Clearly, without realising it, we had ended up closer to Joe’s than anticipated.

Post the tour the team tucked into the food. Without wanting to embellish, the food was excellent. We tasted the ribs (very meaty, juicy, slight smoke flavour and well flavoured), the Z-Man sandwich (creamy, moist with a nice crunch of onions), the Carolina (brisket, spicy slaw & BBQ Sauce), BBQ Beans (A nice pleasant bbq flavoured, a touch of heat and oh so sweet) and finally the extra crispy spicy fries. This was washed down by a local Boulevard beer.

As I looked round the table, I noticed the team were very quiet, licking their fingers, a dreamy look in their face. Sated.

Thank you Doug for taking time out of your day and thank you Oklahoma Joe’s for serving us food we’d love to see a lot more of side of the pond!

Written: Cuan Brown
Editor, Photos: Ben Cops

American Royal BBQ Comp .... On your marks

2010-10-01T05:49:00.000-07:00

The day has finally arrived. Many months of preparation by our intrepid team leader Toby, thousands of emails, phone calls, begging and a borrowing.Stealing and a loaning, the team has their site together, the pits are primed and ready to burn and the nerves are starting to set in.

As a team, the British BBQ team have travelled over 4800 miles to compete in the world famous Royal American BBQ Invitational and Open competition.
The team is made up of Toby Shea, Adie Platts, Steve Heyes, Chris McQuillan, Neil Welsh and our very own Cuan Brown & Ben Cops.

Thus far the team has managed to make a pilgramage to the world famous BBQ restaurant (A guided tour post coming soon) Oaklahoma Joes. Anthony Boudain's top 13 places to eat before you die.

We have visited Kansas City BBQ Shop and stocked up for the cold blightey winters and have scoured Walmart for all its deals. The talking is over, the proof is in the puddin'. Lets get a Cookin'.

Come down and see us we are on Stand 936 and we would love to chat.

kansas city

2010-09-29T17:18:00.000-07:00

Day two in Kansas City and we've had some awesome ribs in oklahoma joes, Cuan is a few kilos heavier in BBQ sauce and rubs, and we've smashed 96 wings in willies bar in minutes. The site is a massive car park with portaloos as far as the eye can see but the enormous smokers and pits are starting to arrive. Our FEC cooker and it's pal are already onsite as is our winnebego.

To the bar!

One sleep 'til Kansas City!

2010-09-26T12:29:00.000-07:00

God I can't wait

And then....

The American Royal Barbecue is the opening event of the American Royal and the season finale for the competitive circuit. Spreading over 20 acres in Kansas City’s historic Stockyards District, and with nearly 500 teams competing in four culinary contests, The Royal is the largest barbecue contest in the world. Combine this with a barbecue-related trade expo, this two-day food festival is truly the “World Series of Barbecue.”

We're competing in the American Royal!

2010-08-05T03:38:00.000-07:00

That's right, two of the BBQ Fanatics team are heading to Kansas City at the end of September to take part at the massive American Royal BBQ competition! We're accompanying a slice of the competitors at the BBBQS circuit and the president (?) of the BBBQS on their annual trip.

As you can imagine this is a massive deal for us and we're very excited. Its a great chance to learn loads and meet some of the most BBQ obsessed people in the world, not to mention to see some proper rigs and eat a LOT OF MEAT.

WOOHOO!

http://bbbqs.com/content/archives/179#more-179

Build your own pit

2010-07-30T06:37:00.001-07:00

Looks non-trivial
http://www.oscarenterprises.f2s.com/build_a_pit.html

Boerewors Bacon Explosion

2010-07-11T04:33:00.000-07:00

BBQ Date: Early July
BBQ Weather: Perfect!

After missing out on Ben's Bacon Explosion last weekend, I was determined to give it a go. However, I wanted a truly South African twist on the experience. A famous sausage from the Rainbow Nation is called Boerewors (pronounced 'bu-revors'), which is a mixture of Pork, Beef and at least 30% fat, loaded with spices such a coriander, pepper, nutmeg, cloves and garlic. Its truly a delight bbq'd and placed on a bun. Needless to say, I substituted pork sausage meat, with Boerewors sausage meat from my local provider 'The Savana' shop.

I followed the now famous Bacon Explosion recipe, but with a few of my own twists. The ingredients are as follows:

2xPack of Boerewors (I only used 1&1/2 sausages meat)
30xPeices streaky bacon
Memphis Magic Dust
BBQ Sauce of Choice - I used Mississippi Sweet Apple in the abscense of my own.

Step 1 - Make the Bacon Weave
This is where I thought I would have the most problem, but was actually straight forward. This takes about 20+ peices of bacon. There is a good video here. I then lightly dusted the weave with the magic dust. The end result looked like this:

Step 2 - Place meat over Weave
I squeezed the boerewors out the sausages and then carefully pressed it out over the top of the bacon weave. It looked like this:

Step 3 - Fry remaining Bacon
I then had about 10 peices of bacon that I fried off till it was really crispy. Once they were cool, I broke them into little peices and sprinkled over the top of the boerewors meat. I topped this with the Mississippi Sweet Apple Sauce and were were now good to go. Make sure you leave about 1" of space around the edge of the meat so that you can seal the meat once its rolled.

