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January 30, 2006
Pork Preparation and Injection Recipe
The following is how we prepare our pork for competition or catering:
This is how we prep our pork butts and shoulders. We always use Happy Holla rub and follow it with a coating of olive oil. Deeply massage the meat until you have a liquefied product. We also lightly sprinkle either black pepper or a product we have just started using (McCormick’s Black pepper and garlic) over the meat. Put into a plastic bag and refrigerate overnight.
The Q Company’s Pork Marinade/Injection
2 quarts water
1 C white sugar
½ C maple syrup
1 T granulated garlic
¼ C soy sauce
½ C Orange Blossom honey
¾ C dry sherry
¼ C Worcestershire sauce
1 ½ T salt
Combine all ingredients. Bring almost to a boil, then cool. Inject the liquid into your pork before smoking.
Smoke at 220 -240* to an internal temperature of 190* for pulled pork. To a temperature of 170* for sliced pork.
Posted by The General at 11:55 AM | Comments (0)January 26, 2006
Chicken preparation and the cooking process
Chicken – Marinade: Adapted by us from a Grey Poupon recipe in their booklet “Meals Made Easy.” We have kicked it up a notch to handle large quantities. Place the ingredients listed below into a gallon size Zip Loc bag: 8 oz Grey Poupon Dijon mustard 1 C packed light brown sugar 1 C soy sauce Add your chicken, zip the bag, and refrigerate overnight.
Next day, drain excess liquid and season with Happy Holla Rub or your favorite rub.
Smoke chicken at 240* to an internal temperature of 170*. We like to finish off the chicken by grilling the thighs over a higher heat so that the chicken skin gets crisp. (If you do this, pull the thighs off the smoker before the internal temp reaches 170* and then monitor the internal temp on the grill.)
Variation of above recipe: 8 oz. Grey Poupon Dijon mustard 24 oz of Italian dressing 4 T minced garlic 14 oz of chicken stock Can also add: 8 oz of apple cider vinegar
Posted by The General at 12:08 AM | Comments (0)January 25, 2006
Sharing Secrets
Janet and Paul Prudhomme are sharing BBQ secrets on the floor of the Catersource 2006 tradeshow!
January 23, 2006
Catersource 2006: Notes for our seminar
This is the Word document that Wiley and I used to construct our presentation. All of the info we mention is in here...recipes, phone numbers, etc.
Posted by The General at 06:56 PM | Comments (0)5 Great Books and Recipes for you to try
Here are five of Wiley's favorite books and we have pointed out five recipes from each that we especially like!
Your best overall reference to BBQ cookbooks is Ten Speed Press in California. See http://www.tenspeedpress.com/
Another one we like is Karen Adler’s Pig Out Publications. See http://www.pigoutpublications.com/
We like all of Steve Raichlen’s books, but some focus more on grilling than smoking. Here are a few of our often-used recipes from his BBQ USA.
1. Smoky Meatloaf – p. 212. This is guaranteed to make a hit in either a restaurant or catering setting. This is one of Janet’s favorites!
2. Eastern North Carolina Style vinegar sauce – p. 239.
3. Tennessee Pork Loin with Whiskey, Brown Sugar and Mustard – p. 262. Great for sliced pork sandwiches or an upgrade from traditional pulled pork.
4. Rack of Pork – p. 272. So different that people are destined to say, “Where did you get this?” This is our favorite at the holiday season. We usually have good luck finding it at Costco. Swift packs it. You’ll turn some heads with this one.
5. Kate’s Mountain Vinegar Sauce – p. 304. If you love a peppery vinegar sauce, this is for you! This recipe makes about 1½ gallons.
After being landlocked for most of our lives, we now live on the coast in Savannah, GA. We plan on integrating a lot of grilled and smoked fish into our menu. Wiley is especially fond of Karen Adler and Judy Fertig’s book, Fish & Shellfish Grilled & Smoked. We especially like all the accompanying sauces.
Here are some winners from this great book:
1. Halibut Filet with Red Pepper Beurre Blanc – p. 64.
2. Teriyaki Catfish – p. 39.
3. Whole Snapper with Tarragon Butter and Wilted Spinach – p. 106.
4. Apple Cider Smoked Trout with Horseradish Cream – p. 227.
5. Plank Prawns with Bearnaise Butter – p. 258.
Don’t ever overlook manufacturer’s suggested recipes for using their product. They have test kitchens and in-house chefs. They have a lot riding on those recipes and they want them to be good!
