Here’s another installment from Arthur Aguirre.  The guy has some serious BBQ (and photography) skills.  In this post Arthur attacks one of the rising phenomenons of BBQing – The MOINK ball.  Not only does he show you how to do it, but he also explains the origins of the mighty MOINK.  These little nuggets of deliciousness are always a huge hit.  From here, I’ll hand it over to Arthur to show you how they’re done…

If you love Atomic Buffalo Turds (ABT’s), you will love MOINK balls. A simple description of MOINK balls are BBQ bacon wrapped meatballs. Without a doubt these tiny tender treats are the biggest thing to hit the grilling scene since ABT’s. The world wide craze of the MOINK ball is credited to a Larry Gaian author of the BBQ Grail.

***Editor’s Note ~ BBQ Grail is an excellent blog/website very similar to what we do here at GrillinFools.com.  I highly recommend Larry’s site***

Since the MOINK balls introduction into the BBQ world, it has earned positive reviews from people all over the world fortunate enough to taste the mighty morsels of smokiness.

The name MOINK is not an acronym, it is the combination of the two main ingredients: beef and pork. When referencing these ingredients, we know they come respectively from a cow and a pig. Hence, the sounds they make are moo and oink. Therefore, the creation was aptly named MOINK ball.

To understand how the MOINK ball was conceived, we need to understand its purpose. First, it was designed to feed the masses. Second, it utilizes two ingredients used often by families – bacon and frozen meatballs. Third, it must be grilled or smoked outdoors. And finally, MOINK balls are aerodynamically shaped for fast consumption.

End of summary.

So, when the 4^th of July came charging upon us, the parties were a plenty. I made a batch of MOINK balls each for two different parties. Unquestionably, MOINK balls are a tasty and an inexpensive way to impress people.

There are five major items needed for MOINK balls:

1. Pre-made, all-beef meatballs
2. Bacon
3. Rub
4. BBQ sauce
5. Smoke wood

When I made a batch of MOINK balls for the first party, I took a conservative approach. This party always had a ton of food and there are plenty of leftovers. Also, early estimates were close to about 60 people attending the party. With that in mind, I bought just a bag of frozen meatballs because I didn’t want to take leftovers home with me, especially when they sit out too long. When I had an idea on how many MOINK balls I’ll be making, I drew up my game plan.

Ingredients:

1 bag of frozen meatballs [approx. 50]
2lb of bacon (2 packages)
John Henry’s Pecan Rub
Blues Hog Tennessee Red Sauce
Hickory wood chunks
Toothpicks

Pre-made, all-beef meatballs are the official meatballs of MOINK balls. BBQ Grail set up guidelines which do not allow fresh meatballs. However, one can definitely make fresh meatballs, just call them meatballs wrapped in bacon. The only exceptions are for international grillers where fresh meatballs are perfectly acceptable.

***Editor’s Note ~ That’s right.  These things are so popular there are purists out there and guidelines that are different for international grillers***

Moving on with our MOINK balls, the first batch is being set up for indirect heat on the grill manufacturer that shall not be named. I’m going with lump charcoal here, so by the time it gets hot enough the MOINK balls will be ready.

First, I have to assemble the meats. The meatballs are thawed but still firm enough to handle without falling apart:

The bacon is a 1lb package of strips, 2 may be needed. Each strip is way too long for one meatball, so cut the bacon in half. It’s easier to cut the bacon when it is semi frozen. The bacon is too much like rubber at room temperature:

I suggest buying the thin cheap bacon rather than the thick cut bacon because it cooks faster and it’s crispier when it’s done.

Use one half piece of bacon and wrap it around the meatball, then stick it with a toothpick to keep it together:

Assembling the bacon and meatballs may take a while. This is a good opportunity to get the kids involved in some BBQ activity:

***Editor’s Note ~ Love the Abita Turbo Dog in the background!!***

Next, I poured the rub all over the meat:

At this point, the grill will be ready to go. I banked the charcoal to one side of the kettle. In addition, I placed the MOINK balls on the grill opposite of the coals so I could indirect grill the MOINKS and keep the temperatures down:

Then, I added some hickory wood chunks. Also, I made sure the lid was placed with the vent over the meat so the smoke would have to travel across the meat before leaving through the vent. I leave the bottom vents open all the way too. The temp range will be somewhere between 350 and 375. Cooking time will be about 1 to 1 ½ hours.

After an hour I check on the MOINK balls:

They look just about done so I brush some BBQ sauce over them. I leave them in a little longer, just enough to crisp up the bacon. As a result, the bacon turned out very dark, almost black:

It isn’t that they are burnt, it’s just the rub and BBQ sauce has lots of sugar in it. It’s almost like bark on a pork shoulder or brisket.

At the time, I thought I really screwed up. I ate a couple of them and they didn’t taste burnt. I put them in a foil pan, brushed more Tennessee Red on them and covered them until they got to the party. Meanwhile, I thought to myself, nobody is going to like these.

So we arrive at the party and I put the MOINK balls on the table and I jump in the pool for a swim. After a while of being in the pool, some brave soul must have tried a MOINK ball because I heard people talking about how others should try these little meatballs. They were a huge hit and the talk of the party. In fact, they were all gone before the main course was served!

The following week, I made a second batch for a family reunion party:

This time, I smoked them for 2 ½ hours at 225 degrees on the smoker with hickory wood:

For me, these were much better than the first batch. Although, the bacon could have been crispier, but I didn’t have time to do it. However, a few people at the reunion who were also at the pool party said they preferred the first batch of MOINK balls.

I used a different rub and sauce for the second batch and I made twice as many for roughly the same amount of people. They too went over really well, but they were not all gone. I love these little succulent samples, I look forward to making more. And so do a bunch of people who loved them at the party.

If you have any questions about the MOINK balls, feel free to leave a comment below or shoot me an email and I will forward it to Arthur.  Although, if he keeps kicking ass like this I might have to give him his own Grillin Fools email address!!

If you are interested in other appetizers and sides click here.

And you can follow the Grillin Fools on our Facebook page and post your own grillin pics just like Arthur did.

No Mexican food this time, but I got a packaged corned beef brisket (in a brine) at the market. I didn’t know what to do with this piece of meat, so I went online to see what I can do. Lo and behold, I was searching GrillinFools.com and came across a few corned beef brisket recipes. I found that Tom, Scott and Greg have cooked up a corned beef for a St. Patty’s Day trifecta earlier this year. As I went through all the recipes, Scott had the most traditional recipe. For me, the traditional recipe is something I always want to try for any first attempt. In the recipe, Scott mentioned that corned beef brisket is not typically smoked and that smoking it is actually pastrami. I got very excited because pastrami is one of my favorite lunch meats. Scott went on to do a modified corned beef. However, I intend to go all the way with the pastrami.

Inside the package, the brisket had a brine solution and a seasoning pack. This was great because most of the work was already done for me. I tossed away the seasoning, who knows what that stuff tastes like.

