What’s Cooking – Page 3 – Think, dude, think!

Let me explain a few things first. For almost my entire life I have been what I’ll term a “Thanksgiving Pedestrian”. What I mean is I’ve rarely had to make anything for Thanksgiving. Even when I was married because we didn’t have kids we were the transient couple going to wherever Thanksgiving was being held and – more importantly – prepared. Sure, we’d bring pies, but my ex worked as a pastry chef for a time, so like I was going to be contributing to that?

One year in grad school we hosted a few friends for a Thanksgiving of roasted chicken, Stove Top, carrots, and (of course) pies. Oh, and one of the other grad student’s truly terrible homemade mead *shudder*.

On my own, I’ve been invited to Thanksgivings with my family, and with my friends, but I haven’t had an opportunity to prepare more than a sourdough-bowl spinach dip (though I make a mean spinach dip, let me tell you!).

This year, however, Fern and I are making Thanksgiving with her mom and aunt, and it’s on like Turkey Kong (tis the season, after all…). Fern’s mom was more than happy to divvy up the cooking responsibilities, and this year I’m more than happy to take on some projects.

This, dear reader, is what I’m bringing:

(Mostly) Nana’s Green Bean Casserole
Vampire-Unfriendly Mashed Potatoes
My First™ Thanksgiving Macaroni and Cheese
Turkey! Turkey! Turkey!
The Greatest Pumpkin Pie Ever

You’d better bet there will be full blog posts and recipes for all these, but I’ll give you a quick rundown ahead of time.

(Mostly) Nana’s Green Bean Casserole: I know this can be polarizing, but for me and my family it’s tradition. I’m hopping it up a little, but not straying far from the French’s fried onion-topped classic.

Vampire-Unfriendly Mashed Potatoes: Keeping this one simple with Yukon golds and garlic. Simple. And they’ll undoubtedly be delicious. Oh! And I celebrated festivities by getting myself a new potato masher! Hey, this is a big deal!

My First™ Thanksgiving Macaroni and Cheese: I’ve never had Macaroni and Cheese at Thanksgiving, but Fern and her family have always had it in the same way my family has always had Nana’s Green Bean Casserole. So, is it wise to give a traditional family holiday staple to the New Guy? We’ll see. The recipe I’ve put together looks like a winner (full disclosure: I haven’t tested it yet! Eek!), so here we go – sink or swim… in amazing macaroni and cheese!

Turkey! Turkey! Turkey! While we’re going to cook the bird at Fern’s, I’m responsible for the prep, and for that I’m counting on my brother Jay’s tried-and-true maple bourbon brine to do the heavy lifting and a traditional homemade spice rub to take it the rest of the way. The rub, I’ll admit, is untested, but I’ll give a preview of the spices used: equal parts Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade, Dallas Cowboys football, and tryptophan-induced naps (stay tuned for the real thing).

Finally, The Greatest Pumpkin Pie Ever: Okay, I’m going to level with you on this one: I have no idea whether this is the greatest pumpkin pie ever, but Fern insists that sweet potato pie (which she is making) is superior to pumpkin pie, and that kind of thing just can’t stand. So, I’ve put together what on paper sure looks to be a winner – a generously-spiced filling with a gingersnap crust and a dollop of homemade bourbon whipped cream. Again, greatest ever? We’ll see. But I’m confident it’ll take down even the finest sweet potato pie. Let’s get ready to rumble! *ding ding*

Like I said, stay tuned – posts, pictures, and recipes to follow. And I wish all of you a safe and fantastic Thanksgiving!

OMG, Smoked Brisket

There’s been plenty of times when Bookface puts up “Your Memories on Facebook” and I groan. But a couple weeks ago Bookface reminded me of this tasty, tasty dinner from last year. A little backstory: A was having a no good, very bad week, and I figured what better way to cheer someone up than a big hunk of meat?

Dinner was on Saturday, but let’s go back to Thursday of that week because you need to get the meat in order to smoke it:

Raw.

First up: the brine…

Nothing exotic for the brisket bath: salt, molasses, and water. Notably, this is a cold brine — no cooking involved. If I were using more aromatics or other spices, that’d be different, but this is about as simple as a brine can get. So, in goes the brisket

Take my word for it, the brisket is in there

And then into the fridge to chill:

Into the fridge. Don’t judge my fridge contents!

I love using that little cooler jug as my brining vessel. And that’s a wrap for Thursday.
Friday night started with pulling the brisket, patting it dry while we assemble the rub…

Naked and afraid.

I should take this moment to say this brisket was inspired by my friend, Mark, who made the greatest brisket I’ve ever tasted. This was my attempt to try to replicate it as best I could. His spice rub started with a Santa Maria spice mix for a base. I improvised with my best make-shift Santa Maria base: salt, peppercorns, garlic powder, dried parsley, and a little sugar all went into the spice grinder. In addition, some cumin, fennel, coriander, chili powder, cayenne, paprika, and onion powder. One of Mark’s additions is some corn meal to try to firm up the rub into something more resembling a crust.

I can smell it from here

Now let’s dress up that shivering cold brisket:

All dressed up…

Now it’s time to set up the barbeque — notice I didn’t say smoker. I don’t have a smoker. Instead I have a standard Weber 22 inch kettle barbeque. Mark introduced me to the “snake” method of “low and slow” smoking on the Weber. Around the perimeter of the kettle go a line of briquettes laid up against each other like so:

2-row “snake”

The white cubes at the head of the snake are paraffin lighter cubes. Onto the back of the snake(s) go the wood chips:

Chips on its, err, shoulder?

Last bit of preparation, pour hot water into the pie tin in the middle. You could use cold water, but the idea is to keep a steady temperature in the barbecue and why waste energy warming water? Finally, light the “head” of the snake(s), put the grill and meat on (and any thermometers you may use), close up the grill and go to sleep.

Wait, go to sleep?

Yep. That’s one of the wonderful aspects of the snake method — it’s going to burn through its briquettes one by one (and its chips along the way) keeping the kettle at a steady temperature for hours upon hours. How long? I haven’t figured out a briquette-to-time formula (yet), but I lit it off at 10pm Friday night and pulled it around 6am the next morning.

But that’s hardly the end.

Brisket is a tough piece of meat and can use all the help it can get. So after pulling the brisket, it went into a pan with apple juice and into the oven at 350 for a couple hours. By that point I’d finished the other dishes — iceberg wedge salad, chili roasted sweet potatoes, and corn bread. How’d the brisket turn out?

Glad you asked.

Spring is here, and with it comes barbecue season. There will be more (and better documentation) soon!

Smoked Brisket