We use the Grey Poupon mustard marinade for our competition chicken. The first time we used it, we won first place in chicken at the Nashville Shores competition.
An author by the name of Ceil Dyer has compiled a list of these recipes in the book entitled Best Recipes – From the Backs of Boxes, Bottles, Cans and Jars.
We have tried almost everything in the Jamisons' great book Smoke and Spice: Cooking with Smoke, the Real Way to Barbecue, on Your Charcoal Grill, Water Smoker, or Wood-Burning Pit!
1. Vidalias ‘n’ Georgia BBQ Sauce – p. 234.
2. Smokey Corn on the Cob – p. 243.
3. Garlic Cheese Grits – p. 255. Grits are BIG in Savannah!
4. Country Collard Greens – p. 317.
5. Quick Chick – p. 174.
The Thrill of the Grill: Techniques, Recipes &Down-Home Barbecue by Chris Schlesinger and John Willoughby has done a lot to bring BBQ to a higher level.
1. Spice Rubbed Grilled Monkfish – p. 90.
2. BBQ Bologna – p. 277. We have always had fun smoking this for our crew when either catering or competing. Once the guests or the other teams taste it, you won’t get it back! Chris suggests fitting accompaniments to be RC Cola and a Moon Pie!
3. Black Bean Salad – p. 319.
4. East Coast Grilled Maple Pecan Bread Pudding – p. 335. Always remember that BBQ is not Beef, Pork and Chicken!
5. Lime-marinated Grilled Kingfish with Red Onion and Mango Relish – p. 91
January 18, 2006
Last Night's Dinner and an Easy Catfish Recipe
This is for our neighbor "Wild Bill" who is always looking for easy recipes which taste great!
Liberally sprinkle both sides of catfish fillets with Blackened Seasoning. Coat the catfish with olive oil and rub the seasoning into the fish. Place the fish into a black iron skillet. Add a tablespoon of butter. Turn the burner on high and when it starts to sizzle, cut back on the heat to medium. Turn the fillets a couple times during the cooking process. Cook to an internal temperature of 140*. (Place thermometer in the middle of the thickest part of each fillet.)
Serve with some wilted spinach and enjoy!
**Last night I used Cajun's Choice Blackened Seasoning. Check out some of their recipes!
Posted by The General at 03:58 PM | Comments (1)Best Beans on the Planet
Here is our baked bean recipe adapted from Steve Raichlen’s BBQ:USA p. 630. Steve calls it “Best Beans on the Planet.” It makes the best beans we have ever had!
This recipe is geared to fill a half pan. 40 to 50 servings per half pan.
1 lb smoked brisket, chopped (can substitute chopped pork)
1 15 oz can black beans, rinsed and drained
1 15 oz can dark red kidney beans (can substitute pinto beans), rinsed and drained
1 53 oz can Bush’s Best Original Beans (Do Not Drain)
1 large sweet onion, finely chopped
1 red bell pepper, cored (no seeds), finely chopped
1 green bell pepper, cored (no seeds), finely chopped
4 T minced garlic
2 Cups of red barbecue sauce (sweet)
1 ½ Cups firmly packed light brown sugar
½ Cup Dijon mustard
Sea salt or Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste.
Mix all ingredients. Put in smoker at 220 – 240* for 4-5 hours. Stir hourly.
Posted by The General at 11:47 AM | Comments (0)January 15, 2006
Our Favorite Salmon Recipe
This recipe won the Salmon Anything But, Anything Goes contest in the Pacific Northwest. This is our recipe of choice when grilling salmon!
Use filleted salmon with the skin left on. Marinate the salmon with the following sauce for ½ hour before cooking:
¼ c soy sauce
½ c salad oil
Juice of ½ lemon
2 or 3 drops Tabasco Sauce
1 clove garlic, chopped
1 T chopped dill, fresh
Fire should not be too hot. Place skin side down on the grill and cook using indirect heat. Add a couple of bay leaves on the coals for flavor while cooking. Baste every 5 minutes with remainder of sauce until done. Cook to an internal temperature of 140* in the center of the salmon.
Posted by The General at 05:37 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBackFilet topped Cajun Crab Cakes with Cream Sauce
Southern Pride “Anything But, Anything Goes” Grand Prize Winner
Big Bob Gibson’s ‘Turf on Surf’ (Filet topped Cajun Crab Cakes with Cream Sauce) Serves 6.
