Cheese Oozing

This recipe is very similar to the one that Chef Christo Gonzales and myself created to win a Chopped style competition held at Serenbe near Atlanta, Georgia. We competed against some of the other Char-Broil All Stars who write for the Char-Broil Live website. What is Serenbe? It’s a 1,000 acre community that shows how an urban development can still sustain the natural greenery of the landscape. It’s also the location of the 2012 HGTV Green Home.

We dined multiple times at the Farmhaus on the property, shopped at the local businesses within walking distance of our cottage, hiked the trails, toured the Green Home, marveled at some of the amazing homes, and most of all enjoyed the natural surroundings including both flora and fauna that Serenbe had to offer.  The fauna included horses, cows, pigs, and even a burro or two.

During the Chopped competition, Christo and I were paired together. We were given a bag of ingredients that the other teams got as well which included: a whole chicken, fennel, pineapple, butter, peanut butter, and bacon. In the “pantry” were oranges, lemons, limes, Worcestershire sauce, garlic and onion powder, and the full array of Char-Broil rubs, spices and sauces. This is not the entire recipe of what we used to win the competition, as we made a fennel, orange, and grilled pineapple salad as well. Basically, I can’t remember exactly how we made that, but this is the main course of that dish, so to speak.  Here’s Christo and I shortly after finding out we won:

Myself and Christo

And our winning dish:

Chicken Breast Stuffed with Blue Cheese, Bacon and Fennel on a Salad of Oranges, Grilled Pineapple and Fennel on a Peanut Butter Sauce

This is my attempt at recreating that dish, or at least the chicken part. It won’t be easy considering I won’t have a chef of Christo’s caliber standing next to me while I do it.

Ingredients:

4 chicken breasts
4 ounces blue cheese
2 tsp fresh garlic
3 slices of bacon
1 tbsp of fennel, sliced thin and rough chopped
Course salt and fresh black pepper

The Ingredients, at Least Most of Them - Salt, Pepper and Garlic not show.

Start by frying the bacon:

Everything is Better With Bacon

With the side burner on my Char-Broil TRU Infrared, I did this outside, in fact I made the entire meal outside:

Cooking Bacon Outside - No Grease Inside

Time to slice the fennel. If you’ve never had fennel, it’s got sort of a black licorice or anise taste to it. Some of you are wrinkling your nose at the thought of that, but I don’t go overboard with it so it’s only a subtle flavor in the background. Or you could omit it entirely.

Fennel looks a lot like an onion:

Sliced and Chopped Fennel

Don’t let that good bacon grease go to waste. Saute the fennel in the pan with the bacon grease:

Sizzling Fennel

Once the fennel has been sauted for for a minute or so, just long enough to soften it and brown a little, add it, along with the garlic, chopped bacon (only 2 slices, leave 1 for garnish), a pinch of salt and five turns of fresh black pepper to the cheese:

The Stuffing

Then take the side of a knife or the back of a spoon and mix it all together:

Mashing The Stuffing

Here’s what it looks like all mixed together:

Stuffing for the Chicken

Now it’s time to create a pouch inside the chicken. Slice into the side opposite the rib bones:

Creating a Pouch

Create a small hole, but run the knife up and down to create a larger pouch inside, but don’t go to far or you will poke a hole on the other side and thus more stuffing will ooze out:

The Pouch

Then push the stuffing into the cavity:

Stuffing the Chicken Breasts

All three are stuffed:

Stuffed

Now close the gap. One could sew the hole shut, but I didn’t have anything I could use for that so I found some skewers:

Skewers

I scored the skewers about halfway with a knife and broke them in half and used them to close the hole:

The Hole is Closed

Now, you may have noticed that there are only three chicken breasts, but the recipe calls for four. Well, that’s all that came in the package. Here’s how much of the stuffing was left over which would easily fill a fourth breast:

Leftover Stuffing

Now off to the grill:

TRU Infrared

I set up two zone cooking, with heat on one side and nothing on the other. In this case, the two left burners are on and the ones on the right aren’t. With charcoal, put the coals on one side of the grill and have nothing on the other. I have the breast a liberal coating of coarse salt on each side and then place the chicken skin side down on the grill:

Searing the Chicken

Sear the chicken until the skin is nicely browned and then place it on the side with no heat, or in this case, I put it on the convenient upper rack:

I basically indirected them on the upper rack for just short of an hour until they reached an internal temp of around 160 degrees. I used my instant read thermometer check them:

Almost Done

Here I am about ready to pull them, wearing the shirt from the place that I named this dish after:

That's me, the Original Grillin' Fool

I know most of you only want to see pics of the food, but the reason I put this in is because my son, Finnegan, took the picture at the ripe old age of four years old. And he did it with a DSLR, not a little point and shoot. I’m a proud papa of this little fella:

Heir to the Grillin' Empire

Back to the Grillin’. Here you will see that despite trying to close the hole, as fat was rendered out of the chicken, the meat has contracted as the cheese mixture has expanded, so some is lost to during the cooking process. This is to be expected and the cause of the smoke you see coming from the bottom grill grates:

Cheese Oozing

And finally, I pulled them and plated them, giving them a little time to rest so the juices can calm down and redistribute throughout the meat. I topped with the last piece of bacon that I crumbled, but you could also use any remaining stuffing if you like:

Plated

The chicken was juicy, but of course it was, cooked on an infrared grill, the skin was crispy, the cheese oozing and melted and the fennel was subtle but a nice addition to the flavor profile.

If you have any questions, feel free to leave them below or shoot me an email.

If you would like other chicken dishes, click here.

Also, you can follow the Grillin Fools on their Facebook page where you can post your grillin own pictures or join the general grillin conversation.  Or, you can follow them on Twitter @GrillinFool

Sweet potato fries are all the rage now with multiple restaurant chains featuring them including some fast food places.  Why is this the latest tuber trend? Because sweet potatoes are amazing.  This is another one of those extremely simple recipes in which the slicing of the potatoes into fries will take more effort than any other step.

Ingredients:

4 sweet potatoes, boiled for 15 minutes and sliced into fries
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup of your favorite rub
shaved slivers of asiago cheese
parlsey, rough chopped for color and garnish

Servers six.

