Smoking Sept 26th 2021 Post Surgery

 

I’m 3 weeks post-surgery for Left Distal Bicep Tear Repair. Being on Short Term for 3 months is the perfect time for some amazing smoking of meats and vegetables.

Today’s menu is a family pack of chicken thighs, a pork shoulder blade 10lbs, a boneless beef chuck roast 5lbs, 5 at Hot Italian Sausage Links that had been frozen, 6 potatoes and 7 ears local sweat corn that were husked and frozen.

We thawed the sausage and corn.

We started at 8:00 am by putting up our pop-up canopy, because it is raining in Northern Arizona. At 8:30 we started un-packing the first items to smoke.

I saw a guy in Texas using mayonnaise to hold on seasonings. We haven’t done a mayo base in a long time, so it was a no brainer.

The beef and pork roasts got a quick rub of Best Foods mayo. Then the pork got Pit Boss Pulled Pork Rub, the beef got Pit Boss Kansas City BBQ Rub and the chicken got just BBQ Spot Rub Some Burger Dead Cow Rub that needed to be used up.

 At 9:00 am we had the Masterbuilt 30 inch Electric Smoker loaded, 2 trays of Smokehouse brand Alder Chips. I know there is no fish in the smoker but we will be doing corn on the cob. We set the digital control on the smoker to 220*F and 12 hours with vent open. Even with the canopy I put my repurposed dishwasher side panel over the smoker to make sure the control doesn’t get wet.

At 10:00 we put another tray of Alder Chips.

At 11:45 I pulled the Hot Italian Sausage Links and on the bottom put in the Potatoes (poked all over with a fork), raised the temperature to 225*F and added a load of Alder Chips. Bumping the temp and opening the door forces the electric element to come on getting a bunch of smoke. We closed the vent to trap it in. It’s lunch time so one of the sausage links disappeared right after the picture was taken.

At 12:42 we pulled the chicken thighs.

 

A change of plans we invited our amazing friends that are like family over for dinner at 5:00 pm. The chicken (when cooled) and sausage went into a glass covered baking dish that was put into the refrigerator. At 4:00 we popped the baking dish into the inside oven at 250*F because the smoker is full of roasts and vegies now. The Corn on the Cob was put into the smoker at 5:00 pm. The wind cooled the smoker when the door was opened and the electric element came on filling the smoker with smoke. Perfect timing.

We pulled everything else at 5:44 pm.

The pork and beef were perfect with a nice bark that yielded a moist tender falling apart inside packed with flavor.

We shredded the pork roast with added hot BBQ sauce and sliced the beef.

The potatoes were amazing smoke flavored and fluffy inside ready for butter.

We drizzled melted butter over the corn on the cob. You would never had known they came out of a freezer.

We pulled the chicken and sausage out of the oven. Everything was delicious and finished at 6:00 pm as planned.

Smoking Easter Dinner 2021

 

I have had a few requests for an electric smoking that has bark on the meat. I like smoking at lower temperatures for sausage, ribs, mushrooms and potatoes.

In order to get bark you need to set the temperature at 250*F to 300*F. You will also need to use larger pieces of meats so there is plenty of volume of water content.

In this day before Easter smoke we are using a beef brisket cut to fit one rack and the remained on the next one down. To fill that rack we are also smoking a pork loin. We just sprinkled “Pit Boss – Lone Star Brisket” seasoning. I have done yellow mustard, mayonnaise, ketchup and honey with very good results.

  

We put the two racks of seasoned meat into the smoker before turning it on. Later we will be putting a rack of chicken thighs into the smoker.

  

We opened the vent, added two trays of Gambel's Oak, set the temperature at 250*F and the timer to 9 hours at 9:00 am. We also cleaned out the drip tray so we can harvest some liquid smoke part way through the smoke.

The outside temperature is unseasonably warm at 60*F, so it will be easy to get to the cooking level easily. At 11:30 am we added one more tray ok oak.

Then at 12:30 we added the chicken thighs and one more tray of oak. Opening the door and adding the cool chicken gets the last oak chips to smoking great. I left the skin on the chicken to hold in the moisture and did not put any seasoning on.

I closed the vent at 3:30 to keep the moisture in the smoker.

Then at 6:20 pm we pulled all the meat.

There isn’t a missing thigh. We had 2 packages of four.

I grabbed the small end of the brisket and sliced a few moist falling apart pieces of fabulous tasting beef. We could have easily turned it into pulled brisket, but decided it would in would better to reheat it tomorrow for Easter Dinner.

The chicken was moist and falling off the bone delicious.