Notice this isn’t the whole brisket, this is just the point half of it. The other part of the brisket is the flat.  Any of these cuts or the whole brisket can be used in this recipe. As you can see, it has quite a bit of fat on one side, and generally, the other side is well trimmed:

The first task was to use Scott’s method of soaking the brisket.  To leach the salt out submerse it in water.  Change the water one time for every pound of meat plus one change of the water.

Again, you can see how grey the beef looks when it is done soaking:

The second task is to make the pastrami rub. This rub is almost basic.  I say almost because all you really need is black pepper and ground coriander. I found this rub recipe on a website and I simplified it further:

4 Tbsp coarse ground black pepper
2 Tbsp ground coriander
1 Tbsp granulated garlic
1 Tsp paprika
1 Tsp onion powder
½ Tsp thyme

Mix all the ingredients together and rub it on the brisket:

While the corned beef sits at room temperature, I fire up the grill manufacturer that shall not be named. I fill my smoker accessory with water, charcoal and two types of wood – pecan and cherry:

After about 10 minutes the temperature is in the range I like:

The corned beef brisket is put on the grill and it’s ready to absorb a lot of smoke:

I want to point out that I forgot to put a drip pan underneath the brisket. I didn’t notice this until it was almost done. It was quite messy and the most critical thing was that my bottom air vents were getting clogged. This made air control a little more difficult.

After an hour in the smoke, the soon to be pastrami is cruising along at 230 degrees despite the semi clogged vents:

You can see some spots are starting to blacken a little bit:

At the 2 hour mark, I inserted the digital temp gauge in the pastrami. I want to get the internal temperature up to 160 degrees because I’m going put it in the fridge overnight and serve it for lunch the next day:

After a total time of 5.5 hours, the internal temp hit 160 degrees. The pastrami has a wonderfully exterior dark crust and it smells so good:

I put off temptation to start eating and sealed the pan with a foil sheet:

Into the fridge the pastrami went. My brother and my folks were coming over for a BBQ the next day.  They were getting here early enough for lunch. I was hoping they would get a kick out of having some homemade pastrami. We all love pastrami because we grew up eating pastrami sandwiches at a Southern California chain restaurant called “The Hat”. We’re a long ways from SoCal now, but I’m attempting to create some nostalgia on the grill.

***Editor’s note ~ For those not serving it the next day, let the pastrami rest for a good 15-20 minutes before slicing***

Finally, the next day arrives. One hour before lunch would be served, I fire up the tamale steam pot. About 5 minutes later, I place the pastrami in the steamer. By using the steam pot I am further breaking down the connective tissue in the meat and adding moisture to the cooking process. As a result, the pastrami will be very moist and juicy:

The same result can be achieved in the microwave if you wrap the pastrami in wet paper towels. In addition, this process is great for leftovers.

About 45 minutes in the steam pot on high heat is sufficient. At this point the steam is carrying the aroma throughout my house, it’s amazing!

I started to slice the pastrami into sandwich size portions:

The Hat serves their pastrami in thin slices. Unfortunately, I don’t have a meat slicer or a knife that can get the job done. Instead, I sliced thick chucks because my sandwiches must have lots of meat. In traditional Hat fashion, the sandwich is served on bread with mustard and pickles:

When I asked my Mom if my pastrami reminded her of “The Hat” she said, “Not really”. Oh well, *sigh*, she ate all of her pastrami sandwich…that has to say something:

In my successful attempt at pastrami, I will make a few changes next time:

1) Trim the fat cap to a very thin layer of fat. It didn’t quite melt away as much as I hoped.

2) Put a drip pan under the meat!

3) Try it without the steam (just curious)

4) Stop trying to get my parents approval.

If you have any questions or comments, simply leave a comment below or shoot me an e-mail and I’ll pass it along to Arthur.

Click here for other beef recipes on the grill.

Also, you can follow the Grillin Fools on our Facebook page where you can post your own grilling pictures.

With the success of the Reverse Seared Pork Steaks I decided to try the method with country style ribs.  These meaty hunks lend themselves nicely to this process as they are not as thin as pork steaks and can handle extensive periods of smoke without drying out.  The process is fairly simple but extremely satisfying…

I started with nine country style ribs that I marinaded overnight in Cherry Coke Zero.  It’s kind of a long story as to why I had Cherry Coke Zero and would’ve preferred just Cherry Coke for this but I was going for the cherry more than the coke.  And both are very acidic so they act as great tenderizers.  After an all night bath in the Coke I patted them dry with paper towels and placed them on a large cutting board:

I then applied some smoked salt and granulated garlic from Penzey’s before adding Dad’s go to rub which is essentially Raichken’s KC Sweet and Smoky Rub.  The reason for the salt is Dad told me he went light on the salt in the last batch he made for me.

Rub Ingredients:

2/3 cup light brown sugar
2/3 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup paprika
¼ cup seasoned salt
¼ cup smoked salt or hickory-smoked salt
¼ cup onion salt
¼ cup celery salt
2 tbsp fresh ground black pepper
2 tbsp chili powder
2 tsp mustard powder
1 tsp poultry seasoning
1 tsp ground ginger
½ tsp cayenne pepper

This recipe makes enough rub for about 100 country style ribs.  We always make extra to keep it on hand.

Now with country style ribs you can’t just hit the top and the bottom with rub.  You have to hit it on all four sides:

What I recommend is hitting it on top and two sides on the cutting board and then putting it top side down on the grill and hitting the bottom.  You will save a ton of rub that way.  If you do all four sides on the cutting board the bottom side will leave a bunch of rub stuck to the board and you will have to reapply.

I set up the grill for indirect grilling.  Coals on the right, and ribs on the left underneath the chimney on my offset smoker.  Why put the ribs under the chimney?  Because of the coals and smoke wood are under the chimney the smoke will go straight out rather than across your meat and impart that amazing flavor and smoke ring:

Since I used the Cherry Coke Zero for the marinade, I went with that theme and used cherry wood chunks for my smoke.  If you don’t have access to cherry wood, check this extensive list of woods and what they are best with and find something you have locally and go with what you have available.

The grill was set at 250 for what I expected to be a two hour smoke before searing:

It was a beautiful day.  The sun was shining, the birds were chirping, the flowers next to my grill were doing great:

I went inside and was talking to some people online about what a wonderful day to grill I was experiencing when I looked out the window and saw everything had changed in less than 20 minutes:

The sky was dark, the wind was howling and I had to scramble.  But all is good.  What’s a garage for other than storing cars and crap?  Why grilling of course:

At one hour I checked the ribs and added another chunk of cherry:

As you can see in the background on the left it was raining.  After sitting on the porch with my 2 year old for a little while watching it pour he started singing the Itsy Bitsy Spider.  I explained what a water spout was and pointed to one of ours.  So of course he wanted to go play with the spout.  His mom wasn’t home so I said, “go for it.”  For the first time in his life he played in the rain.  Do you think he enjoyed himself?

Back to the ribs.  One hour and 45 minutes total on the grill and they were close to being ready for the sear but not quite.  I used the thumb test to check for doneness which can be used on more than steaks.  They were still a little spongy, so I left them on, but they were looking good, and as you can see the sun was back out:

After two hours they were ready for a sear:

All I did was get a quick char directly over the flames on all sides to form a flavor crust.  But for some reason I didn’t get a pic of that.  Sorry.