Step 4 - Wrap
Now, carefully roll ONLY the meat, leaving the weave laid out. As you roll the meat pinch the ends to seal off the sausage. Once the meat is rolled grab the weave and carefully place the weave over the top of the rolled sausage. Tuck the weave under the sausage to its tightly packed. I then covered with a dusting of the Magic dust and we were good to go:

Step 5 - Smoke
I then placed it in the smoker, and smoked it for 4hours until the internal temp hit 170 Deg Farenheit. (75-80 Deg's Celsius). This can be done in a Weber (on indirect cooking or even an oven on a low temp +- 120 Degrees)

Step 6 - Finishing touches
After smoking it for 4 hours, I took the Mississippi BBQ sauce and basted it liberally over Boerewors Bacon Explosion and then placed it back in the smoker for another 20 minutes until the BBQ sauace had glazed nicely over the top. And this was the end result:

The Verdict

We then sliced the roll and placed it on white buns and smothered in a bit more BBQ Sauce... It was FANTASTIC. The mix of beef and pork with the high fat content meant the meat was terrificly juicy. Clearly not a weight watchers meal and high in fat. But heck, who cares. It was to die for. Definately be revisited again, potentially with cheese and jalapeno stuffing next time for an adult version!

Apple & Chipotle BBQ Sauce (Award Winning)

2010-06-06T10:17:00.000-07:00

BBQ Suitability: Use for everything

At the recent BBQ Society - Mayhem in May BBQ Fanatics performed well in the Sauces section. There were a few requests for the recipe, so here is it is. It does take some time, but I have found that if you are prepared to bottle it, it will last 3-6months in the fridge.

Ingredients:

2-3 Apples, cored, peeled and chopped finely

2 large onions, chopped finely

1x Cup Cider Vinegar + 2 teaspoons of cornstarch

1.5 Cups Apple juice

1x large tin (or 2x small tins) Tomato Puree

2tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

1xCup brown sugar

1/2Cup Honey

2xHeaped Teaspoons Garlic

1xTeaspoon Ginger

2-3 Dried n Smoked Chipotle Chillis (deseeded) - Soften in 1/2 Cup salted water for 20mins (But this can be replaced with 2x teaspoons lazy chilli's)

Preparation:

1.) Take 1/2 the onions and fry in a little oil till translucent. Add the chilli, garlic and ginger and fry for an additional 5 minutes. Take the entire mixture and put it in the blender with a little water(using the water user to re-hydrate the chipotle's). You are looking for a paste consistency.

2.) Take the rest of the ingredients (excluding the vinegar) and put into a pot, bring the entire mixture up to the boil and, then let it simmer for 20 mins.

3.) Take the vinegar mixed with cornstarch and 2-3 tablespoons of the chilli mixture (add more if you want a more fiery option) and add to the pot. Stir frequently and allow to cook for a further 20 mins. Add salt/pepper to taste

4.) Bring off the heat and put the sauce into the blender. Blend the results till nice and smooth.

5.) DONE!!!! Allow to cool and put in sterilised jars

British BBQ Society Southern England Championships

2010-05-31T01:49:00.000-07:00

BBQ Time: Late May
BBQ Weather: Rain.... and then Sun

Good news, in our first competition we placed in 2 of the 6 categories. We came in 2nd in BBQ sauces and 2nd in Chicken. Rob from up North pipped us on the sauces (he knows his chilli) and a bunch of crazy South Africans (Kalahari daredevils I think?) threw us off our game @ 2am with the cheapest tequila on the face of the planet to beat us in chicken. We had a great time and all credit needs to go to Toby and the team from the British BBQ Society for the amazing organisational effort. As a team we learnt alot from the other competitors and met some interesting characters to boot.

Beef Ribs

2010-05-19T14:28:00.001-07:00

BBQ Date: Mid May
BBQ Weather: Bright but fresh
I stopped by the Ginger Pig in Borough Market the other day to pick up a couple of racks of baby back ribs – practice for the upcoming “Mayhem in May” competition being held by the British BBQ Society. They didn’t have baby backs, only some mean looking shiners (ribs with the lots of bone shining through the meat), so I left disappointed. But my subconscious had recognised something more interesting, which I couldn’t pass up. I went back to the shop and bought this pair of racks of beef ribs.

The Ginger Pig is one of the best producers of meat in the UK and their beef is fantastic. The standing rib roasts are glorious and cost serious money. These bad boys were cut from the same, aged beef and despite their enormous, flintstone-like mass cost a mere £3.50 each. They smelt absolutely beautiful – sweet, fatty, ruby red meat and great big chunky bones.

I oiled them up and dusted them down with a spicy rub based on Mike Mills’ magic dust;

0.5 cups paprika
0.25 cups salt
0.25 cups sugar
2 tbs mustard powder
0.25 cups cumin
2 tbs black pepper ground
4 tbs cayenne pepper
0.25 cups garlic powder

This is them next to a set of wings that were along for the ride;

These went onto the smoker at about 2pm – I set it with just oak wood this time to compliment the beef and set the smoker at 250F and left it until 5pm. At this point the ribs looked great but still felt like they needed longer (to be expected with meat this primitive looking!)

