Thanksgiving: Turkey, Wings & Venison

In 1997 we were merrily cooking Thanksgiving dinner at my parents' house when the oven failed in the middle of the whole process! Thanks to the kindness of our neighbors we were able to share theirs to get some of our goodies baked up. My dad did a quick internet search (I wonder, was it Netscape? I also remember a search tool called Dogpile that he and I sometimes used). Anyway somehow in that internet frontier he found some instructions on how to cook a turkey on a gas grill. It came out great and  a tradition was born.

All one does is put the turkey like so in a gas grill at 350f. In the roasting pan we use water, chicken stock and coarse chopped onion.  Baste it often until the breast reads 160f and the thigh gives you a read of 180f.

It's Norman Rockwell meets . . . I dunno. But it sure tastes good. We tented it with foil until carving time. Meanwhile the Big Green Egg was patiently waiting at 400f ready for the wings.

Mixology: Cough Remedy

The over-the-counter cough medicine I took last night was a joke. Sure, it tasted kinda nice: sweet mouthfeel with strong bubble gum presentation along with some cotton candy and heavy eucalyptus tones. But it was worthless as a cough remedy. I coughed my head off most of the night.

It's time to take matters into my own hands. As this blog post went to press your correspondent was enjoying the following remedy:

Grill Knuckles Homemade Cough Syrup

• 3 parts bourbon. To my chagrin I only had my top-shelf Woodford Reserve handy.  Oh well. Bottoms up!
• 1 part lemon juice
• 2 spoonfuls honey

Microwave the bourbon and lemon juice in your favorite mug until hot. Stir in the honey. Sip. Ahh. Sip. Sip. Zzz.

Teaching Tomorrow's Grillers Today

Back in June I struck up a conversation with a rising college senior at Davidson College. I wish I could say that I remember how the conversation turned to outdoor cooking, but hey. If you're talking to me, the conversation is going to find its way around to outdoor cooking. His girlfriend and her roommates had just acquired a used propane grill.

Intuitively he felt that propane cooking wasn't the same as cooking on live coal fire. I tried to convince him that there's a time and place for all sorts of grills in this world. But he wanted to know more about cooking over coals and after seeing him on subsequent occasions we continued the conversation.

Ultimately we found time on Saturday to get together for a little grilling colloquium. I gave him a full range of options of things to cook. He liked the idea of doing a beer can chicken and some atomic buffalo turds. Can you blame him?

When he came over, I'd already sliced the jalapeños and scraped out the membranes. I'd also mixed up the stuffing for the ABTs.

I browned two tubes of chorizo earlier in the day and set it in the fridge for use later on when I had time to mix up the rest of the ingredients.

Atomic Buffalo Turd stuffing:

• 2 tubes chorizo, browned
• one packet of cream cheese
• 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese
• 1/2 yellow onion finely chopped
• 1/4 teaspoon minced garlic

Mix all of this until you get a yellow-orange goo.

Stuff the goo into the peppers.

Wrap the peppers with bacon and spear with a toothpick.

I cooked these indirect at 325f until the bacon was crispy.

Slow Cooker: Beef Stew

Here at Grill Knuckles we sometimes eat food that was cooked indoors. For Sunday dinner we enjoyed this easy and hearty recipe for beef stew in the slow cooker.

 After hearing on a cooking program that "stew beef" can be a grab bag of undesirable and chewy bits, my wife bought a one-pound London broil and cubed it to fit the following recipe.

On Location: Coddle Creek BBQ

The co-workers piled into a couple of minivans to hit the 64th annual Coddle Creek ARP Church BBQ luncheon on Thursday in Mooresville, NC. This was my first annual trip. 

Porterhouse with Chimichurri

What in the world is chimichurri? This etymology for chimichurri on Wikipedia was amusing. I don't know if it's true. But I do know that it's great with beef.

The recipe for chimichurri was easy. I just used what I found here at epicurious.com

• 1 cup packed fresh Italian parsley (I used whatever was in the produce section--country of origin unknown)
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 1/3 cup red wine vinegar
• 1/4 cup packed fresh cilantro
• 2 garlic cloves
• 3/4 teaspoon dried crushed red pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

The recipe calls for you to puree it. I just chopped all the dry ingredients and mixed in the wet.