After the quick sear they got a slathering of sauce by dunking them into a pot of sauce one at a time:

The sauce was what I had on hand, Sweet Baby Rays, doctored with some brown sugar, honey, minced garlic, chili powder and a little dried mustard.  Use whatever sauce you prefer.  I put the ribs back on the side with no heat and closed the lid to caramelize the sauce.  After 15 minutes I gave them another bath and another 15 minutes in the grill.  Here is the final product, what do you think?

Juicy with a nice smoke ring.  Layers of flavor from the marinade, to the smoke ring, to the flavor crust, to the sauce.  Awesome.

If you have any questions about the the country style ribs above, simply leave a comment below or email me.

Click here If you are interested in other pork recipes and here if you want other rib recipes.

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With our upcoming event at St. Luke’s called Guys, Grills, and Good Health we decided to document a particularly healthy meal made entirely on the grill.  My dad will take over now and show you how to do it step by step and picture by picture…

This is a rather simple method to grill something that isn’t loaded with fat and all those other things usually associated with grilling beef or pork.  I began with a 10-lb Honeysuckle Bone-n Turkey Breast, rinsed and gravy packet removed—last time I checked gravy wasn’t exactly on the healthy list:

I’ve trimmed the excess skin and plan to spatchcock (butterfly) the breast for easier handling and even cooking.

The backbone is removed with a good pair of poultry shears.  As I proceeded I decided to go ahead and remove all the bones to really make the grilling process simple:

It would’ve been easier to remove the boneless breasts while the rascal was still whole but I was already into it.  I discovered this was more effort than a non-pro meat cutter should handle and created a lot of extra work.  The Turkey Breast could also be cooked whole and then sliced off the bone if desired.

Now I have two boneless halves and will add the healthy mixture below to help flavor the bird and maintain moistness.

1 cup Smart Balance Buttery Spread
2 tbsp. Minced Garlic (or more or less to your taste)
2 tbsp. Tony Chachere’s Creole Seasoning
1/4 cup white wine (reserve for later after you stuff the skin)

A really simple mixture and I was originally planning to simply add the Garlic to the Spread but decided to kick it up a notch with the Creole Seasoning.  Feel free to substitute your favorite seasoning.  The Smart Balance was allowed to come to room temperature for ease of combining with the other ingredients.  Smart Balance and garlic:

Then the creole seasoning:

Here’s the process of adding the mixture under the skin which will likely require a few toothpicks to secure the skin in place.  You could also completely remove the skin and simply baste with the mixture if desired for an even healthier meal.  I’m going for healthy here but the golden brown skin is so attractive, holds the mixture in place, and virtually cooks away.

Work your fingers under the skin to separate the area between skin and meat—sort of like trying to put a latex glove on.  Next spoon or push the mixture into the area created and spread around as much as possible.

I’ve opted to forgo the toothpicks this time around and place the Breast halves into a shallow broiler pan to grill:

***Editor’s note ~ Skipping the pan here and putting the breasts straight on the grill will be healthier than this version as the fat will drip down into the fire rather than stay in the pan***

Reserve a bit of the mixture to melt and occasionally baste the bird while grilling.  I added a few splashes of white wine to liquefy the mixture a bit and may need to add more liquid later.

The old CharBroil is set up for the “flank method”—coals on the left and right with Turkey in the center:

This grill may get retired soon or actually transferred to Scott as I have a new CB 940X in the garage awaiting assembly.  This model had been discontinued and was recently re-introduced by the folks at CharBroil.  Bless them for this!  There will be a break-in posting soon.

Apricot (in foreground) and a few pieces of Nectarine retrieved from my wood stash were used to add the smoke flavor.  Oh yeah!  I’ve got a wood stash and perhaps there will be photos of that in an upcoming post.  It’s a huge benefit knowing some friends that are in the tree removal business:

*** Editor’s note ~ if you would like to see the most extensive list of things you can smoke with on the web. I have more than 50 things ranging from all manner of woods to herbs, grape vines, and even onion or garlic cloves click here***

The Turkey goes on the grill and later the coals are refreshed and a chunk of each wood is added. The wine was added to the Smart Balance/garlic/creole seasoning mixture for basting later.  The lid was closed and I went to work on the sides for this meal:

***Editors note ~ While Dad didn’t do it here, I recommend putting the fat part of the breast closest to the fire so you don’t risk drying out the tip of the skinny part.  With the smart balance basting constantly it’s not as big of an issue but I would do it none the less***

I picked up some new crop California Asparagus at the local grocer to grill with a drizzle of olive oil, cracked pepper, and a small amount of coarse salt.  Fresh Sweet Potatoes will be pre-cooked—boiled about 10 minutes—then cooled, thick-sliced, and brushed with olive oil to be finished on the grill to gather that smoky flavor:

Wine pairing for this meal—is this the unhealthy part?—is a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc:

Typically this varietal from that region imparts a hint of citrus which I’m hoping compliments the Creole Seasoning and smoky flavor of the Turkey.  I don’t think you could go wrong with a Chard here either—even a glass of light red—Pinot Noir or Red Burgundy will certainly compliment Turkey as well.

The thermometer indicates 300 degrees in the pan at 30 minutes in.  Liquid?  The mixture under the skin has melted and the natural juices from the Turkey are bubbling in the broiler pan.  I’m occasionally basting the bird with the leftover mixture:

The wine is corked and I’m perched upon my grilling post out back and sampling a few of the nibblers I had placed on the direct heat and basted with the mixture.  The view is beautiful.  My neighbor, Dave R., has over the years planted the edge of the dam with daffodils that are now in full bloom and reflecting off the mirror surface of the water on this calm, peaceful day.  The Pear trees are blooming, the Plum is about to burst forth, and soon the flowering Crabapple trees will bring their splash of color to the scene.  What a beautiful time to be grillin’ and chillin’:

Here’s a pic one hour in with temp reading abut 325.  Another chunk of nectarine wood is added.  Another coating is basted on the bird and I’m probably in trouble with Mimi.  The broiler pan is getting some serious stuff in the bottom that will likely have to be soaked for a week to get it clean.  Here’s the deal – I cook, she cleans up.  I do help though…..sometimes:

The sweet potatoes are sliced and drizzled with the oil and ready to go on the grill.  The same drizzle is applied to the Asparagus with a small amount of coarse salt and cracked pepper added:

After 90 minutes the Turkey is pulled from the grill to rest under some foil.  Always let meat rest after pulling it from the grill.  The juices are in an excited state and will ooze out immediately after cutting into it.  If you let it rest a bit then the juices settle down and stay in the meat when sliced:

If you don’t butterfly the the breast and split it in two cooking time would be longer.  While the Turkey rests is the perfect amount of time to finish the sides.  The coal grate is raised and the Sweet Potatoes go on.  When they finish I’ll move them to the center, off the direct heat, and begin the Asparagus:

Here’s a pic of the finished Sweets and the Asparagus on the heat.  Once the Asparagus is finished it will be time to carve the Turkey Breasts:

The turkey sliced:

Here’s the meal plated:

The asparagus was still crisp and full of smoky flavor, the sweet potatoes were cooked through but still firm and a bit of Smart Balance Spread was added to top them off.  The turkey was cooked thoroughly although moist in most parts and drier in others.  I probably could’ve pulled it 15 minutes sooner at one hour 15 minutes on the grill as it would continue to bake while resting foil-covered.  It was very flavorful and I didn’t miss real butter at all.  I will certainly prepare this again.  The turkey had a mild smoky flavor and the touch of Creole Seasoning was just enough.   The wine was delightful with the meal.

