Carne Adovada — A Taste of Heaven

CARNE ADOVADA

RED CHILE PUREE

1-2 cups water 8-10 dried red New Mexico chile pods

(Hot) - (get Hatch Valley if you can)

Tear tops off of chile pods and use knife or finger (use plastic food preparation gloves to protect your fingers as they will start to sting a bit — do not touch your eyes with your fingers until you’ve washed them) to clean out seeds and veins inside of each one. Place pods in medium sized pot and cover with water. Heat to boiling on high heat. Boil several minutes until pods are soft stirring occasionally to make sure they boil evenly. Place drained pods (save liquid) in blender container, then pour 1/2 of liquid into blender (keep the rest in the pot and add more water for the next batch) and blend until smooth, add 1-2 cloves garlic if desired. Add more water if needed, but keep in mind this is a puree, thicker than sauce or juice. When pureed, pour into a large stock pot. Sometimes you might need to pour thru a mesh sieve to remove any skins that did not blend up in the blender. NOTE: You will want to make several batches of puree.

CHILE COLORADO (Basic Red Chile Sauce)

2 T. butter

2 T. flour

2 C. red chile puree (see below)

2 C. chicken broth

3/4 t. salt

1/2 t. garlic powder

Dash oregano (use Mexican oregano if you can get it)

Heat butter in medium-size saucepan on medium heat. Stir in flour and cook for 1minute. Add red chile puree and cook for about another minute. Gradually add broth and stir, making sure there are no lumps, a whisk works best. Add seasoning to sauce and simmer at low heat for 10-15 minutes.

THE MARINATED PORK:

4 cloves garlic

1 T. salt

1 T. oregano

2 recipes or more of the Red Chile Puree (above)

3-5 lbs. (approx.) pork tenderloin roast

Add garlic, salt and oregano to chile puree. Cut pork loin into four large pieces (slice in half once horizontally and once vertically) and put them in a large, glass baking dish (even better, a stainless steel stock pot) and pour chile puree over to cover — turn meat to cover completely. Cover and refrigerate for a minimum of 24 hours (36-72 hours or more is even better — I like to marinate mine for a week). It is a good idea to stir it around once a day or so to make sure that every part of the pork soaks in the marinade.

FINAL ASSEMBLY AND COOKING:

Place marinated pork pieces in smoker or barbeque and cook using the indirect method to keep the marinade from burning(for best results, use some pecan wood chunks or chips for smoke flavor — pecan smoke is incredible with this dish but be careful not to over smoke) and cook until internal temp reaches around 150 (use a meat thermometer).

Remove pork from smoker and cut into cubes ½” to 1″ square and put into baking pan/dish about 3″-4″ deep. Pour chili colorado over pork cubes (the pork should be “swimming in it”) and put baking pan/dish into smoker – crank up the temp to around 325 (you can do this part in the oven inside if you want) and let it simmer (for best results, seal tightly with foil so the sauce doesn’t boil off and get too thick) for at least an hour – 2 or even 3 hours would be even better (if you simmer longer than an hour you must seal with foil or the sauce will boil off).

About 5 minutes before removing from smoker, remove the foil and layer on top (fairly thickly) a good amount of pre-shredded Kraft Mexican blend cheese. When the cheese melts (about 5 minutes) remove from smoker, let it cool for 5 minutes or so and serve with rice and beans and warmed flour tortillas.

NOTE: This recipe can be cooked in a regular oven (use a baking pan) instead of a smoker – you lose the pecan wood flavor but it is still incredibly delicious.

Big Dan

 

 

�

HomeBBQ.com releases 2 New DVD’s

HomeBBQ.com has released 2 DVD’s for the backyard cook. “Grilling with HomeBBQ.com” and “Backyard BBQ with HomeBBQ.com”.

In “Grilling with HomeBBQ.com”, Kevin Bevington (5 time FBA Team of the Year Champion) demonstrates cooking on gas and charcoal grills. He starts with the basics and then goes into some great food, including full recipes, and preparation. This DVD will include; Hamburgers, Steak, Chicken, Tri-Tip Roast, Pork Chops, Grilled Salmon, Shrimp, Stuffed Flank Steak, Baltimore Pit Beef, Pork Loin, and much more..

In “Backyard BBQ with HomeBBQ.com” Kevin Bevington (5 time FBA Team of the Year Champion) demonstrates cooking low and slow on a small offset cooker, and a bullet style water pan smoker. He starts with the basics on how to start your cookers, maintaining even temp, goes through full meat prep, and the process of cooking and finishing these meats. This DVD includes full recipes, and preparation. Included are the following; Boston Butt (pulled pork), Beef Brisket, St Louis Style Ribs, Baby Back Ribs, Country Style Ribs, Standing Rib Roast, Turkey, and much more.