First off, rinse your sweet potatoes and then put them in a pot of water and boil for 15 minutes:

Then move the taters to another pot and hit them with cold water to halt the cooking process:

Leave them in the cold water until you can’t feel any heat at all resonating from inside the sweet potato.  Then slice into long french fries. The longer they are, the less will be lost between the grates when cooking on the grill:

Then drizzle with olive oil and shake on your favorite rub:

This rub is from Tasty Licks BBQ Company. It’s their Original Smokin’ Good BBQ Rub:

I used to be a huge proponent of only using my own, homemade rubs, but then I had kids and had to economize my time. This is a really great rub and my wife loves it.  So far I’ve had it on shrimp as well and both were outstanding.

It will take 2-3 applications of the rub to work it through the french fries:

Prepare the grill for medium high heat, in this case my Char-Broil Tru Infrared, and put the fries on the grill perpendicular to the grill grates:

One other note, tongs are great for moving individual fries around, but to flip many at once, use a steel spatula such as this:

You may notice that there is quite a lot of water on that spatula as well as the grill two picks above.  That’s because it was pouring down rain. This pic doesn’t quite capture that, but you get the idea:

Keep flipping the fries until you get some nice grill marks on as much of the potatoes as possible and realize that you will lose many in between the grill grates.  Once there is a good amount of charring, remove from the heat, top with slivers of asiago (or grated) and a couple pinches of coarse chopped flat leaf parsley:

These aren’t going to be the crispy fries straight from a deep fryer, but they also won’t have the calories, but will still be packed with flavor. Special thanks to my wife for the inspiration for this recipe.  Also, you will lose quite a few in the grill grate. There’s no way around it.

If you have any questions, feel free to leave them below or shoot me an email.

If you would like other sides and appetizers, click here.

Also, you can follow the Grillin Fools on their Facebook page where you can post your grillin own pictures or join the general grillin conversation.  Or, you can follow them on Twitter @GrillinFool

This dish is as simple as it is delicious.  Tomatoes, cheese, salt, pepper, and a little parsley for color and garnish and about 10 total minutes prep time.  That’s it. Thanks to Diva Q for the inspiration.

Ingredients:

2 roma tomatoes
grated cheese (asiago, parmesian, romano will all suffice)
salt
black pepper
flat leaf parsley, coarse chopped

Serves two.

Notice, no amounts other than the two romas?  Because there really isn’t anything to this that needs measuring.

Start with the tomatoes:

Fresh tomatoes from the farmer's market

Rinse and then slice to in half lengthwise. Prep the grill for high heat, in this case my Char-Broil Tru infrared. Place the tomatoes flat side down:

Halved and on the grill

Time on the grill depends on the heat of the grill. The goal is a little charring to caramelize the sugars and proteins.  Tomatoes are very juicy by nature, so they won’t char for quite a while.  I believe it took me about 8 minutes get this much sear on the tomatoes, but the infrared grill I was using can hit 700+ with ease. It might take a little longer on another grill for the tomatoes to look like this:

Charred nicely

One tip, I would recommend using a steel spatula to remove them from the grill as tongs will mash them up since they will be pretty soft when it’s time to serve.

Next up, hit them with some coarse salt, fresh cracked black pepper and then some grated cheese (I used asiago) and some rough chopped parsley, although some fresh basil might work well too:

Salted, peppered, and now cheesed

Ready to serve

That’s it. Hand out the forks and knives and enjoy.

Special thanks to Emily for helping out with this.  It’s really hard to get a shot of the cheese being grated by myself!?!

If you have any questions, feel free to leave them below or shoot me an email.

If you would like other sides and appetizers, click here.

Also, you can follow the Grillin Fools on their Facebook page where you can post your grillin own pictures or join the general grillin conversation.  Or, you can follow them on Twitter @GrillinFool

With this recipe, I combine two of my favorite things, jerk seasoning and pork tenderloin.  The reason I like jerk so much is that while it can be fiery hot, it still has a ton of flavor. It’s not hot just to be hot. It’s not mind numbingly scorching on the tongue.  And the reason I love pork tenderloin so much is that as a husband, father of two toddlers, owner of this website as well as working 40 hours a week with my regular job, I don’t often get a chance to do all day cookouts, or even half day cookouts.  The pork tenderloin allows me get my grillin’ fix in under two hours.

This recipe is extremely simple.  There are two ingredients if you can find a pre-made jerk seasoning.  Luckily, there are a couple places here in St. Louis that carry this stuff:

Walkerswood is some outstanding stuff.  But be careful. If you’ve never had it before, and even if you love hot stuff, go easy. The pain will not be just when you eat it, but it will bleed over into the next day.  Trust me. Go light, cut with some oil, whatever.  One note. When you first open this jar, it is not as hot as it will become after some air gets in the jar and you leave it in the fridge for a few weeks where it will somehow gain in heat and flavor intensity. I have no idea how this works.  All I know is the first time I had it, the spiciness was perfect, then I had it about a month later and it was a lot hotter. I have repeated this phenomena over and over with this stuff.  the only difference now is that I actually like it after it gets even hotter, but then I’m nuts with this kind of stuff.

Now, if you can’t find Walkerswood, we have a recipe for a jerk marinade you can make from raw ingredients. Considering my lack of free time, the pre-made stuff is the way to go for me, but when I was single, I was all about making everything from scratch. If that’s you, here’s our jerk recipe from the third Grillin’ Fool, Tom and his wife Tracy.

Jerk Marinade Ingredients:

1 large onion
2 cloves garlic
2 scotch bonnet peppers (if you can’t find this at your grocery use a fresh jalapeño)**
1 tbsp allspice
1 1/2 tsp ginger
1 tsp pepper
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp dried thyme
1 tbsp brown sugar
1/2 cup white wine vinegar
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup dark rum
juice from one fresh lime
juice from one fresh orange

Combine all the ingredients in a food processor or blender and pulse until it runs smooth.