Now for the best part—leftover Turkey sandwiches the next day.  Whole grain Sarah Lee bread with a little honey mustard and you’ve got another healthy meal or two.

As usual if you have any questions or comments leave a comment below or send me an email.

Other turkey recipes can be found here.  Don’t forget about chicken.

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Inspired by Master Raichlen I decided to shake things up a bit and take some ribs into a new direction.  These Asian ribs are marinaded and slathered in a coconut peanut sauce that is phenomenal.  If you are looking to shake things up a bit with your ribs, click below to see how I did that with this Asian inspired recipe…

Ingredients (for one slab)

3/4 cup of unsweetened coconut milk
2/3 cup of peanut butter (creamy or chunky, but if you go chunky add more chicken broth)
1/2 cup chicken broth
2 tbsp fresh garlic, minced
1 tbs fresh ginger, minced
1 green onion, minced
1 tsp of Thai chili paste (more or less to taste)
1 tsp hoisin sauce
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp fresh lime juice
Black and white pepper

One note on the coconut milk.  Coconut milk has a pretty high fat content and can congeal in the can.  Don’t worry if it’s solid.  It’s perfectly normal if it looks like this:

Put it into a bowl and stir it up to get it back to liquid form, and then combine all ingredients into a pot and bring to a boil, stirring frequently:

Let the sauce cool and then use half of the sauce to marinade the meat overnight, saving the other half to brush on the meat while cooking and as a sauce to apply when serving:

Now place it on a grill and indirect for 2 hours at 275-300 degrees and smoke with your favorite smoke wood.  I used apricot wood.

Here are the ribs on the grill after 1 hour.  These ribs were done with chunky peanut butter.  The half slab on the upper left and the one on the bottom are the Asian ribs.  The other two are apple pumpkin ribs which you can learn about by clicking here:

The chunks in the pic above are Bologna Bites.  I highly recommend trying them.  Click here to see how to make them.

Here are the ribs after two hours and are ready to be pulled of the grill and have browned up nicely after I braised them twice with the sauce:

Here they are on the cutting board and ready to be sampled by the Official Grillin Fools tasters:

And here are the tasters:

That’s from left to right, Brian F, Scott P, Brad M, and Tim D.  And of course if someone gets out a camera these guys start hamming it up:

And here’s the aftermath and maybe the best testament to how good the ribs were:

You can serve them plain or slather them with sauce.  The flavor is more intense if you add the sauce:

If you have any questions about the Asian ribs, feel free to email me or simply leave a comment below.

If you are interested in other rib recipes, click here.

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

It was delicious, but I wanted to see if I could perfect it.  I didn’t do all that much to expand on what I did before but I did make it considerably better.  Click below and see how I did it…

Instead of buying 5 pounds of bologna like I did the first time I went with just about the last inch and a half of the chub.  I then sliced that into eighths, scored it around the outside and applied a rub.  The rub was:

1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1 tbsp brown sugar
2 tbsp granulated garlic
1tbsp onion powder
1/4 tsp cinnamon
black and white pepper

No salt needed as there is plenty of sodium in the bologna

Here are the 8 chunks covered in the rub:

The reason I did them in chunks was to maximize the surface area which is also why I scored them around the outside after I chunked them and before I put the rub on.  I just ran a knife around them about a quarter to half inch deep.

Now place the chunks on the grill and smoke for an hour at 250.  I used Apricot for the smoke wood.  Here they are around three different kinds of ribs I was doing at the same time:

After an hour here is what they look like:

And a close up of the scoring:

That’s it.  Very simple but amazing.  I used just standard bologna but you could use beef or specialty bologna as well.

If you have any questions about the Bologna Bites, feel free to email me or simply leave a comment below.

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

Ahhhh, my favorite time of year is here.  It’s officially Fall.  The temp is dropping, soon the leaves will be too after that magnificent color change.  The Cards are heading to the playoffs, football is back, well in other cities its back, no so much here in St. Louis.  The Blues are in training camp, Mizzou is off to a 3-0 start and my Irish just eked one out against Michigan State.  Halloween is just around the corner and the pumpkin ales are on the store shelves.  It’s a glorious time my friends.

Oh, and did I mention it’s the single greatest time of year to grill?  Most people think it’s the summer.  That’s just not the case.  Think about it.  It’s 95 degrees outside, let’s go build a fire and stand around it? Firing up the grill when it’s chilly outside makes much more sense than adding more heat to a hot summer day doesn’t it?  Now if I could get Shawn and Blinda, hosts of Your Livable Garden in Houston and owners of Mirror Lake Designs, up to St. Louis to build me one of those outdoor kitchens with the ceiling fans I might be singing a different tune.  While I grill all year round some of the most miserable cookouts for me are on those ridiculously muggy summer days that we get here in St. Louis.

All of this revelry in the season got me thinking of some sort of fall themed recipe.  It took some doing but I finally came up with the Grillin Fools official recipe for the Fall – Apple-Pumpkin Ribs.  Bear with me here.  Click below to see the steps I took to come up with surprisingly easy recipe that I initially did my best to over think and overdo.  The final result, though, will impress you and your friends.  And realize that this recipe was inspired by the beer shown above…

OK, so let’s start off with the inspiration for this.  O’Fallon’s Pumpkin Ale:

This is probably my favorite beer.  I don’t know if it would be if I could get it all year round but I can’t wait for it to hit every year at the beginning of September and it just makes me believe it is Fall outside when I taste it.  I wanted to grill something that when I tasted it would have the same effect.

Just to give you an idea of how this recipe came into being I thought I would show you how badly I messed it up before I got it right.  My first attempt was less than impressive.  First I tried marinating ribs in actual pumpkin pie filling:

MmmmmMmmmmm.  Appetizing, huh?

Yeah, didn’t think so.

What a huge orange mess that was.  But I wasn’t done wrecking the ribs with the pumpkin pie filling marinade.  Oh no.  I had a ways to go yet before these thing were thoroughly bad.  I also tried to infuse the flavors that make a good pumpkin pie via a rub.  I ground up whole cloves and cinnamon sticks to be combined with brown sugar, ground ginger, allspice and granulated garlic for the rub.  It was way over the top.  Fresh ground cinnamon and cloves can be overpowering.  It was just an assault on the taste buds.