The wings came off and the ribs stayed on. The ribs smelled incredible. About 7:30 I lifted the lid and basted the ribs with Famous Dave’s BBQ Sauce.

By 8 the ribs felt and smelt ready so I pulled them off and left them to sit in foil for 30min, before removing and slicing.

Verdict: Sublime – easily the best thing I’ve eaten this year. Sweet, smokey, juicy meat with a texture (near the spine end) like a slow cooked casserole (but probably softer), running to firmer and finally caramelised/burnt meat at the rib end. A surprise find and a total triumph.

BBQ Pit

2010-05-01T03:55:00.001-07:00

P1010007n_u_o_tonemappedr
Originally uploaded by fishmonger45

Would it be so bad to sell up and just operate this all day?

Overnight Pulled Pork Smoke

2010-04-21T14:22:00.001-07:00

BBQ Date: Mid April
BBQ Weather: Clear night and bright, hot day
In preparation for the upcoming BBQ competition I thought I’d go for an overnight shoulder smoke to be ready for lunchtime, just like we’ll be doing for the first time at the end of May in Tongham. Not a massive difference to the normal pulled pork recipe wise (well, none) but there are a number of important psychological differences;

You have too much, rather than too little time to get things ready. It still takes 13 hours, its just that you get to sleep for most of them.
You don’t have to cut the rind off a lump of pork, apply mustard slather, and dust with garlicky paprika before breakfast, but just before dinner. This makes a massive difference to the care and attention one pays.
You don’t have to light a fire in your pyjamas, but you do have to tend\save a fire in your pyjamas
You have time to allow the rub to form a bark before putting it in the smoker
You can allow time for the smoker to reach equilibrium before cooking (I didn’t do this this time, will do next time)
You can let it rest for 2 hours before pulling the pork
You can pull the pork sober
You can eat at lunch, rather than at 11:30pm

Massive downside;

You don’t get to stand round a smoker in the baking sunshine drinking beer and talking about smokers and meat. I’m sure at the competition we’ll be sitting round the smokers shivering and drinking beer, in the dark, but its not the same.

Here’s my shoulder of pork, not a whole shoulder but most of one

The rind and all surface fat is removed. European roasting law dictates that the skin is key and the surface fat is important in basting the meat, but the whole point of using pork shoulder is that its well marbled and doesn’t need this top layer when slow smoked. The outer skin must be exposed so that through the rub it forms the smokey, tough bark of the pulled pork which is required to contrast with the gelatinous, tender, stringy inner meat. If the fat is still on the outside, it prevents this happening and that’s more than half of the point of the dish, so it all comes off.

Next is the mustard slather – I just use an american “baseball/hotdog” mustard (can’t remember the name). I’ve seen recipes for a slather (there are loads in Paul Kirk’s book “Paul Kirk's Championship Barbecue: BBQ Your Way to Greatness with 575 Lip-Smackin' Recipes from the Baron of Barbecue”) but frankly, I can’t taste the difference in the end so I’ve stuck with just the mustard.
Then its dusted with BBQ rub. Here I am specific, and I’m sold on Mike Mills’ Magic Dust recipe (this is also in his fantastic book Peace Love and Barbeque).

I beefed up the cayenne pepper this time which was great but maybe a bit too hot in the end. I’ve also had very good results with Josh Bousel’s version here.

After a few hours “setting”on the mustard the rub sort of dissolves and forms a crust, which is a good state to go into the smoker in and forms a good basis for the crust at the end.

Next I fired the smoker – I’ve been running a WSM for a few years now and I’m very happy with it. Its the older model and I’ve no desire to upgrade to the newer version, its a great bit of kit. Like everyone else I was on an ECB and it rusted away on me, but we’ve all got to start somewhere! I still use the waterpan from the ECB in place of the bizarrely small and thin pan they provide with the WSM though.

I’ve got a log of cherry tree and a couple of chunks of oak in here which my father in law kindly donated. The cherry is particularly sweet smelling and both together give a great combination for long pork cooking.
This was then topped with a load of lumpwood charcoal and a couple more small branches of cherry ready for lighting with the minion method.

This was then covered in the left over lit lumpwood from the BBQ we had for dinner (just some sausages, vege kebabs, etc).

Then the WSM was assembled, the meat put in and more or less straight after I retired for the evening. I went to bed with the meat cold and the smoker showing about 160F, left the vents open slightly more than I usually would (expecting the smoker to need more oxygen to counteract the cold night) and set my smoker thermometer to alarm if the meat temperature hit 200F or the smoker went outside of 150-300F (that alarm never went off).
At 4:45am my son woke me up and I took the opportunity to check the temps – the smoker was up to 270F (I like to keep it at 250F) and the meat was at 173F. I closed the vents down to where I normally like them and went back to bed.
At 7:30am I got up properly and checked on the meat. The smoker was running out of fuel and the temperature had dropped to 210F or so, the meat was still at 173F (plateaued) and looked good.