These DVD’s can be purchased now via CreateSpace.com through the links below.

Grilling with HomeBBQ.com - http://www.createspace.com/252519

Backyard BBQ with HomeBBQ.com - http://www.createspace.com/252518

We will make these available as packages on HomeBBQ.com online store soon.

Barbeque Fuels

Join the forum discussion on this post - (2) Posts

My name is Dan Colmerauer – aka “Big Dan.” You may know me from my booklet on how to modify a “backyard” offset smoker to make it perform better. The majority of my articles will deal with what goes into building proper fire in your smoker and related topics – but I will diverge from that from time to time. By the way, I will accept questions and comments via e-mail at: screenwriter2@earthlink.net or 2bigdan2@earthlink.net – I try to reply to any and all e-mails but I do not use my computer on weekends and sometimes it may take a day or two before I have time to reply so please be patient.

I am a backyard cooker only — I don’t do catering or cook-offs, etc. I have, however, been barbequing in one form or another for almost 35 years. Originally from Buffalo, New York I was often seen barbequing and grilling even in middle of the biggest snow storms. I now live in Phoenix, Arizona where some days in the summer I swear all you need to do is put the meat in your smoker and wheel the smoker out into the sun. I have a Hondo offset smoker, a Weber Smoky Mountain, a Weber “kettle” grill, and a barrel smoker and I use them all.

Knowing how to build and maintain a fire is the most important part of barbequing. You can have the greatest recipe in the world – buy the best quality meat you can find – yet if you can’t build and maintain a long, steady fire, your final product will suffer.

Today, I’d like to discuss fuel. There are three basic fuels for barbeque: wood, lump charcoal and briquettes.

Typical briquettes are made from powdered charcoal mixed with binders and fillers such as coal dust. Their biggest advantage is an easily controlled, steady fire with very little temperature fluctuation. Their biggest drawback is the large volume of ash produced when burning briquettes. In an offset style smoker the ash will actually build up and snuff out your fire in about 4 hours – not enough time to barbeque much of anything. Plus, there are too many additives that can alter the flavor of the final product for my taste. But, they are inexpensive, readily available, easy to use and certainly can turn out a fairly decent final product.

There are briquettes available (but very hard to find) that are made out of 100% hardwood charcoal and all natural binders. No additives – no strange fillers – just pure 100% hardwood charcoal. I have used Rancher 100% hardwood briquettes and Royal Oak 100% hardwood briquettes and was pleasantly surprised – both at the flavor and the performance. While producing much more ash than lump charcoal, I was still able to maintain a steady 220 for over six hours. And the flavor was a huge improvement over regular briquettes. In an upright “water smoker” such at the Weber Smoky Mountain these are probably the best fuel you can use. I ran mine for over 22 hours with the Rancher briquettes without refueling and still had briquettes left in the smoker to burn. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to find either Rancher or Royal Oak 100% hardwood briquettes in over a year.

Natural lump charcoal (sometimes called “charwood”) is my fuel of choice. Lump charcoal is made by burning hardwood in the absence of oxygen. The process burns off all the impurities (creosote, etc.) leaving a final product that is free of all the bad stuff that can ruin the flavor of the meat. It burns hotter than briquettes and a quality lump charcoal will leave very little ash – which means you will achieve a long, steady burning fire which will impart a wonderful “woodsy” flavor to the meat with a nice touch of smoke. There are a large number of brands of lump available – some not much better than briquettes and others darned near the “holy grail” of barbeque fuel. Hopefully, you will have a good brand available in your area.

The ability to use wood as a fuel is seen by many as the hallmark of the true pitmaster. I don’t necessarily agree.

The single most important factor in whether you can successfully use only wood as your fuel source is your smoker. The typical backyard smoker is simply too small to use wood as fuel unless you burn it down to coals first. In fact, many commercial pitmasters (especially in the barbeque belt) will burn the wood down to coals first no matter what type of smoker they have. The reason for this is simple – you want to burn off the impurities before exposing the meat to the smoke.

So — I tried this once. I used over $50 worth of wood – spent six straight hours burning wood and shoveling coals and the ribs came out tasting exactly like they did with lump charcoal. Some Internet research revealed what has since become my mantra: a glowing lump of hardwood charcoal is IDENTICAL to a glowing coal/ember burned down from logs. The only difference is how it got there.