My poor in laws were subjected to the first iteration of this.  My lovely Mother in Law actually suggested that I tone it down and keep it simple and it was her advice that helped me come up with the final product which I tested out a few days later.

The next Thursday was the first game of the NFL season and I had some of my boys over for the game.  One of them, Bill, had expressed a desire a few days prior to learn how to grill ribs.  I told him to go pick some up and that I would teach him.  Ribs 101 if you will.  He had 2.5 slabs of baby backs and I told him to skin the membrane off, put them in ziplocks with apple cider, a half cup of brown sugar and a few teaspoons of fresh minced garlic.  He put that in the fridge overnight and then came over the next evening before the game so I could show him how to grill them.

I walked Bill through the basics of making a rub for two of the slabs but the last half slab I decided to try my Mother in Law’s advice.  Keep it simple.  And again, I took inspiration from the pumpkin beer.  The pumpkin beer does not taste overwhelming like pumpkins.  It tastes like the spices that makes pumpkin pie so distinctive – cinnamon, clove, ginger, all spice, maybe nutmeg.  If they only had something that was comprised of all those ingredients?  Well they do.  It’s called, sort of appropriately, pumpkin pie spice:

The rub was comprised of 4 ingredients and two of them were black and white pepper.  The rub was simply equal parts pumpkin pie spice shown above and granulated garlic along with a few cranks of black and white pepper.  I put a little coarse salt on each side of the ribs before I applied the rub but that was it.

Nothing fancy in terms of grilling the ribs.  Just the basic two hour method I’ve started using exclusively now where I indirect the ribs at about 275 for two hours.  A more detailed write up on the 2 hour cooking process can be found here.

They were a huge hit with my second set of guinea pig tasters:

Now that the picture was over with, back to business:

Starting from the left we have Chad, Art, Roy and Bill. BTW, those 5 half slabs of ribs were gone in all of about 3 minutes along with the, appropriately enough, apple fatty I did.

So the following weekend, I decided to try a couple more variations just to make sure I had the process down.  I took two slabs of ribs, one I just applied the rub to and put in a ziplock overnight.  The second I marinated in apple cider, garlic and brown sugar as Bill had done a few days prior.  And not just any apple cider.  That dark stuff that is available from the local farmers this time of year:

The next evening I pulled the ribs out of the bags.  The ones with a rub on them got a little coarse salt and straight on the grill.  The other ones were taken out of the wet marinade and patted dry, then the rub was applied along with a little salt.  I also tried some Szechuan salt I got from Penzey’s on one of the marinated half slabs but it had no effect on the final result at all.  Still trying to find a way to utilize the flavor of that salt but it was not with this recipe.

Here they are on the grill about ready to be taken inside to be carved up after being smoked for two hours with, you guessed it, apple wood:

Sliced.  Notice there is not a prominent a smoke ring with apple as you would get with a cherry or say a red oak.  That’s not a bad thing.  It’s just the nature of apple wood.  It’s more subtle than cherry in flavor and the smoke ring:

Three bones of each kind on the plate:

In the end, the ribs marinated in the apple cider/garlic/brown sugar with the pumpkin pie/granulated garlic/pepper rub were by far the best of the three.  The apple cider really permeates the meat and the rub gave that distinct pie flavoring as well as a bit of garlic so as to not make them over the top  sweet.  I may do these again and add a little brown sugar to the rub.  See, I’m never satisfied.  I gotta keep tweaking until it’s just right, but there’s always something more to tweak it with so will it ever be just right?  Alas, this is my lot in life.

And I just wanted to give you an idea of how obsessive I can be to get something like this right.  I had baby back ribs three times in a seven day span simply because I wanted to make sure they were perfect.  I’m a slave to this obsession I tell my wife is just a hobby.

If you liked the rib recipe above you might want to check these out the many other ways we have done on this site by clicking here.

And as usual, if you have any questions or comments about the Apple-Pumpkin Ribs, please respond below or shoot me an email.

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

One of the hardest things to teach people about grilling is dealing with ever changing circumstances that may or may not be out of their control.  Grilling on a muggy summer day is much different than grilling in a blustery Autumn day and certain things should be done to account for the different weather.  Grilling one day with an empty grill and then another with the bottom full of ash and thus a fire much more subdued than the previous cook out can greatly slow down the cooking process.  Cooking chicken over direct heat and trying to keep the flare ups down with a squirt bottle while keeping the heat up in the grill enough to still cook the meat.  There are many times the griller has to overcome some unforeseen problem.

I doubt I will ever be able to document all the obstacles I have ever faced while grilling but this last weekend I had a minor catastrophe that I had to deal with.  I did a Brisket Sunday and made a crucial mistake that could’ve have easily resulted in an epic failure.  Click below to see what I did to screw up and how I responded to that blunder…

Before I get into how this cookout went terribly wrong let’s start from the beginning.  I picked up this 5.5 beauty at a local meat market near my house:

This is a pic of the brisket with the fat cap up.  Someone asked me recently what the difference was.  The above is fat cap up, below is fat cap down:

See the difference?  I noticed a bad spot on the fat side that I removed.  This happens from time to time.  As long as the bad spot is small just trim it out.  This was about the size of a dime and in the fat rather than the meat.  Had it been larger and in the meat I would’ve taken the cut back to the butcher:

You may be wondering what that container is that the meat is in.  It’s advertised as something specifically designed for marinading meat.  The top and bottom of the inside of the container are lined with these little pyramids:

I guess the theory is that the squared inverted dimples would elevate the meat a bit and allow more marinade to touch it.  Maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t, but it’s the perfect size for a brisket that is too big for a gallon ziplock bag.

Now for the prep.  I dusted the outside of the brisket with granulated garlic, black and white pepper:

Now on to the marinade.  Nothing fancy.  Just horseradish mustard:

I slathered it all over the meat on each side – you can see the divot I created carving out that little bad spot:

Closed it off and into the fridge on Friday night.  Next stop, Sunday morning – That’s right, a two day marinade:

Sunday morning I pulled it from the fridge and prepped my rub:

1 tsp chili powder
1/4 tsp dried mustard
2 tsp brown sugar
1 tsp granulated garlic
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp smoked salt (regular salt can be used here)
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp each of black and white pepper

Here is the brisket in a disposable aluminum pan with the rub.  The dry mop ingredients next to it:

The dry mop ingredients are as follows:

2 tsp brown sugar
1/2 tsp dried mustard
1 tsp red pepper flakes
1 tsp smoked salt (again use what you have here in terms of salt)
1/2 tsp each of black and white pepper:

Mix that together with the wet ingredients:
1 pumpkin beer (insert you fave beer here)
1 cup white vinegar

The primary wood I used here was hickory:

I also used some small apple chunks as well.  The little chunks are better than chips but they don’t last long.  Not a fan so I was just sort of getting rid of them.  If you’re not a fan of hickory or don’t have access to it, check this link for a list of close to 50 different woods and such that you can use to smoke meat.