I bunged in a load more fuel, topped up with water and went back into the house for some coffee and 4 or so episodes of Phineas and Ferb (massively underrated Disney cartoon) with young George while the weber continued to do its thing (its damn cold at 7:30am in the UK in April no matter how sunny it is).

By 9am the smoker was up to 250F and the temperature of the meat was rising and by 11am (as ever, 13 hours after insertion) the meat was at the desired temperature (190F).

I wrapped it in foil and let it sit for an extravagant 2 hours.
On opening the pork wasn’t appreciably cooler but smelt and looked amazing.

Verdict: Perfectly cooked. Rub a bit too spicy. Very pleased. Same again next weekend?

Sunny Saturday & Grillpro's Vertical Smoker

2010-04-19T01:25:00.000-07:00

BBQ Date: Mid April

BBQ Weather: OMG - Summer arrived without warning !

With the recent improvements in the weather, and the added bonus of the Icelandic Volcano "Crisis" clearing the Surrey skies of air traffic, I thought it was high time I dusted off my crumbling Brinkmanns & officially welcomed in the smoking season. Whilst jabbing at some home made burgers on friday night, I thought I'd get my ECB's serviced ready for the morning. Initial inspections were not good - rust holes in the water pan, thick layer of congealed crud on the grills, and what appeared to be volcanic rocks welded into the fire pans. But I'm a pragmatic sort of bloke & thought I'd be able to get a few more runs out of them before I gave them the Viking funeral they so richly deserved. Located a new supplier of smoking wood & fell asleep dreaming of smokey meats...

Awoke in a splendid mood saturday morning, to the sounds of a gently burbling baby daughter, and made my way to Cobham to speak with the chaps at The Barbecue Shop (http://www.thebbqshop.co.uk/) and collect my smoking wood. Arrived shortly before they opened shop, and had my face pressed up against the window, drooling, when they unlocked the doors. I was greeted by a lovely chap, who reminded me of everyone's favourite grandad, Stan Lee. Whilst "Stan" set up the magnificent display of Weber kettles, and a huge variety of impressive gas BBQs outside the shop, I wandered round & gazed enviously at the array of kit on display. Saw a 57cm Weber Smokey Mountain for the first time, and was somewhat awestruck at just how monstrous it is - honestly, photos do not do it any justice, it is properly enormous. And they had an equally envy-inspiring selection of heavy duty offset smokers in the store, which made my wallet start to twitch. Once I'd selected a couple of bags of wood, I found myself drawn towards a smallish smoker set up in the corner, merely to "enquire" about it, initially. After a few minutes of drooling, I made the decision to say "what the heck" and promptly added it to my shopping list. The kit in question was Grillpro's entry level Vertical Smoker, priced at a very competetive £129. It looked very similar to my colleagues ProQ Excel, at least in design, which was a good enough endorsement for me. Returned home, full of excitement, and set about constructing my new toy. Assembley took roughly an hour, the instructions were clear and it all fitted together very nicely.

I suspect, though have yet to confirm, that the construction and materials are inferior to the ProQ, and that there are a few other minor differences, but the multi-tier configuration, air vent, and access door layout were very similar. Unlike my old Brikmanns, the smoking chambers are powder coated steel on BOTH inside and out, which should increase the lifespan and reduce the chances of rust appearing. Addditionally, the smoker's integrated thermometer is very helpfully calibrated in Farenheit & Centigrade, which is a vast improvement on the old ECBs (Cold/Cook/Hot) scale. In summary, it is clearly a much more sophisticated design than the entry-level Brinkmanns, but is perhaps not as ruggedly built as the offering from ProQ.

Sadly, I had completely neglected to prepare any meats for the initial run, so I nipped over to Waitrose, and picked up a few bits - some simple ribs, pork sausages, and a pack of 20 wings. The ribs were covered in a simple Kansas BBQ rub I found here http://bbq.about.com/od/rubrecipes/r/bl91211a.htm and popped in the fridge for a couple of hours, and I decided I'd do the wings & sausages raw to see how much smoke flavour would be imparted over a relatively short smoke. On reflection, I should have done half flavoured, half raw, for a more realistic comparison, but that will have to wait for the next run.

I used the highly dependable minion method (http://www.virtualweberbullet.com/fireup2.html) to get the smoker kicked off, and used a few chunks of mesquite to provide some smoke. The fire basket is a decent size, if not huge, but was clearly capable of taking a full 10Kg bag of briquettes. I kept a keen eye on the temperature guage, and with all the vents open, the temp climbed pretty rapidly to around 270F, and seemed to stay between there and 250F for the rest of the smoking. Was very relieved that the temperatures were at the appropriate levels, as I've heard plenty of nightmares about not being able to get the best smoking temp from a smoker.

The meats were loaded in, and the time recorded at around 3:30pm. I opened the obligatory beer, and set about doing a bit of determined shed organising, whilst the Grillpro chugged away. At the 2 hour mark, I noticed the temperature start to climb, and checked the water pan, which was emptying rapidly. A refill brought the temperature back to around 260F, and a few more chunks were added to the fire. It was SUCH a pleasure to have such easy access to the fire pit and water tray after all those years of labouring with the Brinkmann's barely accessible trays.

