PSMO beach and all the steak I can eat

I finally got some grill time in last night, with some neighbors over for a little get together. Wife picked up a PSMO from the Amish market, and never having trimmed or served one, I went straight to Mike's instructions and Cook's Illustrated recipe. Dogs and burgers for the kids, and the moms did all the salads and sides. Just under $100 for the cut, which fed 8 hungry adults, and I still have leftovers.

You'll have to pardon the shots - I'm out of practice with the camera...

Pre-trimming.

 

Trimmed up and tied up. I wound up cutting off the butt, so instead of folding over the tip I just tied the butt and tip together for a relatively even thickness.

 

Seared for 2 minutes a side, then finished for 20 minutes off the coals. Incredibly easy...

 

... and tasty. Some thinner areas came out a bit more on the medium side than I wanted, but nothing was cooked beyond that.

It was good to get back to the grills, though they really need a thorough cleaning this weekend - my S620 is in front of the dryer exhaust vent, which was cleaned last week, blowing lint all over the grill, which got inside it even though it was covered. And while wife is finally learning to use it, she's been a little heavy on marinades, which have somehow dripped into the burner tubes and caused a lot of orange flames. Cleaning all that up will be tomorrow afternoon's task.

Not much else planned for the holiday weekend, besides taking some kids to a water park tomorrow and finally replacing our dishwasher. But I don't feel like I really grilled/BBQ'd enough this summer, so I may have to make up for it on Monday.

Joy.

Fireworks.

If only it were real...

 

The "volume" controls are for Yappin' and Naggin'.

Yes, if only indeed.

Ho hum.

Haven't done any grilling of note lately. Weekends have been a little too busy, sometimes filled with little more than spending time at the pool with my son, who is just learning how to really swim, sans floaties and all. And, it's just been too damn hot to want to spend much time outside... for me, at least.

However, while the grills go used only for some sausages or chicken pieces, my current project is finally upgrading to Hi-Def in our family room. DirecTV comes out next Tuesday to wire everything and replace our dish (don't tell our homeowner's association, since I never got the first one approved six years ago...), and I'm getting ready to finally buy a new TV, the first in roughly 13 years. Unfortunately, what goes with it will have to be a new addition to the entertainment center, or a new one in total if we can't find anything to match what we have, which currently can only fit our old 32" tube.

But I'll make this blog-relevant this way... Can't wait to watch Food Network in all it's hi-def glory!

 

Happy 4th everyone - I may grill a bit on Saturday, but Sunday & Monday will be spent in the Poconos at my uncle's cabin, keeping him from burning food, and drinking more than my fair share of beer and wine.

Father's Day 2008

So, spend the day grilling? Nope! Not today...

Wife called me at work on Wednesday afternoon, saying that there was a loud crash in the house:

My 36x36 bathroom mirror decided 10 years was enough. I'm not terribly handy, but i like to think I am. So a short trip to Home Depot got me a quick and easy replacement.

 

And earlier in the week, we had a really forceful windstorm that knocked one of our patio chairs into the table, knocking off a few of the granite tiles - two on the top and the two side corner pieces. Lowes may be cleaner, but I like the help at Depot better. Bob told me exactly what I'd need, and tomorrow hopefully I'll be able to touch up the epoxy and make it blend in again.

 

 

Well, at least today I get to watch the final of the US Open in relative peace while wife packs for a week in Miami, so I've got a few nights to myself, but I do have to work all weekend, as well as pick up wife and son from the airport Sunday afternoon. Not much time for grilling while they're gone unfortunately, but at least for Father's Day I've got two last 8-oz filets from Costco.

Now that's a knife!

Fortunately, after years of buying me stuff I don't need, or want really, my new more-than-moderate passion for cooking and grilling has given my dad good opportunities to buy me gifts. So for Father's Day this year, blessed with reverse gift-giving, I got an incredible Japanese chef's knife from my dad.

He got me a Ming Tsai ceramic knife by Kyocera a few year's back, which is great for slicing, but pretty fragile. They've come down in price considerably over the years, and my wife picked up one for maybe $50 about two years ago that she uses for almost everything. I sent mine in for sharpening a few months ago, and got back a different knife - I wasn't thrilled with getting a replacement, but it was sharpened nicely. Then, after two or three uses, the tip chipped off, which is somewhat common with ceramics.

Then, my dad watched a Discovery show on Japanese knife and sword makers, and what a craft and art that really is. So...