I set this up for indirect grilling.  I realize that the grill is an offset smoker but I get much more consistent results just using it as a horizontal drum smoker with the indirect cooking method.  With the chimney on the left I put the coals and smoke wood on the right and the meat on the left so the smoke traverses over the meat on its way out of the chamber via the chimney:

And yes, that is a thermometer probe inserted into the thickest part of the brisket.  I have never used this probe in meat before.  I have just used it to check cooking temps in the grills I use.  I wanted to quantify the process a little more so I used the thermometer here.

The grill always runs hot at first because it doesn’t seal very well. So it ran about 300 for the first 90 minutes or so until I could get the temp down. I mopped at 90 minutes at which time the internal temp read about 150:

I mopped it again an hour later. By this time I had gotten the temp to where I wanted it about 225-25o  by reducing the amount of coals on the right.  As you can see a nice crust is forming with the rub:

After 3.5 hours the internal temp was around 180.  This is where it gets sort of interesting. I foiled it. Covered the top of the aluminum tray with two layers of foil to make sure I got a good seal:

I realize that’s not all that interesting, but right after I foiled it I heard my son scream. 17 months old. He had gone up to a card table leaning against the wall that I had out to set up for dinner later and pulled it down on himself. He was OK but it scared the crap out of him. Well I rushed in to make sure he’s OK.  My wife was holding and soothing him.  In a couple of minutes he’s running around again like nothing happened. After that I went downstairs to watch football. And that was my mistake.

About an hour later I went up to check the fire. I go outside and the lid to the grill is still open from when I foiled the meat. When my son screamed I turned immediately and went inside.  I didn’t close the lid on the grill.  My meager fire that was holding the cooking chamber at 225 was just a few tiny bits of coals and the internal temp of the brisket was around 155 (the temp is on the left, the right is the alarm point at which it will start flashing if it goes over that):

I figure that the meat did some steaming in the pan for a while before it cooled down, but I basically stopped cooking for an hour and had a dozen people coming over for some brisket in 4 hours. Many things were going through my head including the words, “epic fail,” and how many pizzas I would need to feed 12.

Rather than give up hope I decided to whatever it was I could to try to salvage this mess.  I had to start up a half a chimney of coals as there was no saving the little fire I had left in the grill. Once I got a nice pile of coals I literally slid the brisket right over the coals. Jump starting brisket like this may not have been a good idea. Brisket is all about low and slow to break down the connective tissue so it will be tender. But I had to do something to other than push dinner back to after 9:00 pm.

I decided I couldn’t do much more so I went back downstairs to watch more football. About 45 minutes later I smelled something burning. The grill was close to a window near to the where I was in the basement. I ran back up, slid it over to the other side and continue to cook it indirect.

That burning smell turned out to be from the thickened juices at the bottom of the pan.  As they steamed out the amount of the juices got less and less. The edges of the little pool of juices in the pan blackened and burned a bit which was much better than the alternative.  And the only reason it was not the meat is I placed the brisket fat cap down. A lot of people put the fat cap up so it will baste the meat but to me that really diminishes the mop sauce which bastes and flavorizes at the same time. That sauce is not penetrating that fat cap but it will penetrate the meat on the other side.  That fat cap insulated the meat from the direct heat when I kick started the cooking process.

90 minutes after kick starting it the internal temp hit 200:

I pulled the foil off – check out the steam action:

I left it on the grill for another 15 or so in the pan. I then took it out of the pan and placed it on a large sheet of foil and wrapped it up:

You can see some of the blackened spots in the aluminum pan that gave off the burnt smell.  I then put it in the microwave to stay warm.  A cooler or an oven works well too:

90 minutes later it was the moment of truth – carving time.  The wine was to drown my sorrows should this thing be like shoe leather.  That is a Zen of Zin Zinfandel from Ravenswood that is really good and around $12:

So how does it look:

I’m not sure if the picture does it justice but it was spectacular. So tender it melted in our mouths. Despite the disaster of that hour off in the middle of the process, the foil really saved my bacon, or in this case my brisket.

The steaming action in the foil seems to accelerate the process of breaking down those connective tissues and keeps it very moist all the while.  And while everyone told me it was really good, the real testament was my 10 year old niece, Katherine, who went back for seconds and thirds.  That and there being just about none left at the end.

A couple of things about slicing brisket – the thinner the better and across the grain.

Now onto the actual meal.  Couple of sammies for me:

And coleslaw is not just for pulled pork.  It’s great on brisket too:

Still some room on that plate.  What about sides?  Fresh green beans, or as my son calls them, mean beans, with plenty of bacon:

And my wife’s cheesy potatoes made in muffin tins:

The recipe for the potatoes is sliced potatoes, layered with colby jack cheese and green onions.  A little salt and pepper and two table spoons of heavy cream per potato muffin.  Then 350 degrees in the oven covered with foil for 30 minutes and then uncovered for 30 more minutes

Heavy cream and bacon?  Brisket and coleslaw?  Not the healthiest of meals.  But I did have whole grain Sarah Lee buns on hand to lighten the load just a little.  That may not be a lot but hey, pick your battles.  The rest of the week I’ll be watching my portions and my carbs.  But on the weekend I eat like this:

So what’s the lesson here?  Foiling is your friend with brisket.  I plan on doing another one of these again soon to try to perfect the process without the one hour lapse in the middle.  Then again, this turned out so well, maybe I should do it this way again?!?!  Nah…

If you liked this recipe you may want to check out other beef products we have done on the grill by clicking here.

As usual, if you have any questions about the brisket, leave a comment below or shoot me an email.

Here is a link to a discussion of this recipe on the air on the Houston airwaves.

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

In an effort to show that not all grilling is fatty pork or cholesterol filled red meat the Grillin Fools are trying to tackle the lighter side of grilling.  We’ve been doing more veggies and fish lately and Dad decided to do this old favorite – Smoked Turkey Breast.  Click below to see step by step, pic by pic, how to smoke a turkey breast yourself.  And if those pics above don’t get you to click below then we can’t help you.  That’s about as good as it gets.  Dad will be walking you through this one so I hand it over to him…

This began with a 7 lb. bone-in turkey breast:

The goal was to keep it simple and healthy grilling—not something all of us do when we think of grilling meat or poultry. There were no exotic rubs applied or overnight brines, just healthy turkey breast grilled with the indirect method with some wood smoke thrown into the mix.   Did I mention healthy?? Well I cheated a bit and inserted butter into it but if you are concerned about the butter then simply omit that step in the process.

First the turkey breast is rinsed then patted dry and a little work is required to get this bird to lay relatively flat on the grill for more even cooking. Using a method similar to spatchcocking the backbone and ribcage are removed using kitchen shears. Click here to see a step by step on how to butterfly or spatchcock poultry. I’ve done it without this treatment and it still turned out fine. This can be accomplished with a large sharp knife or shears but the shears are much safer and easier.  I highly recommend using them instead of a knife:

Butterflied or spatchcocked:

Once everything is trimmed away the breast will lay flatter and cook more evenly and a bit quicker:

With the trimming complete, time for a bit—well OK—a lot of garlic butter to be added under the skin to baste the bird while cooking and help retain moisture. The garlic butter was merely a softened stick of salted butter—unsalted works fine too—and a couple of large spoonfuls of minced garlic mixed together.