Coat the pork tenderloin with the jerk, and put in the refrigerator over the night:

The following day, prep the tenderloin for the grill. Or in this case, two tenderloins. Most of the time a package of pork tenderloin has two tenderloins. With as little fat as there is in pork tenderloin, a single tenderloin will cook extremely quickly and thus there is a very short window from done perfectly to dried out. To compensate for that, tie two tenderloins together so they insulate each other and thus increase cooking time and allow more of that sweet wood smoke to penetrate without drying the meat out.

Place the two tenderloins on a cutting board or platter with the fat end of one tenderloin paired with the skinny end of the other and vice versa:

Then stack the two tenderloins on each other:

Now get a 3-4 foot length of bakers twine and tie one end together:

Then run the twine under the meat:

Then run the twine beck through itself to create a loop:

Then pull the loop tight:

Rinse and repeat:

Then do a final loop around the end:

Then tie off the last loop and cut off the excess twine:

And here we have one section of twine that trusses the entire length of meat together:

I know some are thinking, “Why not just cut five lengths of about nine inches and make five knots?” Sure, that can be done, but once I did this method a few times, I was able to do this in less than about ten seconds.  And I can make two cuts and all the string can be pulled off as one length.  After this cooks, the strings sort of disappear and it’s hard to find all of them.

BTW, doing this and getting pics by myself was not easy and I got all kinds of jerk marinade on my camera!

Also, some are wondering about the silver skin and fat on the pork tenderloin. Don’t.  Any on the outside will melt away and baste the meat. And the silver skin isn’t chewy like it is with beef. It will melt away as well during the c0oking process.

Now it’s time to get the grill ready.

The grill is prepared for two zone grilling with coals (and smoke wood) on one side and the meat on the other:

That’s a chunk of peach wood.

Close the lid and leave it alone until the temperature drops or you see no more smoke. The target temperature is 300:

I had the tenderloins pretty close to the coals and thus they browned more than I had planned on. So instead of smoking for 60 minutes and then searing, I smoked for 90 minutes and skipped the sear. But doesn’t the sear get that wonderful flavor from the browning?  It does, but I got that already with how close the meat was to the coals:

And here we have it on the cutting board resting:

The reason to let it rest is when the meat comes off the heat, the juices are in an excited state and moving a million miles an hour. Slice right away and the juices will spill out all over the cutting board and while the first couple of bites will be fine, but by the time you get to the end, you’ll need some sort of sauce to choke it down.

After about ten minutes, clip the twine and separate the tenderloins:

Then sliced:

If you weren’t someone who believed in resting before, I hope the the above picture changes your mind. If it doesn’t nothing will.  Tenderloin is extremely lean, yet that meat is glistening with juicy fat.

Here’s another picture with a different camera setting to show the nice smoke ring:

I won’t bother showing this plated, because those pictures were a let down compared to the above two.

But I have two more pictures for you to show one of my favorite things to do with left over tenderloin?  Some are asking how there could be any left over.  Because I made those two tenderloins just for me.  One to eat that night and the other to make pork tenderloin sammiches the next day.

Slice the cold tenderloin and layer it on top of a loaf of bread that has a compound butter slathered on each side. I wish I could tell you what’s in the butter, but it was given to me from someone else and he’s not telling:

Warm this under a broiler for a few minutes, lay down four slices of provel and put back under the broiler until the cheese browns a little:

Jerk pork tenderloin and jerk tenderloin sammies.  It doesn’t get much better than that for me.

If you have any questions about the above dish please feel free to comment below or shoot me an email.

For other pork recipes, click here.

Also, you can follow the Grillin Fools on Facebook and post your own grillin pictures or on Twitter @GrillinFool.

I have been asked many times about what to look for when buying a steak. My problem was that in order to do a proper compare and contrast, I would have to buy a bunch of steaks of various cuts, of which I would obviously grill some, and then have to freeze the rest. Two problems with that, I have the equivalent of a college fridge in my kitchen and buying all those steaks would cost me money, particularly if I bought prime cuts.  But then it hit me that with a sponsor like Kenrick’s, I can have them cut steaks from different grades and take pictures for the post.  That way I can show our followers the difference and save me some money and not risk wasting any after I got my pictures.  After I took my shots, they put them in the meat case for someone else to buy. That being said, I still wound up buying two steaks from the photo shoot. I’m the Grillin’ Fool, how could I not?!

First, let’s talk about the three major grades of ranking steak. The lowest of the grades that one should ever consider to eat in steak form is Select which has little marbling of intramuscular fat and thus tends to be drier, tougher and less flavorful than higher grades, although it tends to be the healthiest alternative.

The next level, and of which the majority of beef is graded, is Choice which is moderately marbled and thus usually makes it more flavorful, tender and juicy than Select, but not on par with Prime. Within the grade of Choice are sub-grades making a highly rated Choice steak much better than a lower graded Choice steak, but often they all cost the same, so knowing what to look for between two cuts from the same category is the key to finding a great steak and saving some cash.

And finally we get to the king of all grades, Prime. Not Optimus Prime as my three year old would ask were he reading this, but a steak with heavy marbling of intramuscular fat which makes for the most tender, juicy, and flavorful steak. Once cooked, it should have a buttery texture and a rich beefy flavor.

With that out of the way, let’s look at some side by sides of a few steaks.

Let’s start with one of my favorite cuts from Kenrick’s: the Prime Sirloin.  Below is a picture of two sirloins. Can you guess which is the prime?

Here’s a close up of the top one:

And here’s the bottom steak:

The things to look at in the above pictures to pick the better steak is not size, although that happened to go in favor of the better cut, but in fact are marbling and color.  The top steak is a choice cut while the bottom is prime. The choice has less marbling and is also darker in color. The prime has more striations of fat running through it than the choice and is a lighter color. Look for a light cherry color but avoid anything that is deep red. Also, the color gray in terms of beef is to be avoided entirely.

One thing about marbling with a sirloin is that this cut is pretty lean to begin with, so there isn’t a ton of marbling. While it may not look like there is a huge difference between the marbling of these two, take a look at that top picture again and you will indeed notice a considerable difference. That prime sirloin, at around $8/pound as I write this article at Kenrick’s, absolutely melts in your mouth and is a frequent item on my grill.  I wrote this post in February, 2012, so if you go into Kenrick’s in 2015 after reading this post and find that the prime sirloin is $9/pound, don’t complain to me.