 

It's got a full tang, and is simply beautiful to look at, and even better to hold. Getting my Henckel and Global knives sharpened was well worth it, but I'm not sure I'll ever go back to them. This knife feels like it weighs a pound or two, so there's a lot of heft to it, and it just goes through onions like a laser (that's all I've tried with it so far). So this is what it feels like when you watch the cooking shows and see those chefs slice through food like it's made of jello!

It really is a piece of art:

Thanks Dad!

Weekend wrap-up

Did two beer-can chickens, an Allegro flank steak, and an Asian-style flank steak (compliments of Weber), grilled corn and Texas toast, and more of wife's baked beans and KFC-like coleslaw. Yummers.

And all that's left to show for it is this - burn off!

Empty bladder

Here's what the inside of the boxed wine looks like.

No pictures of what *I* looked like after finishing it though.

Memorial Day Weekend, 2008

I'll try to go into more details soon, but it's taken me this long just to get some pictures up. The weekend was spectacular - clear, not too hot, low humidity, cool at night, and with a cooler stocked with beer & wine. Best summer start ever...

The Moskowitz's.....

Jesse, waiting for an accident.

Asian babybacks, from a Jean-Georges Vongrichten recipe. Boiled for 2 hours, then grilled. Not great, not bad.

Finally got the Performer Rotisserie out of the box, for a cilantro-lime marinated bird.

One hour later. I *love* the rotisserie, didn't need the counterweight at all, and am impressed with its solid feel. The bird was quite good, but we were waiting for friends to come over and had to let it sit a bit too long. The meat was still tender, but the skin was no longer crisp. Also, it was a 6-hour marinade. I'd like to try some basics that I've seen on the BBQ board - olive oil, salt and pepper. If I can make it as good as Sam's Club, I'll be thrilled.

Mexican-style spare ribs, no sauce. Fairly good, but a choice made because I had the seasonings already on hand, and didn't want to have to go shopping.

 

This weekend, some flank steaks and beer can chicken. Another brisket has to be made soon by request, and I'm going to try a whole tenderloin roast this season, dangit.

Brisket, part 3

This is the third time I've done the brisket recipe from America's Test Kitchen, and for the third time, it was &$^%@! perfect.

A 2-hour brine before seasoning with simply salt, pepper and sugar.

A simple rub, right before hitting the grate.

Coals are ready at 350, though they did inch up to about 400- had me a bit worried, but it still turned out tender.

 

On the grill - the thicker side towards the coals for more even smoking, as per the recipe. Six 2" applewood chunks gave a nice smoky flavor. The process was 50 unlit coals banked under 65 lit ones, with 10 more added about 3 hours in. Easy and reliable - my favorite.

Seven hours later, cracklin' good heaven.

 

It's unfortunate that fat can taste this good.

Sliced, and served with some homemade, though recipe-taught, BBQ sauce.

Grilled corn was a hit, and wife made some excellent baked beans, with little more than Bush's in a can brought to a new level with bacon, mustard, and some other condiments thrown in - way better and easier that starting from scratch. The new coleslaw recipe that mimics KFC's was a hit as well.

And yet, child insists on a hot dog. Good use of my $1,400 grill!

 

Best of all, it stayed sunny, clear, and about 70 degrees today - hello spring!

All hail...

 

My dad bought some 140th-Anniversary bottles of Tabasco, made from the peppers the McIlhenny family use for their own consumption. The bottles are actually numbered, but the box isn't, so of the 2,500 that were released, I don't know what number this one is. And since my dad opened a bottle for us to try anyway, this one will remain sealed for a long time. Like an unopened original Star Wars action figure. Only tastier.

Grilling season begins...

Sure, I grill year round, but not to the level of what I do in the spring and summer, simply because of nicer weather and more time worth spending outside.

I had to work early Sunday morning, so there was no way to go out for a Mother's Day brunch as we usually do, so instead my awesome wife suggested I grill her some Kansas City ribs that we saw on America's Test Kitchen on PBS. I've usually preferred the cleaner taste of a dry rub and have the option to add BBQ sauce if I so desire, but this recipe for sweet, smoky, spicy and sticky sauce looked too good to pass up. I made the sauce on Saturday while grilling up about 8 flanks for a neighbor throwing a communion party, figuring if it sat for a day the flavors would meld even better. Didn't get any pics of the process, or of the baked beans I made as part of the recipe that sat in a pan under the ribs for two hours. Some grilled corn finished out the meal, and it was good. Sticky and good.