Cajun Crab Cakes
5 cups toasted bread crumbs
5 T butter
1 large white onion, chopped fine
1 large green bell pepper, chopped fine
2 stalks celery, chopped fine
1 T Worcestershire sauce
2 cloves garlic, minced
¼ cup clam juice
12 oz lump crabmeat
3 eggs beaten
1 cup heavy cream
Spice Mix
1 ½ t garlic powder
1 ½ t salt
1 ½ t paprika
1 t onion powder
1 t cayenne pepper
1 t thyme
1 t oregano
1 t black pepper
½ t cumin
½ mustard powder
Cream Sauce
2 cups heavy cream
½ c chopped green onion tops
Filet Mignon
6 bacon wrapped filets
½ cup Big Bob Gibson Championship Red Sauce
½ cup your favorite soy based steak marinade (Dales, Moores, etc.)
Combine chopped onions, bell peppers, celery, Worcestershire sauce, spice mix, garlic and clam juice. Refrigerate overnight. Sauté vegetable mix for a more intense flavor.
Combine 3 cups toasted breadcrumbs, crabmeat, the vegetable mix, eggs, cream in a mixing bowl and stir. Remove ½ cup of the mixture to use in the sauce. Chill the remaining mixture for 2 hours.
To make the sauce, combine 2 cups of cream and the ½ cup of crab mixture in a pan. Place on the high heat of a grill (or stove top). Cook for 4 minutes stirring constantly. Add the green onion tops and cook for an additional 2 minutes. Set aside but keep warm.
Mold crab cake mixture into patties using ½ cup mixture for each. Lightly coat crab cakes with remaining 2 cups of breadcrumbs. Spray grill-top and lightly mist crab cakes with vegetable oil. Grill over medium heat for 4-5 minutes on each side until cakes are golden brown.
Combine Big Bob Gibson Championship Red Sauce and soy-based sauce. Marinate filets for 4 hours in mix. Place filets on a grill over high heat. Cook to desired doneness.
Serve crab cakes covered with a generous amount of cream sauce. Top with filets cooked to personal perfection.
Posted by The General at 05:27 PM | Comments (4)January 12, 2006
Meats
1.Pork Shoulders are always preferred if not frozen…unless you have two or three days to thaw them.
2.Pork Butts (Bone in) is our second choice. Cook fat side up.
3.Pork Ribs - We always use St. Loius Cut 2 and up unless the client specifies some other cut. Start cooking with the back side up. Cook approximately 4 hours at 240*. You will know they are finished when the meat in center begins to break when you lift them up.
4.Beef Brisket (CAB – Certified Angus Beef) Trim 75% …leaving 25% on. Cook fat side up to 190*.
5.Sliced pork loin (not tenderloins) cooked to an internal temp of 170* make for great sliced pork sandwiches.
6.Chicken - We like to cook chicken halves and then quarter after cooking.
Posted by The General at 02:32 PM | Comments (1)Wood
Our cooking wood of choice is pecan. It can be found throughout the Southeast, Texas, and is predominant in California. Sometimes we complement the pecan by mixing one stick of hickory with it. You need to be careful in using hickory as sometimes it is very harsh and you have no way of knowing how harsh until you have finished your cook. Use hickory on large cuts of meat, like hams and shoulder.
Oak is a suitable back up to pecan and can be found in most parts of the country.
Mesquite needs to be left to the Texans! I strongly recommend that you never burn it in a Southern Pride or Ole Hickory…unless you want to live with it for the life of your cooker. It leaves an oily residue that is almost impossible to remove from your cooker.
Fruitwoods: Apple wood is great! Jack’s Old South, one of the winningest teams in the USA uses peach. Cherry is another good one. Although we have never had access to them, we hear grapevines are good! I would love to find some of those old vines that they use to make my favorite BBQ wine –Old Vine Zinfandel. Also, in the Pacific Northwest, alderwood is the wood of choice when cooking salmon.
Wood smoke should always be used as an accent flavor…and never a predominant flavor. Nothing is worse than to go eat some “Que” and three days later be belching up smoke. Charcoal is a good substitute for wood when you are doing expensive cuts of beef when you do not want a heavy ‘woody’ smoke taste.
Posted by The General at 02:31 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackRubs
Seasonings/Rubs are such an integral part of our overall flavor profile. We use the following quality products to season/rub our meats:
1. Head Country Food Products, 2116 North Ash, Ponca City, OK 74601 (580)762-1227
2. Happy Holla' Ed Roith
3. Mike Mills’ Magic Dust 3280 W. Hacienda Ave. Suite 210, Las Vegas, NV 89118 702-869-9112
You never want to taste the rub itself. It is only an accent flavor. To prevent this from happening we always use a rub and follow it with a coating of olive oil. Deeply massage the meat until you have a liquefied product. We also use either black pepper or a product we have just started using (McCormick’s Black Pepper and Garlic.) Many chefs use a brown sugar coating as well. We haven’t done this in recent years because the end result is a very gooey product.