By 6pm the meats had taken a wonderful colour, so the sausages and wings were removed & set aside in a warm place. The ribs were given another half an hour, to ensure they were fully cooked. The meats were served with a simple pasta salad, some of my mother in law's glorious potato salad (potatoes, mayo, chunks of blue cheese, bacon and spring onions), and some, inevitably untouched, salad leaves. My wife, who has in previous years been steadfastly unimpressed with my efforts on the smoker, recanted her opinion, and even commented on how much she liked the ribs - a real breakthrough!

A fantastic opener to the season, a real celebration of the sunshine, and holds great promise for my next planned smoking - an overnight Pork Shoulder smoke.

Pulled pork

2010-04-18T00:11:00.001-07:00

Its the time in April where we get a bit of decent weather, decide its summer and start making pulled pork! More on that later, but for now here’s a decent description;

http://playingwithfireandsmoke.blogspot.com/2002/02/pork-pork-shoulder-butt-picnic.html

Team 'BBQ Fanatic' is Competing!

2010-03-09T05:35:00.001-08:00

Team 'BBQ Fanatic' has entered the BBQ Society 'Southern Championships' from 29-30th May 2010 @ Minley Nursery, Spoil Lane, Tongham, Surrey, GU10 1BP.

The ProQ and a Pork Shoulder

2010-03-08T13:05:00.000-08:00

BBQ Date: Early March
BBQ Weather Suitability: Sunny but very chilly day

A new year and a new approach, time to toss the Brinkman (AKA El Cheapo Brinkman smoker) that was modded and rusted to bits. Its always a tough choice, but basically it boiled down to charcoal, electric or gas. Based on previous experiences, I wasnt overly keen on electric, and gas is, well cheating. As a result, it had to be charcoal. The choice of smokers is vast (from the $70 Brinkman to the $2000 offset smoker). However, by sheer chance I stumbled across the ProQ Excel 20. Based on a hail Mary and a great price from Ebay (speak to Tony from British BBQ Society). It arrived 2 days later and what can I say... Its HEAVY HEAVY HEAVY ... A really good sign!

After getting home, I immediately unpacked the new baby and discovered it was some seriously heavy guage steel and extremely high build quality. Assembly was relatively trivial, attached the the re-inforced legs to the base unit (x3), attach each of the extension units which are held in place by a pair of metal clips. The extension rings fit quite snugly into each other, creating a solid (and more importantly smoke tight) seal. Each of the extension rings comes complete with a little silver metal door, whilst not completely airtight, is still good enough for smoking. As can be seen from the picture below, the lid has a thermometer fitted to the lid.

I fired up the smoker, using the minion method. The heat quickly climbed to 200F, and then rapidly dropped to 150F. It was only after about 2 hours, I realised that the wind was probably the cause of the low temp's. I removed the 2nd extension unit, making the unit smaller. The temps rapidly shot up to 300F, I shut the airflow down and the temps came down to 250F and stayed there for the next 7 hours. I then stoked up the coals at 9hrs, and went to the bar for a few beers, I cam back on the 12 hr mark to find the temps stuck @ 250F. What can I say, a fantastic smoker. As a result my first pork shoulder was a complete success

Pro's - Cutdown prices! ~~because ProQ has gone bankrupt~~ (Correction: ProQ USA went bankrupt, official dealers/suppliers in UK still exist as can be seen below). Either way, you can save £100 by hunting online, this will however mean you have issues with warranty later on. Overall excellent build quality and a great product.

Con's - Extension ring doors arent to the same quality as the rest of the unit. The water unit showed a few spots of rust after the first smoking, even though the water was removed immediately after smoking and cleaned.

Verdict - BUY NOW!

Baby backs

2010-03-07T10:51:00.001-08:00

IMG_0147
Originally uploaded by Copsey

I'm not sure its possible to become more eager for summer to arrive...

Open Pit Bar B Que

2010-02-12T15:51:00.001-08:00

Open Pit Bar B Que
Originally uploaded by Jeff Ctree

Jesus the BBQ photos on flickr!

The Red Lead

2010-02-11T07:43:00.000-08:00

BBQ Date: February snow and paternity leave
BBQ Weather Suitability: Not going outside today... or tomorrow

Following in the tradition of me posting non-BBQ recipes in the freezing winter months, this one's another tomato based dish, this time adapted from the Baked Ziti recipe (with Sunday Gravy) from the Sopranos Family Cookbook (now sadly out of print and going for serious money on ebay). Tony Soprano called his mother's Sunday Gravy "the red lead" in some episode or other, and here's my version.

There are two parts to this - the sunday gravy (a tomato sauce) and meatballs then made into a pasta bake. It is architectural meat cookery and takes 2 days worth of gentle afternoon/evening cookery or one whole afternoon and evening. If doing in a leisurely fashion, make the gravy on the first day and finish the second.
This serves 4-6.