The recipe called for the ribs to be wrapped in foil for the last hour of smoking. Some time I'd like to try one rack wrapped and the other not, to see how much of a difference it really makes. I always trust America's Test Kitchen's recipes, because they try every different permutation, and if they say wrapping the ribs in foil makes them more moist, then I'd have to agree. These just fell apart, held together more by the crisp exterior of the meat than anything else.

Memorial Day weekend is coming up, and I really want to try out my new rotisserie for the Weber Performer. Mike does ribs using his S650 rotisserie, so mine would be over coals - not sure if that would matter, but I'm looking to inaugurate it with a good old chicken. If I can make it as good as the ones at Sam's Club, I'll be thrilled.

But first, next weekend is our long-delayed Eastover party, and I'm doing my brisket... again, recipe compliments of ATK. 04:00 wakeup call on Saturday!

They're boxy, but they're good...

It just so happened that I was reading an article last night about the new method of selling wine in boxes, and how it's becoming a lot more prevalent not just with low-end swill vineyards, but more popular and upscale ones as well. I was at a wine store this morning and happened to see one of the boxes mentioned in the article as a top buy in boxed wine. The advantages of boxed wine are many, including longer shelf life after opening, more convenient storage, and up to a 90% savings on packaging costs for the vineyards, passing on the savings to me. This box contains the equivalent of 4 bottles of wine, takes up not much more space, and cost only $20. The box is recyclable and the plastic bladder containing the wine comes from recycled plastic. I'm all for doing what I can, especially if it means less money out of my pocket for a glass of wine.

I haven't tasted it yet, but my palate is pretty forgiving.

Update - for the equivalent of $5 per bottle, the wine is quite good.

Finally!

And it only took about a year to receive. I feel like I just got the special decoder ring from the cereal box.

It begins...

Today turned out to be just nice enough for a quick grilled dinner. Wife and son are in Florida for the week, so I have the house to myself. Most meals are already planned out, but I couldn't pass up the chance to take advantage of a few hours without rain today, so I went shopping for a good old man's meal - steak and potatoes.

I bought what is probably my third cast iron skillet today, as I think the best seared steaks come from a skillet on the grill. I really want to get one to the point that it's so seasoned that nothing will stick to it, but I never have the discipline to take the full care that's needed - it always winds up left out in the grill getting all rusted. I've done a bit more research and now know that no pan is beyond repair, so I'm making sure this is the last one. It came pre-seasoned, but I seasoned it in the grill anyway. I may have done some damage to the pre-seasoning, but it will all work itself out in time.

Those scratch marks are just from some waxed paper I used to put in some shortening to season it. It also seemed to take off something, though I'm not sure what, which is why it looks like a half-moon sort of. Either way, it's on its way.

Here's my 8-oz filet freshly put on the grill, which was around 650^. The selection at the grocery store was pretty poor, hence the string to round it out. I rub some olive oil in on both sides, as well as kosher salt and pepper, and then let it sit in a container on the counter for about 30 minutes. I know people who say let the meat come to room temp, and others who say it doesn't matter. I had the time to prepare my salad anyway, so I did it. I'm sure it doesn't matter much on such a thin cut of maybe 1-1/4", but for a whole roast or a nice 2" filet from Lobel's, I'd certainly let it rest. Letting the salt and pepper soak in a bit anyway is a good thing, and helps form a nice crust.

After 4 minutes, you can see how the edge is no longer raw.

I finished the steak on the grates for another 5 minutes over medium heat. I made the potato in our new Advantium microwave oven, which took all of 18 minutes. Came out like one of the potatoes you can find in stores that come in plastic for microwaving; these take only 8 minutes, and I'd stick with these in the future for quick baked's. But for a real meal, I prefer to do a real baking for the 45-60 minutes or so for a real crisp skin. Nevertheless, drench anything in butter, salt and pepper and I'll eat it.

And to think some people are vegetarians.

Finally, one of my favorite salads - spinach leaves, crumbled Roquefort cheese, chopped walnuts and balsamic vinaigrette. Sometimes I'll add granny smith apples too. It's painfully easy with all the good pre-packaged product available today. I like to let it sit for about 20 minutes to let the dressing soak into everything. Usually, I like to use only half the amount of dressing that most people do, as I prefer to actually taste the lettuce and veggies in a salad. But this one is very rich with the cheese in it, and needs a good dressing (and wine) to cut through everything on the palate. Being alone for a few more days, there's plenty ingredients left over for another serving!

