They are easy to roast. Just poke the skin a thousand times with a fork, so the fat can drain out. Because they are all dark meat, and fatty, they are harder to over-cook than a chicken, so there’s a very wide range of temps that work well.
And soooo delicious. But too rich for regular consumption.
While the breast is the best part, i like the legs and the wings, too. And at least where i shop, the price for the whole duck is about 10% more than the price for just the breast.
In my area I can easily find duck breast or whole duck, but no other options. I’d like to cook the thigh/leg quarters, particularly if they are cheap and not desirable for other consumers. That’s not an option here though.
Duck legs aren’t cheap here, although they aren’t as pricy as breasts. Really, it’s just that the pieces cost a hell of a lot more than the whole bird.
Had some smoked Wagyu Tri-tip last night, a party created by a weekly stupid-games poker contribution ($1 for six players, times 4 years, minus COVID).
I’m not a fan of whatever my friend did on the outside, be it the rub or the smoke flavoring of the wood, but the inside was fantastic!
I have a balsamic/soy marinade I use, but I’d probably just salt rub for a day, add some pepper before I slow-cooked it in a gas grill, then sear afterward.
I generally like my rubs on beef to be simple: salt, pepper, garlic.
I do like to serve chimichurri with tri tip
Did a ~4lb brisket, maybe my best one so far. It’s from a grass fed cow and it’s lean, at 195° it still felt too firm. I pushed it up to 201° and it felt just right. Managed to retain a good amount of moisture, and the consistency is really nice throughout.
ETA: my wife and son hate burnt ends, so I get them all!
I grilled a chicken yesterday. Sorry i didn’t photograph it. Although… It was getting pretty dark by the time it was done. So maybe i couldn’t have gotten a good picture.
This weekend was the penultimate chicken harvest at the place I’ve been getting chicken. So i bought two. I grilled one last night and roasted the wither this evening.
Punjabi tandoori style chicken wings tonight on the smoker. Served with coriander chutney and celery.
That all looks really nice.
I have a WSM a friend gave me after he upgraded to something new. I find it hard to justify using for anything other than something like pulled pork or 321 ribs that will be on for several hours. Any tips on how to set it up for shorter smokes?
Maybe explain the schedule for something like the pork tenderloin. How many coals are you adding, when do you start, how is the smoker set up, temp, etc.
So, i decided y’all have convinced me that i should try reverse sear for beef steaks. So i tried it Saturday. What a pita. I though i could just use my cast iron frying pan for the whole process, like i do with the traditional sear method. So i put it in the oven on 200 with the steaks.
In due course, the steaks reached a suitable interior temp, and i removed the pan, which was covered with drippings. If i just put that on the stove to heat, it would have been hell to clean. So i removed the steaks to a plate, and awkwardly tried to clean out the hot frying pan.
Then i brought the pan to temp and put the steaks back in it.
They came out fine. Yes, there was less of a gray line between the surface and the interior, but i can’t say it made a huge difference in the sensation in eating the steaks. (After all, i usually cut vertically, and don’t ever try too eat a piece that is just edge.) And i didn’t clean the pan well enough, so it was a bitch to clean after supper, and i also had an extra dirty plate that the steaks rested on while i cleaned and heated the pan.
So, okay, the extra plate just took up space in the dishwasher. But cleaning the frying pan was three times the work it is with the traditional method, and i had to do it hot, which feels risky. I don’t like putting my cookware under more thermal stress than i need to. Do you usually pull out a separate pan to pre-heat the steaks?
I switched from cooking steaks in the broiler to using a frying pan because clean up is easier. Even though i prefer the results of the broiler. I’m thinking reverse sear may go with the broiling pan as, “nice idea, not worth it”.
I like to cook pork tenderloin like I would in an oven: target 350-400 cooking temp, and it should cook in 20-30 minutes. To do that in the WSM, I’d use a charcoal chimney that’s mostly full. Wait till the flames start licking through the top coals in the chimney, pour them into the WSM and throw a couple of wood chunks in. Assemble the cooker with the water pan in place but empty, and all vents open. I have a cheap pizza pan that I cover with aluminum foil and put on top of the water pan to make cleanup easy for these types of cooks. I recommend using a probe type thermometer to monitor during the cook, and you want to cook pork tenderloin to about 145 internal. It’s so lean you don’t want to go much beyond that or you risk drying it out.
In general I use the WSM in these ways:
Low and slow cook 200-250: full water pan, vents often mostly closed early in cook, partially lit coals.
Faster cook, indirect heat 300-400: empty water pan, lit coals, wide open vents towards the high end of the range and partially closed towards the low end
Faster cook, direct heat 300-400: no water pan, lit coals, open vents. Cooking on the top rack at a distance from the coals works great for a few things. Tri-tip and chicken wings are especially good using this technique
Direct grill: self explanatory
If you haven’t explored VWB, they have detailed recipe instructions that include how to set up your smoker for various temps/cooking times: Cooking Topics - The Virtual Weber Bullet