Sunday Gravy

Some beef and pork bones. I used some large pork bones and some beef rib bones
Two Toulouse sausages (or other garlicky sausage - presumably some fennel Italian sausage would be best but I'd rather put that to use in the sausage sauce)
4 cloves of garlic, or more. Peeled and cut in half.
5x400g tins premium peeled plum tomatoes. Some tomato paste (half a cup apparently - optional)

You are basically making a meat stock using tomatoes instead of water. Oh yes.

First brown the bones over a medium low heat in some olive oil. A good 10-15 mins of browning turning frequently is required to get the most out of the bones. Remove and reserve the bones. Then brown the sausages, removing and reserving once browned all over.

You need to liquidise the tomatoes. Put a tin and a half or however many fit in your liquidiser in and swill out the tins with a little water and add that to the liquidiser and blitz.

Now add the garlic to the oil and fat in the pan and cook gently for a few minutes. If you were using tomato paste add that now and fry a bit to colour the fat. Place the bones and the sausage back in the pan.

Put in the liquidised tomatoes and turn the heat up. Liquidise the rest of the tomatoes with a little water each time to swill out the juices in the tins, and add to the pan. When the red, foaming cauldron approaches a boil, put it on a very low heat and blop away for at least 2 hours - I did about 5.

Remove the bones and sausage. Keep the sausage in the fridge for tomorrow, sling the bones. Pass the mixture through a sieve, pushing it through with a spoon or something, discarding any bits of gristle, chipped bone, etc that remains in the sieve. Stick the resulting red lead in the fridge overnight.

The next day....

Baked Ziti

500g pasta such as rigatoni (or ziti, even!)
Red Lead (sunday gravy, above)
small pot ricotta cheese
Bufallo mozzarella (optional)
parmesan
Tiny meatballs... below

First, eat those sausages in a sandwich for lunch - two slices of bread, butter, thick slather of dijon mustard.

Next make some tiny meatballs:

500g beef mince, or a combination of beef and pork
1/2 cup plain dried breadcrumbs
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon very finely minced garlic
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan
2 tablespoons chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

Mix all the ingredients together very well with some salt and pepper. Form into meatballs about the size of a grape.

Fry in a hot non-stick pan until well browned all over.

Meanwhile, reheat the red lead. When the meatballs are ready, add them to the red lead and blop on the lowest heat for 30 minutes.

Cold sauce from yesterday - Note this is half the quantity in the recipe

Also it set overnight - 5 hours simmering with bones = jelly

Frying the meatballs

Cook the pasta and drain it, then return to the (now empty) pan you cooked the pasta in. Fish all the meatballs out of the sauce and add to the pasta along with a cup or so of the sauce, and mix well. Stir in half a cup of freshly grated parmesan and mix well.

Final assembly and cooking

Heat the oven to 180C. Add half the pasta and meatballs to the dish you want to bake the pasta in. Top with the ricotta broken up into chunks and the mozzarella chopped up into chunks (if using). Grate over a load more parmesan. Pour on half the remaining sauce.

Put on the other half of the pasta and meatballs, top with the rest of the sauce and more parmesan. Cover with foil and place in the oven.

Bake for 20 minutes, remove the foil and bake for another 15. Serve with plenty of red wine.

Verdict: Heartstopping

Schmitty's Sausage Racks

2010-02-08T03:17:00.001-08:00

Schmitty's Sausage Racks
Originally uploaded by Berry Weiss

Just idly surfing for pics on flickr and found these pictures of Kruez market - one day I hope to make the pilgrimage...

Brown Sugar Ribs

2010-01-03T02:15:00.000-08:00

BBQ Date: First BBQ of the year

BBQ Weather Suitability: Subzero temps, but who cares

The problem with cooking ribs on an open bbq is that it takes a real low heat and lots of attention to make sure they dont burn and dry out. This is a classic recipe I have used before to maximise the flavour and minimise the effort. The ingredients are pretty simple, pork ribs, apple juice, brown sugar, dry rub and bbq sauce of choice.

The preparation is easy, rub down the ribs with your dry rub of choice and leave for 2-3 hours.

Once the rub has been soaked up by the meat, make sure they are place on a tray within you cooking tray. Fill the bottom of the tray with about 1-2cm of apple juice, this will make sure that while the ribs cook there is a good amount of moisture. Then cover the ribs liberally with brown sugar. Its ok to stack the ribs on top of each other.

Place tin foil over the top, throw them on the weber, I normally only place coals on the one side of the grill and the tray on the opposite side. Close the lid and leave for 2 hours. If you have a temperature guage, you are looking for 180 degrees Celsius. After about an hour, pull the tin foil off for the last hour. After +- 2 hours, pull the ribs off and give them a minute or 2 directly over the coals to get the sugar to caramelise.