After prepping, we always rest the meat overnight so that the spices can set.
If you want to experiment, see Steve Raichlen’s book “Barbecue Bible: Sauces,Rubs and Marinades”.
And also Mike Mills’ “Peace, Love, and Barbecue” for his Magic Dust recipe .
.
Magic Dust Recipe
½ C paprika
¼ C Kosher salt finely ground
¼ C sugar
2 T mustard powder
¼ C chili powder
¼ C ground cumin
2 T ground black pepper
¼ C granulated garlic
2 T cayenne
He also gives a recipe for a basic dry rub that you can start with. P.66
Your Basic Dry Rub
3 T paprika
1 T ground black pepper
2 t chili powder
½ t salt
½ t cayenne
½ t granulated garlic
¼ t mustard powder
Places you can buy spices:
Townsend Supplies, Inc., 8 E. Main St., Oxford AR 72565 870-258-3523
Spice House, 1031 N. Old World Third, Milwaukee, WI 53203 414-272-0977
The basis of all rubs in the simplest form is seasoned salt and black pepper. Then start adding flavors and spices that will compliment your base rub. Keep strict notes so that you can recreate something that you end up liking. Don’t ever make the mistake we have made and think, “I’ll write it down later.”
Posted by The General at 11:44 AM | Comments (0)Sauces
Here are the sauces we use on a consistent basis:
1. Head Country Food Products. 2116 North Ash, Ponca City, OK 74601 (580)762-1227
2. HomeTown Bar-B-Que 584 Fieldstream Way, Lawrenceville, GA 30044 (770) 822-0712
3. Texas Rib Rangers (940) 565-1983 or (940) 206-3442
Many people ask us why we have stopped bottling our "Better Than Sex" Sauce and the answer is that our bottler went out of business and we have been...just slow to get a new bottler. The sauces listed above meet our strict standards and have been suitable replacements. (Remember: we use only the best ingredients!) Since we have now moved to Savannah, GA, and are planning to open a "place" you can be assured that our sauce will be back on the shelves in the next year!
We believe that a multitude of sins and mistakes are covered up by a heavy helping of BBQ sauce already applied to the meat. As we learned in competition, one should be able to taste the meat, then taste the sauce, then try the meat and sauce together to see how well they complement each other. We generally serve our pork unsauced, serving the sauce on the side. Our ribs and our chicken are basted in the pit with sauce. We also paint each slice of brisket with a light brush of sauce. Most all of the commercial BBQ products are sold already sauced…there is a reason for that….$$$$$$$. You are not getting 5 lbs of pure meat, you are getting meat and sauce together…the question is how much meat are you getting?? Two examples are Hormel and Sadler.
Most parts of the country like a sweet sauce. Add maple syrup or honey and orange juice to any sauce to add a depth of sweetness to your sauce.
We are especially fond of a vinegar sauce for pork. There is an excellent one in Mike Mills Peace Love and BBQ on p. 14
. It is really for cole slaw, but I think it tastes great on pork as well.
Also, if you are after a vinegar/pepper sauce, try Kate’s Mountain Sauce on p. 304 in Barbecue USA by Steve Raichlen. ***caution…go easy on the red pepper flakes unless you want it really hot…
Presently, Head Country is our sauce of choice to use on caterings. It is a smooth, sweet, tomato based sauce. Shipped to us costs us $12.50 per gallon. It is almost as good as our “Better Than Sex” sauce that we are not currently producing.
To sauce or not to sauce? A good compromise is lightly coating a small amount of pork at a time, making sure that it never puddles or pools. Never turn the sauce bottle upside down and pour it over your pork…watch your kitchen staff…they have a tendency to do this!
Posted by The General at 11:37 AM | Comments (0)Consistency
I believe that the greatest compliment that you can be paid in BBQ Catering is for your clients to tell you that EVERYTHING was good…across the board. You don’t have to hit a home run, but you do have to remain consistent. The way you do that is through strict time and temperature methods and enforcing this with all your employees. As an example, a pork butt must be cooked in a temperature of between 220* and 240* until you reach an internal temperature of 190*. We have published our cooking chart in the post labeled "The BIG Secret," but this is so important, I am going to post it again.