Let’s move on to a more expensive cut like the Filet Mignon or Beef Tenderloin (same thing). There is very little marbling in a filet because it is an extremely lean cut of beef. These two steaks come from two different grades:

The marbling difference in the above picture is negligible. Again, look for the color difference.  The steak on the right is lighter than that on the left. You can also look at texture. It’s hard to see the difference in texture from the pictures I took, but you can see that the one on the right as a much finer texture than the one on the left.

Again, looking at these two steaks, pick the lighter colored of the two, which also has a better texture:

And finally, the almighty Rib Eye. Here you will really see the difference between colors. Below is a choice rib eye and one that is ungraded:

Some are looking at that darker steak in the foreground and think that looks pretty good. Let me show you a shot from the top:

Some are still thinking that’s a pretty good looking steak with all that marbling. Let me show you a close up of the darker one:

There is good marbling and bad marbling.  Fine striations of fat running uniformly throughout the meat is good marbling. Thick bands of fat (that glob in the middle excluded from this discussion), like those in the steak above translate to a stringy, chewy steak.  A beef jawbreaker if you will.  Now let’s look at a closeup of the Choice rib eye, keep in mind that glob of fat in the middle of the one above:

See how much smaller that glob of fat is? Every rib eye, no matter the grade has that fat to some degree.  The higher on the cut, the smaller that vein of fat becomes and thus has a smaller footprint in the individual steaks. The darker, unclassified steak, has a bigger glob of fat because it was taken farther down the roast in which it was cut from. When looking at two rib eyes, take into account that glob of fat. Some meat cutters and grocery stores will cut that out for a fee because it’s not a simple procedure. Doing so practically removes the top of the steak from the rest. One can ask any good meat cutter to lop off a chunk of fat along the outside for no fee, but most won’t cut this out without charging more. Some cut it out, tie the steak back together with bakers twine and call it a Sarasota steak for an extra couple dollars per pound.  Save the money and look for rib eyes taken from higher up on the cut.

Now I want to talk about T-Bones and Porterhouses. What are they exactly?  Well, they are two cuts of steak on either side of a T shaped bone, hence the name of one. On one side is the tenderloin or filet and the other is NY Strip.  To be a T-Bone it must have a least 1/2 inch of tenderloin but there is no defined maximum. A porterhouse must have 1.25 inches tenderloin. Of the three steaks below, all three can be classified as a T-bone, but only two can be sold as porterhouses:

Why am I explaining this? Because a porterhouse is usually sold for more per pound than a T-bone, yet I’ve seen many times a steak that should be sold as a porterhouse in with the T-bones. So if you see that steak above on the right in with the T-bones, buy it and any others like it with that thick hunk of filet and freeze what you don’t cook.

One more note on this cut. “Bone in,” anything is very much en vogue right now. Bone in filets are a big deal.  And so are bone in NY Strips.  All they are is the porterhouse with the filet and bone cut off.  It’s nothing fancy other than the NY strip side of a porterhouse or T-bone.  Still, bone in steaks are better steaks and more expensive because you are paying per pound for bones you aren’t going to eat.

Some of you are thinking, the moral of the story is to buy the most expensive cut of meat and it will be the best. Generally speaking yes, but that doesn’t mean the lower cuts can’t be made better. For one, they are actually healthier because they don’t have the extra fat and are cheaper. Select cuts don’t have the flavor of a Prime because they don’t have the fat a Prime steak does, but then again, a filet doesn’t have the fat that a NY strip does. We compensate for the lack of fat in a filet, and it’s particular shape, by wrapping a slice of bacon around it. It’s hard to wrap a slice of bacon around a select porterhouse,  but that doesn’t mean one can’t add flavor.  A brush on steak sauce such as Andria’s added during the grilling process or a compound butter added to the to the top of a plated steak can add a lot of flavor. To counteract the toughness of a select steak, try an acidic marinade to break down the connective tissues. Never use an acidic marinade with a filet as it will take an already tender cut and turn it into mush, but a Select porterhouse (with that side of filet), marinated in an oil based marinade can compensate greatly for the lack of flavor from the fat and break down the connective tissue somewhat without turning the filet into mush.

After all that I have written here, my greatest bit of advice is this: get to know your meat cutter. Don’t be afraid to ask to lop off a glob of fat from the end of a rib eye or a the fat along the outer edge of a NY strip that’s too thick. You’re paying premium prices for that meat, save a couple bucks and have that fat trimmed off.  If the meat cutter won’t do that for you, find a new meat cutter. Tell them you want rib eyes from farther up the cut to minimize the glob of fat. Get to know them and when they find out you are a discerning steak person, they will find you exactly what you are looking for.

Proper seasoning and cooking helps a lot too.  I won’t go into specifics here other than: salt, let come up to room temperature, sear, flip, sear, pull to the side to bake until desired doneness and of course resting are the keys in a single sentence. Here are a few detailed steak recipes that outline the process to a tee with step by step, picture by picture instructions:

Jerk Steak

Teres Major (it’s not a constellation, but a cut of steak that is out of this world)

Flat Iron Steak (another less common, yet amazing steak)

How to Grill Steaks for a Crowd

Another excellent link is the thumb test to know when steaks are done.

Oh, I almost for got. I bought two of those steaks above. The rib eye and the filet.  You didn’t think I was going to show you all these raw steaks without putting any pictures of beautifully cooked steaks did you? I cooked the filet for my wife who normally eats some of a filet and I get the rest. I’m a lucky guy on so many levels, but not this time. I seared it and brushed it with a little Andria’s and she ate it all. In fact she raved about it:

And I’ll just show you one bite from my rib eye:

Yeah, they were both out of this world.

If you have any questions, feel free to leave them below or shoot me an email.

If you would like other beef recipes, click here.