 

I'm getting excited over the prospect of warm weather and more grilling time. Just to take an afternoon in the crisp spring air, and give the grill a nice cleaning, actually sounds like fun. It hasn't had much use over the winter and while I was seasoning the skillet today, the flames actually went out - fortunately I was checking on it every few minutes, so there wasn't a build-up of gas. Still, not a good thing, though I partially blame it on the windy day. For dinner though, everything worked fine. I've already got a recipe ready for the first big BBQ weekend - St. Louis ribs and baked beans, on the charcoal kettle, of course.

Walk the flank...

Flank steak with wife's churrasco. We're into portion control as our New Year's resolution, trying to shed a few pounds gained by the recipes of previous entries.

Medium rare-ish, of course. I love flank for it's ability to take marinades so well and lend itself to any tasty concoction.

Today was the kind of day I love living in the northeast for - mid 40's, sunny, crisp and clear. Perfect grilling weather, especially when the steak is on for all of 7 minutes. I did a grill burn-off just to prepare for coming months of more grill time. Doesn't matter what Punxsutawney Phil says...

For heaven's sake

Made a pilgrimage up to Edgewater, NJ, to visit Mitsuwa Marketplace yesterday, after a sake recommendation from our server at Sakagura restaurant in NYC that wife took me to for my birthday last month. The place had over 200 bottles of sake, and I was in heaven. It was actually more a japanese tapas bar than a sushi place. They only serve sushi for lunches, but the dinners consist of ordering a bunch of little dishes. It was fantastic, and our waitress was a certified sake sommelier and paired each dish with some great sake. She recommended the market, which is almost 2 hours from home, hence the big purchase.

The bottles on the top left are Himezen sake, which was dry and sweet, almost like a dessert wine. The genie-like bottles I had at the Sapporo restaurant in New Brunswick, NJ, were good and only $7 each for 300ml. The twisty bottle looked too cool to pass up, and the other two just sounded good.

Mitsuwa was horrendously packed, impossible to park, but had a sake isle as long as a grocery store's dairy isle. I almost cried. Might have been the pre-New Year's rush, but I didn't want to have to go back any time soon, so I bought what I knew I'd like plus a few other things to try. I'd like to go back in the off hours sometime though, because they had a noodle bar inside with a line that went outside, so it must be good. And, almost everyone shopping inside was Japanese, or at least with someone who was; can't go wrong with that kind of customer base.

To find a place that specializes in sake, even two hours away, makes life that much better. Kampai!

Success!

The turkey fry sans rub came out beautifully. The brown sugar in the brine added plenty of flavor to the skin, and the color was gorgeous. Usually the rub would make the bird come out pretty dark, looking burnt, although it never actually was.

After a 30 minute rest, it was still really hot. The mark of a good fry is that the thighs just twist right off the bird.

 

Meaty glory. Unfortunately the carcass did us no good, because we're leaving for Miami on Wednesday and there's still soup leftover from a roast chicken we did earlier this week. I think someone actually took it home for their own use. Just as well.

 

Unfortunately though, there was quite a bit of splatter from the oil on my patio - I'm hoping that it won't stain, but I know bluestone is quite porous. As it is, I can't see how bad it is, nor have I cleaned up the fryer, because everything is coated in half an inch of ice and slush. Although, we have a 3-pound chicken frozen since summer, as well as leftover brine and oil... There just might be one more fry to be done before vacation.

Wanna take a bath?

It's turkey-fry time! I'm trying out a recipe from Alton Brown where the brine is made from kosher salt and brown sugar, plus some ice to keep it cool. No rub or seasoning is put on the bird afterwards, which is a first for me. But honestly, most times I've fried a turkey, it's hard to tell if any of the rub even stays on, or if it boils right off.

Either way, his recipe calls for starting the fry temp low and increasing it once the bird goes in. I'm going to stick with the 3-minutes-per-pound-plus-5 rule instead. Since the weather is going to be barely above freezing tomorrow, I'm going to try air-drying it for an hour or so before the putting it in the oil as I heard that helps the skin dry out for a good crisp when roasting, and I'm going to separate the skin from one breast side, to see how that affects the crisping as well. Have to experiment...

Once nice thing about it hitting only 20* tonight is that our porch steps make a perfect temporary fridge and freezer.

We're expecting 15-16 people tomorrow for our holiday party, also called Chrismukkah. Yes, we're religious mutts in this house.

Off to start cleaning the house. After almost two straight weeks of Chinese food, it's nice to get my fry on.

Come, waste more time on the internets...

I decided to start another blog to capture dining experiences outside of my patio - check it out here. I'm in China now until December 9th, and hope to get some posts in if the web here will allow me. Lots of pictures to show, but they may not get posted until I get back home. Chinese food is a totally different experience when you're actually in China.