BBQ Journal: boys & steaks

Wednesday, July 22 — Tonight we got some steaks. Decided to up the ante a little bit, but not over do it. I wanted to be able to just cook a good steak that highlighted the steak, not the rub.

As usual (this hasn't been mentioned before in the BBQ Journal) Caleb was at my side. He usually starts up the grill and has been upping his involvement in the cooking by helping brush on sauce, butter, etc. He helped oil the grill, but it got a little too hot for him. Even still, he wanted to put the steaks on himself. The BBQ has definitely been in Caleb's blood from, well, the beginning. This is definitely one of those things that seems inherent in him as a boy (also would be "to-wools").

We simply put fresh ground pepper and ground sea salt on the steaks before putting them on the grill. I tried to put the whole fancy crisscross pattern on the steaks by rotating them 45 degrees after 2 minutes. But, it didn't seem to really work. Maybe should have turned up the heat more to start or left them longer before the rotation.

As we waited for the steaks to grill we played with the tongs and drank some cold water. Not exactly a cold beer, but still a manly time.

The steaks looked great on the grill and the timing of 5 minutes a side for a 1 inch steak was right on (I just needed to control the flair ups a bit more). When I took the steaks off the grill we let them sit for a few minutes while we brushed on some olive oil and put on more pepper and sea salt.

Caleb immediately started getting the juices on his fingers to taste. He loved it. I have never seen him go after meat like he did tonight. He would have kept eating all night. He especially enjoyed dipping the pieces of steak in the juices on the serving plate. Great night!

BBQ Lesson 1: BBQ with your son often.
BBQ Lesson 2: Sea salt is the way to go.
BBQ Lesson 3: Enjoy the juices.

BBQ Journal: hamburgers & gas

Sunday, June 19 — Eric, my brother, and his family were in town for the weekend. There was talk of just throwing a pre-made lasagna in the oven after having had a few meals together, but I figured I could whip up some quality burgers for less.

Dad provided the meat. I added the spices (fresh garlic, chopped onion, parsley, cayenne, cumin, pepper, and salt). The key here was to add the spices slowly. You knead the spices in and cook some of the meat in a pan on the stove to check the flavor along the way. I had Eric check the final flavoring for taste. Then made patties and put them in the refrigerator for an hour.

I also wanted to try to make my own animal style sauce for the burger. So chopped some more onions and got the side burner on the grill setup to grill the onions, melt the cheese, and mix in the thousand island dressing.

Then came the grill. I melted butter to brush onto to the burgers and sprinkled some pepper and salt on one side before I put it on the burner. I had tiny burgers for the kids, big burgers for the grown ups, and onions on the side burner grilling in some oil. It was quite the setup. Timing the onions, the tiny burgers, and the bigger burgers was tough. Made even tougher when I ran out of gas right in the middle of cooking everything.

I was pretty ticked. I wanted somebody to solve my problem for me (basically a result of having a number of things change recently). After a bit of a fit, I ran to the local propane place and got some more gas. Finished the burgers and the animal style sauce.

The result was excellent. We had some quality burgers, even if it was a bit of a hassle with the gas.

BBQ Lesson 1: Know your gas.
BBQ Lesson 2: Butter is better.
BBQ Lesson 3: Animal style works at home.

BBQ Journal: rib cook off

With some extra time on my hands this summer, I have decided to enhance my barbeque and cooking skills. As part of this adventure Rebecca has been encouraging to keep a BBQ Journal about my cooking transformation. I have three entries to catch up on. So, if these are good, all the credit goes to my writing. If they are bad, then talk to Rebecca...

Sunday, June 12 — The First Annual Crossroads Rib Cook Off. The one church event I was looking forward to the most this summer was my last at CBC. Simply put, this was a pool party for the whole church with a pile of baby back ribs for everyone to eat.

The event was shaping up to be an epic battle between the Seasoned Veteran (Reynolds Stewart), the Rough Neck (Tim Martin), the Rookie (Jordan Jensen), and the Ryno (me). I was pretty excited about the whole thing, until it became my last Sunday at CBC. We had all planned to skip second service to prep our meat and get it on the grill. I was not going to be able to make it in time to prep and cook. It seemed like a lost cause.

Luckily Jordan proposed teaming up. The Paterson rub and sauce, with some Jensen flair. Jordan set us up with indirect grilling over mesquite charcoal and whiskey soaked hickory chips. The setup was sweet! We definitely nurtured the ribs with rub, smoke, sauce, and a lot of love. When done we had a great set of ribs. With a rich hickory aroma, a sweet outer taste, and final kick of hot from the inside, they were spectacular.

Unfortunately, the judges didn't agree. We came in third of three. Tim took first with a ton of brown sugar, Jack Daniel's, and some spices (he has a similar smoking setup). Reynolds kept his sauce more under wraps, but had a classic BBQ ribs flavor. Apparently the hot kick from our ribs was too much for the judges.

I proposed a more elaborate scoring method for next year (even though its likely I won't be there next year)... I guess you could say I was a poor loser.

BBQ Lesson 1: In competition, a whole bag of brown sugar with a whole bottle of Jack Daniel's wins every time.
BBQ Lesson 2: In competition, cook to enjoy & eat to win.
BBQ Lesson 3: In competition, sweet beats the heat. (courtesy of Andrew Jensen)