Also, you can follow the Grillin Fools on their Facebook page where you can post your grillin own pictures or join the general grillin conversation.  Or, you can follow them on Twitter @GrillinFool

All three Grillin’ Fools gathered for an all day grill, chill, and photograph session for the website on a recent Saturday.  It can only be described as epic. We did a wide variety of dishes that you can see here on the site, or check some more candid/behind-the-scenes pics of the process that we posted on Facebook.  One of the recipes I chose to do was rack of lamb because we don’t have many posts about a meat we all love.  The posts we do have seem to focus on cooking lamb racks carefully and not grill them past medium rare lest we ruin the precious, and expensive, cut of meat.  Over-cooked rack of lamb is considered to be a cardinal sin in our group so you can imagine the reaction I received when I announced I was going to indirect the lamb for an hour and a half or longer.  So…we’re off on an adventure into uncharted territory for this Grillin’ Fool.

The first step will be soaking the lamb in  a marinade for 3-4 hours and up to overnight.  I like overnight best.  The ingredients are:

Marinade Ingredients:

2 eight-bone racks of lamb (excess fat trimmed) more about this later
2 tbsp  Worcestershire sauce
½ cup sweet onion, chopped
10 cloves garlic, chopped
10 sprigs fresh rosemary leaves
10 sprigs fresh thyme leaves
1 tbsp ancho chile powder
1 tbsp black pepper
1 tbsp hot red pepper flakes
¼ cup water                                

Combine all ingredients for the marinade and puree in the blender/processor (optional as I didn’t use the food processor, but doing so will awaken even more of the flavors in the marinade) and add to the lamb in resealable plastic bag coating the lamb completely and, preferably, refrigerate overnight.

Dry Rub Ingredients:

4 tbsp smoked paprika (I emphasize smoked variety for a far different flavor than non-smoked)
2 tbsp chili powder
2 tbsp garlic salt
1 tbsp lemon pepper

Sauce/Glaze Ingredients:

¼ cup honey
½ cup of your favorite barbeque sauce (I used Blues Hog)
1 or 2 garlic cloves, finely grated
½ jalapeno pepper, finely grated

The lamb racks are removed from the marinade and ready to be rinsed:

The lamb is patted dry before applying the dry rub ingredients:

Remember that part about trimming the excess fat?   This senior citizen griller forgot to do so.  No problem I’ll just do it now:

Now I have weird-looking lamb racks:

The dry rub is applied:

Love the way it turns fingers orange…reminds me of an old Cheetos joke:

Notice I’m coating the bone side first?

This is why.  If the meat side was done first a lot of rub would simply end up on the cutting board because there would be a lot of surface area of the meat touching the cutting board.  This way the meat side is protected from rub loss because the bend in the bones keeps the meat from the bone side propped off the board due to the concave shape of the bones. Better to lose some rubs off the short section of meat on the bone side than all along the meat side:

Now the meat side is coated:

The racks are entirely coated including ends and taken out to the grill:

Both racks are placed on Tom’s Big Green Egg which has been set up for indirect grilling at a temp of 250 degrees with a little oak wood in the coals for the smoke:

***Editor’s Note ~ For those of you that don’t have a Big Green Egg, or any other ceramic cooker like this, you are probably wondering how one can indirect grill by having the meat in the middle of the grate as in the picture above.  Notice that you can’t see the coals? That’s because there’s a deflector put under the meat that shields the meat and allows the heat to pass by on the outside and out the top.  On a regular grill, put the coals on one side an the meat on the other to get the same indirect effect***

I’m looking to indirect grill for an hour to an hour and a half or until the instant read thermometer reads 125.  Time could vary depending on the type of grill/heat of grill.

While the lamb racks are gently grilling it’s time to make the sauce/glaze.

First, to cut the heat down, remove the white flesh and the seeds.  I used the half jalepeno on the right.  If you want more heat, leave the seeds and the flesh:

Here I’m trying to grate the pepper and it turns out to be quite difficult:

These jalapenos came from Tom’s freezer and aren’t ideal for this as they are a little spongy.  Hint: don’t attempt to grate previously frozen jalapenos. They lose their rigidity and become rather soft and wiggly making grating difficult.  I suggest using a fresh pepper for this recipe.

The garlic cloves are grated:

The grated garlic and jalapeno are added to the honey and Blues Hog barbeque sauce:

Whisk together and set aside:

Time to go check the lamb…I’m hearing a chorus of yells from the outdoor kitchen.

I rush out to see what all the commotion was about and Tom points to the thermometer.  It’s only been 45 minutes and the internal temperature is 145, way past the desired 125 mark previously indicated:

Scott and Tom and our honored guests are not saying much but the looks I’m getting tell me they think I’ve really screwed this up because the next step calls for applying the sauce/glaze and grilling for another 20 minutes to caramelize the glaze.  I don’t want to serve them gray lamb.

***Editor’s Note ~ Since that probe thermometer has a built in alarm, it probably would’ve been a good idea if we had set that alarm to ring at 125. Mental note for us for the next time we do one of these deals at Tom’s***

Here’s what the racks looked like.  Meat pulling away from the bone but not too much:

I reinserted the probe thinking, perhaps, the probe was in contact with a bone thus yielding a hotter temp reading.  Not the case, so I pulled them inside and prepared to continue with the rest of the recipe regardless of the potential consequences.  Be sure to spell Fool with a capital F.

While cooling a bit inside the sauce/glaze is applied.  All I can think is, “That looks really good to this old griller.”

Again, sauce bone side up first, just like with the rub:

Full steam ahead!  Once the lamb racks are coated it’s back on the grill for another 20 minutes to get that glaze good and sticky.  Hoping this doesn’t end in disaster:

The glazed racks of lamb are pulled from the grill.  Notice a little char? That is to be expected considering the honey and sugar in the sauce:

Staying true to form the lamb racks are covered in foil and allowed to rest for 5-10 minutes to allow the juices, which are in an excited state to calm down and redistribute throughout the meat:

The racks are cut into individual lollipops and served to those in attendance.  Lo and behold, the center still exhibits a bit of pink!  I would call this a perfect medium:

What about taste, texture, and tenderness?  It was unanimous!  A definite home run!  Very tender, full of flavor, and melt-in-your mouth texture.  The 3-step process of marinade, dry rub, and glaze worked extremely well together.

