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Grilling/BBQ'ing

Doctor_Van

All VUSports.com Team
May 20, 2014
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Anyone have any good BBQ recipes? Smoking meats? Grilling fish, etc.

Hsve always just stick to simple marinades and chicken/steaks and burgers but looking to make better use of the grill.
 
What type of grill do you have? Do you have a smoker? If so, buy the book Smoke and Spice, its a great resource with tons of recipes including rubs, marinades and sides. If you have something like a Webber Kettle you can also smoke on that with an offset fire.
 
Have a Weber Genesis but recently was reading about smoking using a seperate standalone offset smoke box.
 
Does it have the smoke box attachment? I think some newer ones do. If not you can buy one (they are cheap) or even make one with a small foil pan and aluminum foil. You use the smoke box, damp/drained wood chips place it over a burner with the others turned off. I'd mess with the smoke box a bit to see how long you get smoke for it and how quickly it smokes/what temp.

I prefer higher heat. With ribs I try to smoke around 275 and I usually use spares versus baby backs. An easy rib approach would be the 3-2-1 method. 3 hours on the smoke around 275, 2 hours wrapped in foil with some sort of liquid (e.g., apple juice/cider vinegar), 1 hour back on the smoke. While tasty that method tends to lead to ribs I find a bit overcooked (e.g., fall off the bone), but for a first attempt its a good way to get started.

While you can do that on your gasser a Weber Kettle using charcoal or even better the Weber Smokey Mountain will be infinitely better. Big Green Egg is also an excellent smoker and can also go super high heat to do things like pizzas.
 
I have been using a spicy bbq marinade the past couple years for shrimp skewers. I basically just combine Sweet Baby Ray's barbeque sauce with a lot of Sriracha and a bunch of other spices. There has been no set recipe but every time I make it people seem to enjoy it. I am going to try it with some chicken breasts for the 4th. I should probably write down some sort of combination of what I use, but having it taste a little different each time is what I like. In the end, the Sweet Baby Ray and Sriracha do all the work anyway.
 
bought a rib rack for the grill. you can do six slabs at a time. prep the racks with a bit of olive oil and then plenty of your favorite rub to make a nice bark. on the Weber just put one burner on low to keep temp under 250. every half hour, spritz with some apple cider vinegar to keep them from drying out, and move them around the rack. after 4 hours, pull them off, wrap in foil, leave for another hour. then fire the grill back up, slap some BBQ on there, char it up and you're good to go.
 
Another vote for the book Smoke and Spice here. When I first started out, it was my bible. Great rub receipes and pretty good with the fundamentals of bbq'ing.

I started out with a Brinkman electric smoker which was cheap and easy enough for a few years until I got my feel wet, then once I figured out that this was a hobby that I wanted to explore, I went out and got a Meadow Creek pig roaster/smoker last summer. Just at the point now where I can dial in the temp, it had a pretty steep learning curve to get that figured out but it throws out some fantastic bbq. My only issue is that it's so big, anytime I feel like throwing something on the smoker I have to invite half the neighborhood over for a party because it's not worth it to get it fired up for just a few racks of ribs for the family.
 
Anyone else have a Big Green Egg? I got mine about two years ago and considered getting rid of the Weber. However, I am not using the Egg as much largely due to the time factor and lack of expertise. I have had success with large turkeys but less luck with steaks, burgers or seafood. The problem is that the Egg takes a good thirty minutes to start and set at the desired temperature. With seafood and chicken I like to use different marinades which get overwhelmed in a smoker.
 
Kind what size on the meadow creek? Some of those are huge rigs. I have a Weber Smokey Mountain and love it. Small enough to be portable which is nice for trips/events/parties.

PeterN I don't have a BGE but have cooked on them before. They are great cookers but nailing temps can be tough. I will likely add one to my collection when we next move but would never drop the gas grill due to convenience for when you need to grill something quick.

There are some electronic temp controls out there and many swear by them.. especially for holding low temps on long cooks, not sure if they also help to get a temp set for regular grilling. I have no experience but the BBQ Guru is one people love. I think they may have one specifically for the Egg. Also I'm sure there is a Big Green Egg owners forum on the interwebz.. I know the one for the Weber Smokey Mountain was pretty invaluable when I first got it.
 
I have the 60" Meadow Creek. It was the biggest size that didn't come on it's own trailer. I wanted to have a lot of capacity in case I get to the point where I want to start doing some amateur competitions here and there, but if it was a trailer unit I wouldn't be able to get it through my gate into the backyard. Fits nicely into the bed of a pickup truck when I want to transport it, you just need 3 guys to muscle it up there. The thing is a charcoal hog though. Looking at a minimum of 40lbs of lump charcoal to get it cooking, then whatever wood you want to cook with on top of it.

WSM's are great. I don't think I have ever heard anybody say a negative thing about them.
 
Folks, we are in the company of men. Good ole fashioned American men. God bless all of you.
 