***Editor’s note ~ You didn’t think we were going completely healthy did you?  Also, bulk sausage can be used instead of the garlic butter.  Andoullie and Chorizo are amazing.  But if you want to go a lot healthier, try a butter substitute which work really well, which can be seen here***

The skin is loosened by running your fingers underneath and spreading the distance between the skin and the meat. Then simply force the mixture in with your fingers as shown:

You want to go really deep to get full coverage of the breasts:

A few toothpicks were added to secure the skin.  More on those toothpicks in a minute.

The old Charbroil is set up for the “flank method” of indirect grilling which is simply positioning the coals to the left and right and the breast placed in the middle. Notice the drip pan in the middle of the coal grate. Three cups of water and one beer (why not?) have been added to put moisture into the cooking box:

***Editor’s note ~ There is actually a really good reason not to add the beer to the drip pan.  It’s a waste of beer.  None of the flavor of the beer will actually be added to the bird.  The drip pan is designed to do two things, act as a heat sink and add moisture to the chamber.  The only way it will add flavor is if you actually steep herbs in it.  Essentially you need something much more pungent than a beer diluted in water or even if you just filled it all with beer.  It would need to be something a lot more pungent than beer to impart any flavor into the bird.  Save that beer for me next time!!***

Please be aware that when you grill with a lot of open space whatever you are grilling will loose moisture more rapidly than if you had a grill full of meat or poultry. This simple addition to whatever you grill is, in my opinion, a great idea. In this case 75% or so of the grill space is empty so as the liquid in the drip pan heats it begins to simmer and steam thus adding moisture to the cooking chamber. This idea has been suggested by some of the oldest pit-masters in the country. An alternative would be to place a pan of liquid directly on the grill grate and set the turkey breast inside. I think, perhaps, this might be more “steam-grilling” than grilling but I may give it a try in the future. The steam-grilling method was employed using a mop sauce and a shallow pan housing a beef brisket in an earlier post and it was superb. Going forward, I will be employing this method of adding moisture when grilling for extended periods of time. Does it help? I can’t quantify that but it certainly won’t harm the process.

I chose peach wood for this session:

Why peach? The sweet flavors from fruit woods such as apple, peach, and apricot are particularly appealing when grilling poultry. Cherry wood will discolor the skin pretty badly. Making it almost black.  While the bird will taste great it will not look all that appetizing.  Some of the more pungent woods such as hickory can easily overpower poultry but if used it should be used moderately.  Click this link to see a summary of over 50 different types of smokes woods and such that can be used to accentuate the flavor of just about anything you can grill as well as the foods they pair best with.

Here’s the bird on the grill:

And here is good pic of those toothpicks used to secure the skin.  They aren’t needed at this point but as the skin loses moisture while cooking it will shrink back and it can shrink back off the meat which is not something you want:

Here’s a pic of the turkey breast 45 minutes in and it’s browning nicely. The skin can be brushed with olive oil to retard burning but in this case I simply smeared the remaining garlic butter over the skin.

A few more coals and chunks of peach wood were added and the lid closed once again to continue smoking the breast.

***Editor’s note ~ It’s always a good idea to limit the amount of times you open a grill when grilling for any significant period of time.  Each time you do all the heat escapes and it has to build up again.  So when you have to open the grill try to get everything you need to get done in one opening such as basting the breast, adding coal and wood, taking pictures for a goofy website about grilling, etc.  This goes for more than just turkey.***

Mother Nature decided to bless us with a thunderstorm (weather has never dampened the spirit of the GrillinFools) so coals and smoke wood were added between the drops:

It didn’t take long for the wood to start smoking despite the rain:

Note to self: if a bonus arrives next year I’ve got to cover that patio! I love being outside during a storm. What could be better than being outside during a cooling summer shower, a smoking grill, and a cool beverage in hand? Does it get any better than that?

Here’s a pic approximately and hour and 15 minutes since the breast was placed on the grill.

In spite of the storm the fire is holding heat and we should complete the cooking process in 30-45 minutes. I apologize for not providing temperature readings even though I now have a digital thermometer obtained at the urging of the Original Grillin’ Fool recently. By the time I located a battery for the contraption I was well into the process but will attempt to provide this information in the future. This is a bit foreign to me as I’ve never used one in my grilling history. I have always gone by sight, touch, and past experience but will endeavor to add temperature information going forward. Right about now you can look for an editor’s note giving me some kind of grief for not using the gadget.

***Editor’s note ~ First, a thermometer is a ‘contraption?’  OK there old timer.  Second we realize it’s very hard to teach feel.  I apologize for the my dad not making these recipes easier to follow by quantifying the temps and the cooking times.  With coals on both sides he estimated the temps to be between 300-350 and took about 1.75-2 hours.  If you are using an internal thermometer I would suggest pulling the breast at 160 degrees which should rise to about 165 after it rests for a few minutes.***

The turkey breast is removed from the grill an hour and 45 minutes after grilling began. It appears to be nicely browned from the heat and peach wood smoke.

***Editor’s note ~ That looks so good, gotta post a second pic of that.***

It was loosely foil-covered and allowed to rest for 20 minutes before carving to allow the juices to calm down from the excited state they are in so they don’t leak out all over the cutting board the instant the meat is sliced:

When the knife was brought forth and slices were rendered the bird was very moist and tender.

The peach wood has also done the job and the flavor was great. While I enjoyed this hot meal sometimes I think the best part is the leftover turkey sandwiches the next day.

If you have any questions about the Turkey Dad did please either post a comment below or email him at Greg@GrillinFools.com

If you like this recipe, here are a couple more that may interest you that are on the healthier side of grilling:

Jamaican Jerk Chicken

Indirect Chicken

Another smoked turkey recipe

Rotisserie Chicken Smoked on a Gas Grill

Grilled Sugar Snap Peas and Sweet Potatoes

Grilled Baked Potatoes

Grilled Romaine Lettuce

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

I give those with gas grills a lot of grief.  “Why not just haul your stove out onto the deck to grill,” I often say.  I make no attempts to hide the fact that I am a charcoal purist, but I understand that some people like the ease and convenience of a gas grill.  Other charcoal purists, charcoal snob if you will, will say that gas grills just aren’t all that versatile.  They are good for steaks, burgers, brats, but that’s about it.  They can only do hot and fast grilling.  And while they are pretty much designed for hot and fast grilling, it doesn’t mean they can’t be used for other things.

So for you gas grill owners out there, this post is for you.   I will show you how to turn your outdoor stove into a smoker.  That’s right.  Low and slow on a gas grill….

First off, whenever I grill chicken I brine them before hand.  Always.  The results are almost magical.  Anyone can make a good chicken but brining takes it to a whole other level.  What is brining?  It’s dropping meat into a salt water solution for a period of time, usually 12 hours or so.  More on the solution itself later.    The thought of adding salt to meat, other than right before it goes on the grill, always made me think of drying the meat out.  But there is legit science behind brining.