Here’s the money shot taken on Tom’s outdoor granite counter… His outdoor kitchen is a great place to grill and chill:

The Barbaresco was great with the lamb.  What is it about Italian wines and food?  So good together.  Also consider a spicy Zinfandel or Shiraz with this recipe.  We hope you give this a try soon and share your experience with us.  We understand lamb is expensive but what a great Valentine’s Day treat for your significant other!  Think about it.  Grilled lamb, I hope it’s snowing, along with a great red wine and red roses on the table…what a great evening!

If you have any questions or comments about either of these dishes, feel free to leave them below or shoot me an email.

If you would like to see lamb dishes, click here.

Also, you can follow us on our GrillinFools Facebook page and post your own grillin pictures or join in on the general grillin conversation.  Or, you can follow us on twitter @GrillinFool to get all the updates from the site.

In the last few weeks and months, a new supplier of rubs, seasonings and hot sauces known as Crawdad’s Classics Gourmet Flavorings has been popping up all over the place in St. Louis and the Midwest in general.  This is a crowded market to try to break into, but they have done so with some great products.  My favorite I will be reviewing here – Crawmama’s Gourmet Dipping sauce. I know the logo above is Crawdad’s, but this is another product line of theirs that is outstanding.

The fist time I had heard of them was at a Blues game a couple weeks ago when I saw a sign over the condiments station that read, “Try a real ‘hot’ dog,” and the logo for Crawdad’s Classics.  Being a hot sauce junkie, I obliged and slathered my hotdog with the sauce. It was great.  It had nice kick but didn’t knock me over. I hate spicy stuff that is so spicy I can’t taste what I put it on.  What’s the point of that? And it doesn’t hurt to be the official hot sauce of both the St. Louis Blues and the St. Louis Cardinals to make me a fan.

Since then I’ve had two of their rubs as well as the habanero sauce which, much to my surprise is not hot.  Well, OK, it’s not “hot” in terms of habenero’s, but it’s still got some heat. But normally I don’t touch habanero sauce because the vast majority of hot sauce makers have no idea how to temper the heat in their insane desire to injure the taste buds of their customers. I don’t fault people that do that. There’s definitely a market for it, but I’m not part of the market. I prefer how Crawdad’s Classics does it. I can taste the habaneros and I can taste, well, anything after the habanero hits my tongue rather than the lingering effects of third degree burns on my taste buds.

Which brings me to this lovely Crawmama’s dipping sauce:

Anyone who has been on this site more than a couple times knows how much I love jerk flavoring because I get the heat I like plus many layers of flavors. That’s the same vibe I get from this sauce that is sweet and spicy and thick and gooey. It’s not nearly as hot as the jerk I slather on stuff and lights me on fire so all of you who shy away from that, and want that Caribbean flavor, this is it. It’s got hints of pineapple that counter the spice that sticks to the food thanks to how thick and cloying the sauce is. The first time I tried it I dipped blackened steak into it, but all I could think about was how it would be on ribs since it already had a BBQ sauce like consistency, if not even thicker.

So that’s what I did.  I got a bottle of the sauce, which can be found at Kenrick’s and Dierberg’s regularly and sometimes at Schnuck’s (but you might have to ask for it as they aren’t displaying it everywhere), and a couple slabs of baby back ribs from Kenrick’s:

I went simple here, salt and black pepper on each side:

Then onto a grill I set up for indirect grilling with some peach wood chips:

After a little more than an hour in the smoke they were ready for some sauce:

The smell of this stuff cooking and thickening is intoxicating.

About 90 minutes later, and a couple more bastings, I pulled the ribs:

And then after some time to rest we sliced and tore into those bad boys:

Excellent smoke ring, meat tender and juicy but not quite fall off the bone, and the sauce was sweet and spicy and oh so good.  I’m already thinking of how to make this again and improve the process.  And I just figured out how to do it.  Rather than go simple with the salt and pepper, why not hit it with a rub and combine two great Crawdad’s Classics products when I hit it with this rub before I slather them with the gooey, sticky sauce:

And just for fun, last night I put the Crawmama’s on a steak:

Mmmmmmm…

So far everything I’ve sampled by Crawdad’s Creations has been fantastic. I can’t wait to use it more extensively.  Next up, the BBQ rub and the dipping sauce on ribs.  I can’t wait.

This may be one of the easiest recipes we’ve ever done on here, but with many things, simple can be outstanding and this is both.

Ingredients:

12 dried dates
12 slices of prosciutto
12 slices of parmesan
12 toothpicks

Now, obviously, I am only doing 6 in this write up, but you get the idea.  For every date you use, you need one slice of prosciutto, one slice of parm and one toothpick.

First thing that needs to be done is to prep the dates.  These dates are not pitted so you need to take the pit out by slicing a slit in the side and popping the little nut like pit out:

And you need to take this little thing off the end if it’s there.  Not all the of the dates have it. All I did was peal it off with my finger:

Place the pitless date on top of a slice of parmesan and fold the prosciutto in half:

Then place the parmesan and date on the folded prosciutto and roll it up:

Now time to go in the smoker with some oak wood:

The temperature was set to 250, but there was no way that was accurate:

The problem was either there was a bad thermostat or this electric smoker wasn’t getting enough power.  Either way, it took almost three hours for these to cook.  I am not recommending you smoke these for 3 hours at 250. I have no idea how hot the smoker was or how long to smoke them for in degrees or minutes.  So how will you know when they are done?  Smoke them until the prosciutto looks like this, because these were delicious:

These were a fantastic combination of sweet and savory and a little crunch.  The dates were sweet, the prosciutto and cheese savory, with a nice smokiness on top of all that.  The prosciutto was a little crunchy around the edges too which added to the taste. This just might be the appetizer that sets your Super Bowl Party above the rest.

If you have any questions, feel free to leave them below or shoot me an email.

If you would like to see other sides and appetizers, click here.

Also, you can follow the Grillin Fools on their Facebook page where you can post your grillin own pictures or join the general grillin conversation.  Or, you can follow them on Twitter @GrillinFool

Pinwheels have received a bit of focus recently on our website so I thought about how to kick it up another notch.  How about a 3-meat pinwheel lollipop on a skewer?   I spoke to Scott about the idea and I think he thought I was slightly off kilter for suggesting it.  Well here we go into a fun recipe of grilled meat lollipops.