I have the 60" Meadow Creek. It was the biggest size that didn't come on it's own trailer. I wanted to have a lot of capacity in case I get to the point where I want to start doing some amateur competitions here and there, but if it was a trailer unit I wouldn't be able to get it through my gate into the backyard. Fits nicely into the bed of a pickup truck when I want to transport it, you just need 3 guys to muscle it up there. The thing is a charcoal hog though. Looking at a minimum of 40lbs of lump charcoal to get it cooking, then whatever wood you want to cook with on top of it.

WSM's are great. I don't think I have ever heard anybody say a negative thing about them.
Holy crap. Is this for commercial use? If "no" what time should we come over on the 4th?
 
once again a green mountain grill has temp control and a thermometer for perfect cooking. uses wood pellets for smoking and grilling has wifi access via your smart phone or tablet. One of the best purchases I have ever made.
 
My theory was that if I was going to drop a lot of money on a smoker (and honestly, I had my mind set on dropping a lot of money on a smoker) I didn't want to ever say "I wish it was big enough to roast a 200lb pig" or "Yeah I have a smoker but I can't feed 60 people at once". I also have it in the back of my mind that I'd like to give a competition a try down the road, so I needed to be showing up with something that could handle that. I have a buddy who has a food truck, I toyed with that idea too.

Basically I don't want to feel the need to upgrade to something bigger down the road.
 
whats the best beer to pair with grilled beef? an IPA? how about chicken and fish? salmon, flounder, etc.
 
I also have it in the back of my mind that I'd like to give a competition a try down the road, so I needed to be showing up with something that could handle that.
Thats definitely quite a rig... have you ever swung by the NJ State Championships in north wood? I know a dude on the Local Smoke team that has taken the title a few times, not to mention taking first in ribs at the American Royal. Guys are legit but super friendly... as are most of the team

whats the best beer to pair with grilled beef? an IPA? how about chicken and fish? salmon, flounder, etc.
I like burgers and IPAs... even as a big IPA fan for a steak i find them a bit much so maybe a brown ale or porter. For fish or chicken it probably depends upon how im cooking them in terms of marinades/rubs/sauces.. a good lager or an APA. Victory's Summer Love is a pretty versatile one that works with a bunch.
 
Thats definitely quite a rig... have you ever swung by the NJ State Championships in north wood? I know a dude on the Local Smoke team that has taken the title a few times, not to mention taking first in ribs at the American Royal. Guys are legit but super friendly... as are most of the team.

I haven't had the chance to make it down to the NJ Championships.... I think it's coming up in a few weeks, but weekends in July were scheduled out months ago and I'm going to be out of town for that. I've found for the most part that people are really friendly and helpful to newcomers on the scene, they're all kind of geeks about bbq (and they all think theirs is the best) so they don't mind talking to you and sharing some knowledge.
 
"about a hundred dollars. Yeah."
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kindbits, what would you recommend as the best choice for home use (feeding no more than 10 people)?
Pipermal loves his pellet cooker and in terms of convenience/ease of use I have only heard good things about those.

Some prefer using charcoal and wood versus the pellets and for that I have only good things to say about the Weber Smokey Mountain. The 18.5' will save you on charcoal and still provide a great amount of cooking space. If you want to be more space the 22.5' gives you a ton of cooking surface but will use more charcoal and can be a bit tougher to control the temps. It will last forever and Weber customer service is top notch.
 
kindbits, what would you recommend as the best choice for home use (feeding no more than 10 people)?

Going to agree with bgranc here and say the Weber Smoky Mountain. I've personally never owned one, however I have friends who swear by theirs, and I've tasted the results and been impressed. You even see them occasionally out there in competitions.

I started out with a Brinkman Electric smoker and for the price (about $150) it's a good entry level smoker since you don't need to mess with temperature control, charcoal, etc. That being said, you are really at the mercy of the smoker itself because there isn't a way to adjust the temperature, so things are done on their own schedule, and outside factors (weather, wind) affect the cooking time.

I have no experience with pellet smokers other than I understand that they are also pretty foolproof, since you set a desired temperature and forget about it. Similar to the electric in the way that you don't have to mess around with tinkering with the temp, but a higher price point than the Brinkmann.
 
Reading this thread tells me I need to step up my grilling game.
 
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I use the 18.5" Weber Smokey Mountain. Swear by it. I've come in the top 5 3 times over the past 10 years in a local rib competition using it. Just did 2 pork butts overnight for pulled pork at a camping trip. Can pretty much set it and forget it for an overnight smoke. Came out great. 12 hours at 225. Last summer I did 9 racks of St. Louis spare ribs on it at once for a block party Rib racks on both upper and lower grates. Great results.

Good friend of mine is on the competitive KCBS circuit. He went from a Big Green Egg, to Meadow Creek now to a custom block trailer smoker. Awesome rig.
 
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