I then cut them up and baste with my favourite rib sauce (currently Famouse Dave's sweet and Zesty, not available in the UK unfortunately, except for the odd occasion on ebay. This is the result

Verdict: Easy to cook and is oh so moresome

BBQ Pit Boys

2009-12-20T10:00:00.000-08:00

This bloke on YouTube scares the hell out of me. The mean, southern drawl and the fact that you can never properly see his face. The large, rusty bullnose butchers knife. Their theme tune "I'm going down to the house of sausage" does little to reassure. However I am definitely drawn to their food.
Here he is slow smoking 4 packs of streaky bacon on a weber platinum;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DsqpNq9YLY

I notice they're not afraid to grill in the snow though...
http://www.youtube.com/user/BarbecueWeb#p/u/2/2EjOR6QK1ds

The Sausage Sauce

2009-12-20T02:30:00.000-08:00

BBQ Date: Just before xmas
BBQ Weather Suitability: Violent snow

Cuan might, but I will not BBQ in December in the snow. Actually I have BBQed in March in the snow and I've BBQed calçots in February which was cold but not snowing - but 14 hours in front of a smoker in the snow isn't going to happen.
So yesterday I knocked up a batch of "the" sausage sauce, from the river cafe cookbook. My mate Matt introduced me to this and I've been cooking it ever since. The only thing you need are the correct sausages, which must be the Italian type. If you look in your local Italian deli they should have them. There's usually a choice of chilli, fennel or plain, and all are good for this but the chilli ones are the best. Yesterday they only had the plain ones;

They come packed in a bit of liquid usually and if they're kept out they dry out a bit - these ones seemed a bit dry but that's all to the good for this sauce.

The recipe is quite simple. Crumble the sausage up and fry over a medium heat until the fat runs.

Then add 2 small red onions chopped, a shake of chilli flakes (if the sausages aren't the spicy ones), 4-5 cloves of garlic sliced fine and a bay leave.

Cook over a low heat for 30 minutes.

Then chuck in a third of a bottle of red wine and boil hard to reduce the wine down.

Once the wine has boiled down you should see the clear fat start to show between the remaining wine/sauce.

Then put in a couple of tins of tomatoes and cook slow for a couple of hours

2 hours later....

Finish with grated parmesan, fresh nutmeg, pepper and maybe some salt (probably doesn't need it with the sausages being seasoned and the parmesan). A couple of tablespoons of cream now is a worthy addition but not required. Stir into your chosen pasta.

Verdict: A classic.

Mike Scrutchfield's ribs

2009-12-13T12:46:00.000-08:00

I've no idea who Mike Scrutchfield is but I was recently sent this by virtue of being on David Klose's mailing list (who makes the kind of pits I dream about, and will one day possess). My in-laws recently cut down a cherry tree and have been feeding me logs so I will give this a whirl come summer. Looks great.

Naug says use rib racks 1^st 2 to 3 hours

Then stack ribs on top of each other to keep moist

This recipe and cooking procedure won the prestigeous title "Best Ribs in

the Universe" at the 1996 American Royal Invitational, and the 1993 American

Royal Open Bar-B-Que contest as the Overall Grand Champion. They also took

"Reserve Grand Champion" at the 1994 American Royal Open. All true and

verifiable!

Meat: IBP Brand Loin Baby Back Ribs, 1 3/4 - 2 lb. size. Membrane on the

inner (stomach) side removed. All excess fat trimmed.

Dry Rub: Mix all ingregients thououghly and store unused in moisture proof

container.

1 Cup Sugar

1 Cup Non-Iodized Table Salt

1/2 Cup Brown Sugar (dried out lightly by exposing on cookie sheet room temp. several hours, or in slightly warmed oven)

5 Tablespoons + 1 Teaspoons Chili Powder

2 Tablespoons + 2 Teaspoons Ground Cumin

4 Teaspoons MSG (Accent)

4 Teaspoons Cayenne Pepper

4 Teaspoons Black Pepper freshly ground (important)

4 Teaspoons Garlic Powder

4 Teaspoons Onion Powder

Sprinkle Meat 2 Hrs. before cooking with rub and allow meat to come to room

temperature. Do not overseason. A good overall dusting of the spices is

all that's needed. The spices will become a nice red, liquid coating after

sitting for about an hour, if you used the proper amount.

BASIC COOKING PROCEDURE: Smoke ribs in a BBQ Pit by Klose (the best!), or

Weber "Smoky Mountain Cooker" . Start Charcoal (12-15 lbs.) and 4 chunks of

White Oak and 2 chunks of Cherry wood (about the size of a tennis ball) a

least 1 hour before cooking meat. All fuel should be started in a chimney

style starter, no starter fluid, and all must be grey/white hot. Remove all

bark from wood chunks, do not soak. Very little smoke will be visible.