***Editor’s Note ~ Stay tuned at the bottom for a bonus cookout of these meat lollipops we did the week after we made them the first time***

Here’s a photo of me stumbling into the kitchen after a shopping trip to Kenrick’s… that always seems to bring a smile to my face.  I’m like a kid on Christmas morning:

Ingredients:

2 thin boneless rib eye steaks
½ lb ground sausage
2-4 slices smoked ham

I picked up several steaks as I planned to do additional lollipops later.  Kenrick’s had thin-sliced steaks ready and waiting at their service counter:

The steaks are placed on a cutting board and covered with plastic wrap while I wreak havoc on them with a tenderizer:

I don’t want you to think Kenrick’s steaks need tenderizing, they don’t, but this will flatten the steaks yielding a larger surface area and make it easier to roll.   Remember, we’re doing layers here.

Notice how the flattened steak has spread out compared to the non-flattened partner:

From a different angle you can see how much thinner the flattened steak is:

Snuggled side-by-side:

Notice the placement of thinner end to wider end and vice versa to give a more uniform outer layer.  Be sure the steaks are tight against each other, a slight overlap might not be a bad idea. Here are both steaks flattened:

A half pound or so of ground sausage will be layered on top of the steak:

Sausage was approximately a quarter inch thick, but you could easily go a bit thinner:

Great off-the-bone ham from Kenrick’s. We did a bit of snacking on this stuff while doing our prep:

I’m only using 2 slices for this effort but would increase another layer or 2 next time around.  Hey!  This is the first time attempting this which is a learning experience, much the same as it would be for you:

***Editor’s Note ~ In the bonus cookout below, we lessened the sausage and increased the ham to four slices. Being a week apart between tastings, neither dad nor I could determine which was better. Both were really good, so feel free to use your own discretion here***

Now the tricky part… rolling this baby up into a log.  Be sure to keep it as tight as possible:

I made it!  However, I didn’t quite cover all the sausage:

Could I have flattened the steak more to cover?  Possibly, but the steak can tear easily and fall apart if pounded too thin.  I could’ve stopped shortly before the end of the roll with the layer of sausage to insure better coverage by the steak layer when rolled.

Cover with plastic wrap and place in the freezer for an hour.  The roll will stiffen, but not freeze, which will keep all the layers together after it’s sliced:

Freezer time is up and it’s on to the lollipop part.  I used 6” wooden skewers that had soaked in water for a couple hours to prevent burning.  Longer skewers could easily be substituted or even metal skewers:

Here’s my poor overlap again but also notice the seam made by the rib eye.  This is where you’ll want to place the skewers so the concoction holds together:

Skewers are inserted every inch or so right along the seam:

All skewers inserted.  Looks kind of silly doesn’t it?  Like barbeque acupuncture?

Simply and carefully slice between the skewers.  Use a gentle sawing effort as opposed to cutting straight down:

Viola!  Raw meat lollipop!

The grill is set up with coals to one side.  The lollipops were placed right over a hot fire with the skewers over the side without the heat so they would not ignite:

Here’s the first one flipped… looking good!  Typically, 3-4 minutes per side over high heat will do the trick but it could vary by grill and also weather:

I’d say Scott, who assisted, had a very good bed of coals. Don’t walk away from these once they hit the fire. The sausage in the pinwheel will send a great deal of fat into the fire and can cause flare ups:

Looks close to being done.  Notice the 3 on the cutting board in the background?  They came from the end that wasn’t sealed very well and we decided not to include them in the photos.  We thought they might fall apart so they were set aside.  Later I put them on the grill for my wife who had just returned home from work and the end result came out as great as the others.  They didn’t look as pretty going on the grill but they were great coming off in both appearance and taste.

The lollipops are moved away from direct heat to bake a bit, while we poured the dipping sauces:

The lollipops are plated with sauces for dipping:

The barbeque sauce could also be glazed on the pops on the grill.  The pops were great but we agreed they benefited from sauce.  No rubs or seasonings were applied to any meats for this effort.  Experimentation will likely incorporate a favorite rub, herb, and cheese to add different character.  Different sausages such as chorizo could yield a spicy pop.  There are many combinations possible so please send me your ideas or leave a note on our Facebook Fan Page.  This is a fun recipe that adults and kids both will enjoy and we hope you try at your next family barbeque.

What were the sauces used?  Here they are, Blues Hog Barbecue Sauce and Trader Joe’s Aioli Garlic Mustard Sauce — both were outstanding with this:

***Time for the bonus cookout***

All three Grillin’ Fools, Tom, Scott, and yours truly, gathered at Tom’s recently for an afternoon/evening of epic grilling.  You can find a photo anthology of all that we did during this lengthy and spectacular grill session on our Facebook page or check back here to see all the recipes as we put them up that include: gumbo done entirely on the grill; prosciutto and parmesan wrapped dates which is already up on the site; an amazing lamb recipe; goose breast and water chestnuts wrapped in prosciutto; a venison recipe as well as a product review of the same sauce we used on these meat lollipops on ribs. We also had a couple of honored guests that would get to try the meat lollipops.  Earlier in this post I mentioned that basting or glazing the lollipops would be a tasty alternative and this was the perfect time to try.

I prepped the lollipops at home and brought along Crawdad’s Classics Hot Sauce and Crawmama’s Dipping Sauce for basting sauces:

We sampled the hot sauce last week and thought it to be very, very good.   Some hot sauce is just… well…hot.  This sauce is different. It has a quality throughout that I call, “hot sauce with character.”  We sampled the dipping sauce last week served with blackened steak by Chris Avolio of Hot Shots fame.  What a tasty combination that turned out to be so good I decided to try it on the lollipops.

Here they are hitting the grill, a brand new Char-Broil Quantum Infrared Grill:

What a great addition to our grilling equipment family.  Expect to see a product review forthcoming.