Brining performs three essential functions.  First, the salt partially dissolves muscle filaments.  Muscle filaments contract when cooking and make meat tough.  Why is a well done steak not as tender as a medium rare steak?  More contraction of the muscle filaments.  If they are partially dissolved they cannot contract as much, thus the salt makes the meat more tender.

Second, the salt has an impact on the proteins in the meat.  It allows for the meat to absorb and retain more fluid.  The meat is going to lose fluid in the cooking process but if you can somehow add more before you cook then you will cut down on the overall fluid loss at the end thus the meat will be juicier.

Now you can stop here and just use a salt water solution to brine the meat, but why not go an extra step to the third thing a brine can do which is introduce flavors into the meat as well.  I just said that the brine allows the meat to absorb and retain more moisture.  Now where will meat completely submerged in liquid get that extra moisture?  From the water around it.  By adding flavor to that water you will add flavor to the meat as it draws the moisture in.

What do people always wish for when cooking?  Meat that is moist, tender and flavorful.  This gives you a leg up on all three.  Are you sold on brining yet?  If not, just try it once.  I guarantee you will be then.

So how does one create a brine?  Simple, fill a container with water, salt, and flavorizers.  This is not rocket science or chemistry.  Basically stick to the 1 cup of salt per gallon of liquid rule and then add whatever you like to add flavor.  For me that usually involves some sort of fruit, some sugars, garlic and/or onion and some acidic soda.  For fruit I have used citric fruits like oranges, lemons, limes, but I have also used apples and peaches.  The riper the better here.  For sugars I have used maple syrup, white sugar, brown sugar, turbinado sugar, and molasses.  For soda I have used white and dark sodas.

One quick note, not all salts are the same.  Table salt  weighs about 10 ounces per cup whereas kosher salt can weigh in anywhere between 5-8 ounces.  Some brands are heavier, some lighter.  If you go with Kosher salt you want to kick up the amount.  Regular table salt go with the 1 cup rule.  Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt, you want to be closer to two cups and Morton’s Kosher, look to be around 1.5 cups per gallon of fluid.

For this brine I was putting the chickens in a cooler so I needed quite a lot of water to submerge all three chickens.  I estimated the water to be about 3 gallons.  The ingredients are as follows:

• 3 gallons of water
• 3 cups table salt
• 5 peaches – sliced into bite size chunks
• 2 cans of cola
• 1/2 large onion – coarse chopped (you could use more here, it was just what I had left over in the fridge)
• 18 cloves of garlic – coarse chopped
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup maple syrup

Combine all the ingredients into a sterilized cooler and stir quite a bit to get the salt to dissolve then drop in the chickens:

Normally I can do two chickens in a large pot and put it in the fridge overnight but I could not get all three of the chickens in my pot.  Hence the cooler.  Now I need to make sure that the whole concoction stays cold overnight.  This seven pound bag of ice did the trick:

The next day be sure to rinse the chickens when you remove them from the brine otherwise they can be too salty.

I decided to rotisserize these chickens because I was going for low maintenance.  If I did them indirect I would have the chickens on one side and the heat on the other and with three I would likely be repositioning multiple times as the one closest to the fire cooked faster.  This way the rotisserie keeps the chickens moving for me.  You can most definitely do them indirect if you do not have a rotisserie, just expect a little more maintenance.

Couple of tips about rotisserie grilling chickens.  First, use bakers twine and tie the legs and wings in tight to the bodies or the appendages will cook fast and burn.  Second, when doing three chickens, each one will require a rotisserie fork to keep it rotating along with the spit.  And third, when doing three chickens, put the smallest bird in the middle.  The other two will insulate the bird and slow down the cooking of it to help all three get done at the same time.

The chickens below were rinsed, patted dry, put on the spit (with a rotisserie fork in each) tied off and dusted with granulated garlic:

This grill has long front, middle and back burners that run the entire width of the grill.  I just turned on the front and the back.  You may need to adjust accordingly based on your burner configuration or if you are going indirect.

Now to the smoke.  How do you smoke on a gas grill without making a huge mess?  There are all kinds of after market wood tins or chip trays that you can buy to hold the wood and keep the ash contained but I say skip that and buy yourself some chips, yeah, I said chips, and some tin foil:

Those apricot chips are not soaked.  Just a couple handfuls on a sheet of tin foil.  In the pic above I only used one handful.  It only smoked for about 30 minutes so I upped it to two handfuls when I made the other two.  Now wad up the foil into a ball and poke holes into the top of the ball:

Now off to the grill.  Put the ball directly on the flames if you can or in the hottest location if not.  In this case there was more room between the spit and the front than the spit and the back of the grill.  So I turned the front burner to high and the back to medium.  I was looking to hit 400 for the first 30 minutes so this works perfectly.  Here is that foil ball on the hot burner after a few minutes.  It takes a few minutes because the foil insulates the chips from the heat:

Wait another few minutes, close the lid and now your gas grill is a smoker:

I wound up using three foil balls throughout the process.  The first one with only one handful of chips only smoked for about 30 minutes.  The other two went for at least 45.  When one smoke ball is done remove it and replace with another one.  Since I was doing chicken here, I only used one at a time.  Too much smoke can overpower chicken.  But if you were doing say ribs or a loin on a gas grill by all means use two or even three foil balls at a time to produce extra smoke.

After 30 minutes the grill was not producing anymore smoke so I lifted the lid to check my chicken and replace the smoke ball. The chicken skin had browned nicely and tightened up a bit, so I replaced the foil ball with a fresh one and proceeded to brush on my garlic butter sauce:

Wait.  Garlic butter sauce?  Did I forget to mention that?  Oops.  I took about a dozen cloves of garlic and plopped them in one of those little coffee grinders.  This one had never been used for coffee.  It’s just used to grind up herbs and garlic.  I basically pureed the garlic and then added the garlic to a pot that I had melted four sticks of sweet butter in.  Once the skin had browned a bit and tightened up I braised the chickens with the garlic butter sauce using a pastry brush every 30 minutes or so.

After I closed the lid I dropped the front burner down to medium to try to get the temp down to 300.

Here we have another basting session after about an hour on the grill:

Another 45 minutes later (total time so far about one hour and 45 minutes) and these are looking ready to come off the grill.

Some of the other items were taking too long so I dropped the temp to just under 200 for another 30 minutes or so.  You want to cook these till the breast is about 160 degrees.  So stop the rotisserie and shove a meat thermometer into the breast.  Pull them from the grill and let them rest for 5-10 minutes and they should continue to cook until they hit the FDA recommended 165.  If you don’t want to keep poking the bird with a thermometer (something I do not recommend as you will lose a lot of juice that way), look for the juices naturally running out of the birds as they go around.  If the juices are clear all the way around on all three they are done.  Or buy chickens with those little popping thermometers already inserted into the breasts.

Here we have the finished product:

Juicy enough for you?  This was the hit of Father’s day.  A must try for any Grillin Fool!!!

If you have any questions about the above dish please feel free to comment below or email me at Scott@GrillinFools.com.

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