If there is a secret, I would say that it would be using a digital meat thermometer throughout the cooking process. This allows consistency...and you can cook your meat the same way every time. If you've ever hit a home run one week with your meat and then the next week when you think that you are doing it the same way and you strike out, chances are you were not using a meat thermometer.
There are many digital thermometers on the market, but generally the Polder is the one we use the most. 
Another question that we frequently hear is "How long do I cook it?" There is no correct answer for that because there is an assumption that every oven in the world is calibrated just exactly the same. Meat in Denver cooks differently than meat in San Diego. This again stresses the importance of the digital thermometer. So the correct answer would be that you cook it until you reach the correct internal temperature. Temperature always prevails over time.
These are the internal temperatures that we have always used in competition...and always check in the center of the meat and away from a bone.
Pork Butt - 190*
Pork Tenderloin - 140-160*
Pork Loin - 160-170*
**Most all cuts of pork should be over 160*
Pork Ribs - Unfortunately ribs are not subject to temperature rules and can be judged done when you lift them up in the center and they begin to break.
Chicken - 170*
Beef Brisket - 190*
Other cuts of Beef
1. Rare- 125-133*
2. Medium Rare- 133-140*
3. Medium- 140-145*
4. Medium Well- 145-150*
5. Well- (Anything over 150*)
**However, industry standards say that we should cook all of our beef to 160* for food safety! We would urge you to keep a small notebook in your pocket and keep careful notes as you cook for the temperatures that best suit your individual tastes.
.
The greatest example of consistency I can give you occurred to us in 2001 at the South Carolina state championship. The top 10 teams in each of the 4 categories….beef, pork, chicken and ribs were announced and The Q Company was never called...until they called Grand Champion and then they called our name. Janet and I looked at each other in disbelief. They had to call us again to make us believe it was true. What happened was that every one of our 4 scores were within 1 point of each other and inconsistency caused the other competitors the overall prize.
CaterSource 2006- Featured Speakers
Two weeks from today, Janet and I will be in Las Vegas at the 2006 Catersource Conference and we are the BBQ featured speakers . Our topic is Advanced BBQ: A Recipe for Success. When first asked by Mike we were flummoxed because of the extreme diversity of levels of the attending audience (those who will be in attendance are the small guys all the way up to those who do millions of dollars a year in sales). Even though it is hard to pare down 15 years into 6o minutes, we are going to try. And the good news is that we will be posting all of our information here on our blog.
January 01, 2006
The BIG Secret
Over the seven years we cooked competition BBQ, people would often ask us, "What's your secret?"...as though there was one magic bullet that could put them cooking out on the circuit. I have always answered that making great "Q" is equivalent to a making a great piece of music...where the flutes, the trombones, the clarinets, etc. all come together to make one beautiful piece of music. The same is true with making great BBQ...coordinating the meat, the rub, the cooking time, the temperatures, and the sauce.
If there is a secret, I would say that it would be using a digital meat thermometer throughout the cooking process. This allows consistency...and you can cook your meat the same way every time. If you've ever hit a home run one week with your meat and then the next week when you think that you are doing it the same way and you strike out, chances are you were not using a meat thermometer.
There are many digital thermometers on the market, but generally the 
Polder is the one we use the most.
Another question that we frequently hear is "How long do I cook it?" There is no correct answer for that because there is an assumption that every oven in the world is calibrated just exactly the same. Meat in Denver cooks differently than meat in San Diego. This again stresses the importance of the digital thermometer. So the correct answer would be that you cook it until you reach the correct internal temperature. Temperature always prevails over time.
These are the internal temperatures that we have always used in competition...and always check in the center of the meat and away from a bone.
Pork Butt - 190*
Pork Tenderloin - 140-160*
Pork Loin - 160-170*
**Most all cuts of pork should be over 160*
Pork Ribs - Unfortunately ribs are not subject to temperature rules and can be judged done when you lift them up in the center and they begin to break.
Chicken - 170*
Beef Brisket - 190*
Other cuts of Beef
- Rare- 125-133*
- Medium Rare- 133-140*
- Medium- 140-145*
- Medium Well- 145-150*
- Well- (Anything over 150*)
**However, industry standards say that we should cook all of our beef to 160* for food safety! We would urge you to keep a small notebook in your pocket and keep careful notes as you cook for the temperatures that best suit your individual tastes.
Posted by The General at 04:42 PM | Comments (0)
