Well. We've rabbited on about it for a minute now. So here it is. BBQ thread.
This was my first foray into smoking meat, and while it definitely wasn't perfect, I am not discouraged - only encouraged to keep trying.
Alright. Here we go.
I bought the Jack Daniels smoke box and smoke chips from BBQ's Galore for $17. The rib rack was $13 from Bunnings. Bunnings has a dangerous BBQ section, and I had a bunch of other things, like thermometers (which I will buy now), flavoured chips, utensils, different style racks, etc. etc. But I was uncharacteristically restrained by a voice of reason, knowing I'd never really done it before, and I might not even like it, or it might be too much effort and be a waste of money.
So. Thirty bucks (assuming you own a BBQ) and you're good to go. Obviously you could just mod up a little take away container or similar with the chips in it, but I was keen on a Bourbon flavour.
800g/850g bone in Rib Eye's from the local butcher, cows reared literally a five minute drive from here (Just near Cow Brewery!). At this stage I have just salted the meat, which I left for a good half hour on advice from a friend in America.
Ribeye is a thick meat, it can stand up to hot smoking easily. The most important thing about smoking meats though, is that you have to drink beer while doing it... no wait.... that's not it...
Salting the meat quite a while before hand helps to develop what is called a pellicle on the meat, which helps the smoke to stick the the exterior of the meat and gets a proper 'smoky' taste.
Bloke is legit. He's never steered me wrong on culinary quests before.
This is the part that I know already. Flavours to go with red meat. So this was my meat rub;
Sea salt, Brown sugar, Black peppercorns, Garlic, Mustard seeds, Rosemary, Paprika, Ginger, Onion, Chilli
All dried except the rosemary, luckily I have a kitchen store room to raid, but it's pretty basic. Use that list as the most amount first, working down. I just did it by taste.
OK. So at this point I had an idea to experiment a little. I had two pieces of meat, so why not try two different cooking styles? If you start looking up smoking meat you'll find it a little bit confusing on a few fronts, the main one for me was the stage at which to sear the meat. For the amount of people saying you sear at the start, there's the same amount saying you sear at the end... and then there's probably the same again saying you don't sear/grill/char at all!
I decided to sear one up front, and sear the other at the end. So a full rub went on the meat that would not be seared, and just seasoning for the seared first piece.
Getting my flame on. In the left of that shot you can see the 'smokers box'; which houses this;
My first rookie move was not letting the smoke start before starting to cook.
Setup now with the upright rack, and a little alfoil underneath to keep the whole process an indirect heat, and for cleanliness.
Aimed for 150c - nailed it. Haiiiyyooo!
Seared piece up front, unseared and heavily rubbed up back
Thirty minute mark. Pretty hard to take a photo of smoke, but the little box was chimney spec at this stage - hard to keep the smoke in there though (will explain).
Out at 40 minutes.
Wrapped up, fifteen minutes. They felt close to well done, I was pretty worried I'd just wasted a lot of effort.
First slice of the pre-seared piece, a slight amount of juice run, still nice and pink but definitely visually over done. Until I ate a piece. It was like buttermeat. Insanely tender, so much flavour, and all you could smell was smoky bourbon'y joy joy.
Unseared piece. Overcooked as well, probably could have taken both out after about 25 minutes, and extended the rest time. Tasted amazing though, the rub/smoke penetrated way further into the meat on this one. Really a tough choice between them.
So.
Issues;
Cooking time too long. I feel the temperature was right, it really sat around 150 the whole time.
Too windy/BBQ far from closed off - if you look at the pictures, there are gaping holes all over the thing - the hood is an option on this cheap'o BBQ. The wind was just sweeping through and stealing all my smoke!
Not putting the smoke box on early enough. Considering it will continue to happily smoke for over an hour, I will next time wait until it is puffing billy before I even sear the meat.
Not having the left side of the BBQ working (tourists broke it, wankers) so when I took the unseared piece off to do the end seal on it, I had to leave it for too long and it didn't even really colour up.
Not trimming a bit of the fat from the edge - the fat took on most of the smoke flavour, and the smoke didn't really penetrate the sides of the cut.
Bit long winded.
Anyway.
I'm definitely trying this again. Even with all those faults, it's one of the nicest steaks I've ever cooked. I am such a fuss pot when it comes to fat, and I could just eat it straight up.
Look forward to doing it again, and more so looking forward to seeing what you blokes come up with!
Cheers,
Nik