***Editor’s Note ~ Since this was the inaugural cruise of this sweet grill, I thought I would post a couple of the pictures of the virgin grill from earlier in the day***

***Back to your regularly scheduled blogcast***

Now the lollipops are flipped with some serious grill marks appearing.

A couple are basted with hot sauce:

The dipping sauce is drizzled on the rest of the lollipops:

Classic plated shot:

My wife had shopped that day for a variety of plates for us to use in our presentations.  Scott was eager to use one of the new dishes but in his haste he forgot to remove the manufacturer’s sticker.   So much for professional presentation.

OK, back to the food.  The samples were quickly devoured by everyone present and compliments were handed out unanimously.  Great lollipops, great Crawdad’s Classics Hot Sauce, and great Crawmamma’s Dipping Sauce.

If you have any questions or comments about either of these dishes, feel free to leave them below or shoot me an email.

If you would like to see other sides and appetizers, click here.

Also, you can follow us on our GrillinFools Facebook page and post your own grillin pictures or join in on the general grillin conversation.  Or, you can follow us on twitter @GrillinFool to get all the updates from the site.

I know that this sounds a little weird.  Coffee? Chocolate?  Ribs? But bear with me. I was leery when I made a coffee steak recently, but it was so good it made me start to think about coffee and ribs, but then I felt like I needed to balance the coffee out with something sweet which is where the chocolate came from and then I had to hit it with some heat and thus the ancho chili powder. In the end, it came out really well balanced and something I will definitely repeat.

***Editor’s Note ~ While I initially labeled these Coffee, Cocoa Ribs, they are actually Coffee, Chocolate Ribs.  I didn’t use cocoa rather ground chocolate with cocoa.***

Ingredients:

3 slabs of ribs
1/4 cup coffee, finely ground (I used a decaf hazelnut blend, although decaf nor hazelnut are required)
1/4 ground chocolate with cocoa
2 tbsp ancho chili powder (you can use regular chili powder, but I would cut it by 25-50%)
1 tbsp paprika
1 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground mustard
Salt and black pepper

Combine all ingredients except for the ribs, salt and pepper in a bowl and then mix together well:

Now to the ribs.  These were brined overnight in apple juice, garlic, black pepper and salt.  The ratio is one gallon of fluid per cup of salt.  Add in plenty of black pepper and a quarter to half cup of garlic. The next day rinse the ribs and pat them dry with paper towels:

I realize the recipe calls for three slabs of ribs and I only have two slabs (four half slabs) here. The amounts in the recipe are to make enough rub to cover three slabs, but you don’t have to do three slabs. Keep the rub sealed and dry and it will be good for weeks.

Lay out the slabs, bone side up.  This is very important and I will explain why in a minute:

Here is where the salt and black pepper come into play.  Hit the bottom side heavy with coarse salt and fresh cracked black pepper:

You could put the salt and pepper into the rub, but I like to know that the salt and pepper is evenly distributed to the meat in the amounts I want as most of the time one rub has a different salt content than another.

Then cover with the rub:

After the rub is applied, kneed the rub into the meat and let it set for a few minutes so it will adhere better to the meat.

Then flip.  Here’s why you always do the bone side first. If you had done the meat side first, and then flipped, wherever the rubbed meat touched the cutting board, the rub will stick to the board rather than the meat when you pick the slabs up to put them on the grill.  This way, the natural concave of the bones keeps the meat and the rub elevated off the cutting board, and saves you from having to reapply rub to the meat side when you put them on the grill. See how the bones elevate the ribs off the board in the picture below:

Now hit the other side with salt, pepper and the rub:

Time to get the Char-Broil 940X ready:

We set up the grill for two zone grilling with coals and smoke wood on one side, meat on the other:

I chose hickory over a milder fruit wood like peach or apple, because I wanted to make sure the smoke could stand up to what I was expecting to be a pretty powerful rub.

We’re big proponents of the high heat method for ribs which is a bit of a misnomer. It’s only like 300 degrees so it’s more of a medium heat method but it doesn’t sound as good. The goal is 300 (give or take 25 degrees either way) for two hours. So far so good:

After 30 minutes, the ribs look like this:

Remember what’s in the rub. These things have only been on the grill 30 minutes and yet they look like they’re burnt and yet they’re pretty much raw at this point.

Here they are after an hour:

And here they are a little over 90 minutes:

They are just starting to glisten with fat rendering out and they are supposed to be done in 30 minutes.  Well, the timeline is great in the summer, but not on a day with a high of 39 and a heavy crosswind. Each time I opened the grill to take a status photo for this post, I added smoke wood and charcoal if needed, but the time it takes to get the grill back to full temp on a day like that is a lot longer than a 90 degree day in July.  And the other problem is this:

With as cold and windy as it was, I couldn’t keep the temp above 240. Well, I could’ve but I didn’t add enough extra charcoal to compensate.  At the 90 minute mark I rotated the ribs and at the two and a half hour mark, here’s what they looked like:

After testing the tension of the meat by picking up the slabs with the tongs, we decided that the two thinner half slabs (bottom) were done and decided to put them in foil and put them in the microwave to stay warm while the thicker ones stayed on the grill:

And then I moved the thicker ones closer to the heat:

After another 30 minutes, I pulled the thicker ones.

Here are the thinner ones at the three hour mark (two and a half hours on the grill, 30 minutes in the foil in a powered off microwave):

Yeah, those look terrible.  But they weren’t burnt.  That may be the only downfall of these ribs. There’s no way to tell if they’re burnt until you taste them because the coffee is black and the chocolate has a lot of sugar in it that will blacken quickly. The outward appearance may not be all that great, but they are a mighty fine rib:

And here are the fatter ones:

This rub combines the savory, earthy flavor of the coffee, with the sweet of the chocolate and the heat of the chili. The coriander, paprika, ginger, mustard, and oregano help to balance out this well layered rub.  The only draw back is how black they get, but don’t let that stop you from trying this recipe next time you make ribs.

If you have any questions, feel free to leave them below or shoot me an email.

If you would like other rib, click here.

Also, you can follow the Grillin Fools on their Facebook page where you can post your grillin own pictures or join the general grillin conversation.  Or, you can follow them on Twitter @GrillinFool