It's Here....and 2 Days Early

My Weber One Touch Platinum kettle grill arrived at my local Lowe's today. It's now setting in my living room in a prime location to make assembly easier and more comfortable. It is summer in Florida after all and my garage is not air conditioned.

My wallet is a little lighter, but I did save $25 at Lowe's compared to the price on Amazon.com.

I couldn't resist opening the box to take a look, but I'm not going any farther tonight.

Cowboy Cauldron

Weber One-Touch Platinum Charcoal Grill

I've needed a new kettle grill for a while now and tonight I ordered a Weber One-Touch Platinum Charcoal Grill at Lowes.

I wanted a blue one, but according to the Weber sales literature at Lowes, it's only available in black.  They must not make the colors for the big box stores, but I swear I saw a blue one on Amazon.com a couple weeks ago.  Tonight Amazon.com only has black and red available.

Tip: If you tell the big box store you're also shopping and comparing prices on Amazon.com they might give you a discount.  I did and got a 10% price reduction, which turned out to be $20 cheaper than Amazon.com.

The best part is, I'll have the grill on Thursday.  Look for some future grilling recipes and videos.  I've always wanted to try a pork butt on a kettle grill.  I guess this is my chance.

Brisket for Lunch?

After a recent drive over to St. Petersburg to visit the Salvado Dali Museum, my taste buds were hankering for a brisket lunch.

Linda and I saw a piece on the local news about The Brisket Basket on 5th Ave North (across from the high school) a couple of years ago and stopped by for an enjoyable lunch.  Unfortunately, my more recent attempt didn't work out...the brisket has left the building. It's now a Java Bar or Java Hut or something similar. Bummer!

I didn't have the phone # with me for lunch, but after dialing it a few minutes ago it appears the phone # is now out of service.  The website still works though.  I hope it's not getting much traffic, because if it is there are going to be a lot of other dissapointed bbq fans (besides me).

If any of my readers are familar with the details regarding whether the brisket relocated to another building, or closed down completely, and would like to share....I'm all ears.

BBQ Veal Chops

I wanted to try something different on my Weber Smokey Mountain this weekend. 

I flipped through my Smoke & Spice recipe book by Cheryl and Bill Jamison and found a recipe for veal chops on page 159.  I didn't follow the recipe exactly, but I used their basic ideas. 

The chops were marinated in the refrigerator for 4 hours in a mixture of sage, salt, garlic powder, olive oil, and a little lemon juice. (I skipped the wine and lemon juice mop.)

I smoked them with Royal Oak lump charcoal.  They were removed after an hour when the internal meat temperature reached 155.  If you like your veal medium rare, then you may want to remove them a little sooner. I usually like my meat closer to medium-well, so I cooked the chops a little longer than teh recipe recommends.

My first attempt at smoked veal chops was a success!

Southern Food Blogs - Top 50

Cindy Cullen from CulinaryArtsCollege.org sent me an e-mail today to let me know my bbq blog was chosen as one of 50 Best Southern Food Blogs.  (Thanks Cindy.)  Numbers 1, 5, and 32 on the list are food blogs that I read often.  There are a lot of blogs on the list written by formally trained professional chefs and some are designed by professional webmasters (I am neither), but all the bloggers share an enjoyment of food and cooking. 

I'm pretty humbled that anyone would think to include my 'lil ole blog' on a food blog list that includes Ree Drummond's Pioneer Woman. In 2009 and 2010 her blog won the coveted Bloggie Award as the "Weblog of the Year" and other awards for writing and overall design.  The blog caters to women, but I'm not ashamed to say that I do occasionally read it. I steer away from the more womanly aspects of the blog - especially the "boy meets girl" posts and the Confessions section - but her Photography and Cooking sections are tremendous. If you're a blogger, food or otherwise, you can learn alot from ThePioneerWoman.com.  And for anyone looking for a gift idea for a daughter, wife, or mother, Pioneer Woman Cooks is a sure fire future favorite. 

BBQ Pitmaster: Week 2

Here's a preview of the 2nd episode:



To paraphrase the promotional e-mail I received from the network:

With one Pitmaster headed into an ambulance, the rest compete for $5,000 and an invitation into the finale for the $100,000 prize. Thursday 10 pm ET 9 pm CT.

BBQ Pitmasters Season 2

Thursdays at 10:00 eastern / 9:00 central



I wonder if the rules state that they have to use Kingsford charcoal.

BBQ Smoker Poll

For the last 3 weeks or so I've been conducting a reader's poll here on the BBQ Blog to find out what types of smokers my readers are currently using.  Here is a quick summary of the results so far:

Weber Smokey Mountain 13 (27%)
Backwoods Smoker 1 (2%)
Cookshack Pellet Smoker 0 (0%)
Stumps Smoker 4 (8%)
Lang Offset 3 (6%)
Klose Offset 0 (0%)
Big Green Egg 9 (18%)
Other Offset Smoker 16 (33%)
Other Vertical Smoker 6 (12%)

It looks like the Lang and Other Offset Smokers are in the lead with 39% of the votes. The Weber Smokey Mountain is in second at 27% with the Big Green Egg third with 18%.

There are two days left to vote in the current poll. Have you cast your vote yet?

Care to share your suggestions for a topic for the next poll?