Don't worry about that! you'll get the flavor. Use straight water in the

water pan, (unless it's a Klose and I dont know if they have a water pan)

and keep full during the entire cooking process. Control oven temperature

of cooker by regulating the bottom vents only. or, if it's a Klose, it's

probably got a setting: "automatic blue ribbon", press that! Never, ever,

completely close the top vent!, Dave'll E-mail ya on that shit! If you

don't have one, put a thermometer on your cooker. Cook ribs for 3 hours

fairly cool at 225 degrees on rib racks. After 3 hours lift the lid for the

first time, flip the slabs end for end, and upside down, and open all the

vents on the smoker wide open. Temperature of the cooker should rise into

the 250 to 275 degree range. Peek every 1/2 hour to monitor doneness. Ribs

will be finished when fairly brown in color, and the meat has pulled down on

the long bones at least 3/4 of an inch. (usually another 1 to 2 hours)

Remove from cooker and sauce both sides before cutting individual ribs. I

like K.C. Masterpiece sweetened even more. (5 parts sauce, 1 part Honey),

and so do the Judges! This basic cooking procedure is probably the most

important of all, and works very well with other meats as well. Forget

about how much smoke is coming out of the cooker, if you've got the wood you

like in there burning up cleanly, the flavor will be in the meat. Smoke is

nothing more than a smoke screen, and any coming out of the top of the

cooker is flavor lost! Ribs to Ya! Enjoy.

Mike Scrutchfield

"Top Secret"

===========

The cheesecloth protected the meat from darkening, which made a tremendous

score in appearance. Smoke the meat for 2 hours, wrap in cheesecloth coated

with APPLE SAUCE.

Franks Hot Sauce: Sweet Heat For Wings

2009-11-30T09:52:00.000-08:00

BBQ Date: Late November 2009
BBQ Weather Suitability: Torrential rain & low temperatures

Cuan got one of his relatives to smuggle this new sauce from Franks through customs and gave me the recipe for the wings sans Weber. Its not BBQ but it tastes like BBQ, all good given the torrential rain and early nights.

I've never oven baked wings like this before. Usually I would marinate them in lemon juice, salt, pepper, garlic, olive oil and then roast them.

Instead, they were dry coated in a mixture of flour, salt, pepper, garlic granules and lightly floured in that lot, and left all afternoon. Then baked and then placed under a hot grill. Then sauced.

Here’s the wings getting floured.

I wanted chips, as usual, so here's some maris pipers cut thin-ish, and run under the tap for a while to rinse off some of the starch

An initial fry and they're on their way to meeting my chip bar

The wings sauce in a "bottom layer" to receive the wing sauce

The wings themselves had been roasted in an oven at 200C for 15 minutes here. The flour coating mixes with the chicken fat and makes a kind of crust which we'll BURN later to make it taste a bit like BBQ.

Chips need to go back in for fry 2 of 3. 200C for chips, marked "CHIPS" on my sugar thermometer

I always cook chips in an asparagus steamer.
After 25 minutes the wings come out and go under a very hot grill for 5 minutes to burn the skin and crust a bit. This makes up somewhat for the lack of charcoal and wood

The chips go in for their third fry at 200C and the wings go into the sauce, plus some more sauce, plus some more

I ate it all.

Verdict

The sauce is, as Cuan said, a BBQ sauce with the franks edge. In fact it reminds me a bit of the Jardine's spicy ketchup (with the Franks edge rather than the sour, pepper edge of Jardines). Its damn tasty and the run off from coating the wings I used in place of ketchup for the chips. I ate all the sauce that came out of the bottle today.

After finishing all the wings and all the sauce, it is a bit sweet and once my palette got used to the heat and pepper reminded me a bit of those sour, tamarindy Indian starters you sometimes get. Its a different beast to the normal franks + butter wings combo which is a lot hotter and franksier. This is a lot sweeter but still as addictive. I likes it.

Lemon Chicken & Garlicy Rosemary Roast Potatoes

2009-11-29T10:28:00.001-08:00

BBQ Date: Late November 2009

BBQ Weather Suitability: Rain & low temperatures

Lemon chicken is an easy recipe for the oven as well as the BBQ. But there is something that really makes it sing when you get that smoky bbq flavour cutting through the sweet zestiness of the lemon.

Preparation is quite easy, 2 lemons cut finely and the lemon slices then placed carefully under the skin. As you can see, I managed to split the skin in my eagerness... try and avoid this.

I then pre-roasted potatoes under the grill for 10 mins to give them some colour and to make sure they didnt turn into sludge whilst in the Weber. They were then tossed in garlic, rosemary, sea salt and olive oil.

Right... ready to rumble... This then went into the weber BBQ Grill using indirect heat. (about 20 coals on each side). The potatoes were dropped in the under the chicken, between the coals in the classic Weber fashion. The chicken fat drips down into the potatoes and they fry up beautifully. However, word of warning, cheap chickens tend to be injected with water to beef up the weight. As a result, it drips down into the potatoes and you end up with boiled tatties... not really pleasant... you have been warned! So, bung it in the weber, after about 60 mins you should have a beautiful crispy chicken. For an extra treat, throw some hickory chips onto the coals for that bbq/smoky flavour.

And the result, well speak for itself. I consider this a dead easy recipe, minimum preparation time and even the novice bbq'er can pull this off looking like a BBQ hero.

Our Bird Resting after a 60 minute sprint

A face that any mother could love

Supposedly carved, but it looks like someone let a bomb off inside my bird

Verdict: The potatoes were crispy and brimming with flavour. The chicken was delightfully crispy on the outside and the lemon flavour was subtle but pleasant. There were no leftovers... so yes.... MORE