Interestingly enough – at the more recent bbq cook-offs I’ve attended (I do love to eat good ‘que) I’ve noticed that most of the competitors were using lump charcoal in even the biggest of smokers because —- a glowing lump of hardwood charcoal is IDENTICAL to a glowing coal/ember burned down from logs.

Now, what about wood chunks or chips for added smoke flavor. They work, but you have to be very careful because there is a very fine line between a little extra smoke flavor and over-smoked, creosote-coated meat. Cross that line and you’ve ruined a nice hunk of meat (unless, of course, you like the flavor of creosote). This is more of a problem in the offset smokers than with the uprights. The man in Phoenix who sells cooking wood to all the local restaurants taught me a neat trick if you like to use chunks or chips for a stronger smoke flavor. Simply take a piece of heavy duty foil and gently place it on top of the meat – don’t “tent” it and don’t “wrap” it – just gently lay it on top. The foil will catch most of the bad stuff before it settles on the meat leaving the meat exposed to the remaining flavorful part of the smoke.

Next time I’ll discuss exactly how to build a fire using the Minion method for a long, steady fire.

For now….

Keep on cookin’!

Big Dan

Make it your own…

 I was told by my brother in law, Glenn, that at least one time I would want to try to make barbecue my very own…from start to finish.  I asked him what he was talking about…he explained.

He told me that I take the time to select and buy the cut of meat I am looking to cook, I trim it and do all the other prep stuff…fire up the cooker and then start the cooking process…which is a long investment of time.

He went on to say that you do all of this, take it off the cooker, hold it while you prepare other items for sides and then put some store bought bbq sauce on your barbecue right before you eat it…He didn’t understand why I would do that.

Well, to be honest, I never had given it a thought…there were rubs already made for me to use…the same thing in regards to sauces.  I figured I was just saving some time in certain areas.  But he explained that if I would just take the time to learn how to make a rub and a sauce THEN the barbecue would truly be MY OWN!  No one else’s mixes or recipes would be in my bbq hence it would be MINE from start to finish.

Just some bbq for thought for you folks who are just getting in to the art.  Don’t get me wrong, I use rubs that aren’t mine more then I use my own…but 9-10 times I make my own sauce.  I love it…my guests like it…and it just seems to compliment my barbecue.

CHOCOHOLIC’S HERSHEY BAR CAKE

Joe Phelps

CHOCOHOLIC’S HERSHEY BAR CAKE, a sinful desert from Joe Phelps CHOCOHOLIC’S HERSHEY BAR CAKE My sister, Carol Bryan, has a great chocolate recipe to share. Here ’tis. Chocoholic’s Hershey Bar Cake 1 box Swiss Chocolate cake mix 1 c. walnuts, chopped 8 oz. cream cheese, softened 1 c. powdered sugar 1/2 c. granulated sugar 10 Hershey bars with almonds, chopped 12 oz. frozen Cool Whip, thawed Prepare cake batter according to package directions. Add walnuts to batter. Pour into 8″ cake pans after spraying pans with baking spray. Bake at 325ºF for 20 to 25 minutes. Remove from pans and cool completely. Beat cream cheese, powdered sugar and granulated sugar, with mixer until creamy. Combine 8 chopped candy bars, Cool Whip, cream cheese, and blend well. Spread this mixture on the top and sides. Take remaining candy bars and sprinkle them over the cake and at the bottom edge for edible decoration. Beware as the above is a “sinful” love potion.

DEVILED EGGS MARZETTI STYLE

BBQ LAMB RIBS

Pan Fried Catfish Filets

Pan fried catfish filets, soaked in Buttermilk, and seasoned with HomeBBQ.com Deep South Tangerine Pepper. This recipe uses the following ingredients;   1-2 lbs. - Catfish Filets 2 cups -  Buttermilk 4 tsp - HomeBBQ.com Deep South Tangerine Pepper 1 cup - flour 2 - tsp salt 2 - tsp pepper canola oil     Place catfish filets in buttermilk and let soak 6 to 8 hours, remove the catfish from the buttermilk, and squeeze off excess buttermilk. Pat filets dry with paper towels. Season each side of filet with approx. 1 tsp of HomeBBQ.comTangerine Pepper. Let marinate with spice for 15 to 30 minutes.   Combine flour and salt and pepper. Coat both sides of filets with the flour mixture. Place catfish in heated canola oil. Cook approximately 3 minutes per side (look for flaking and seperating of texture, do not overcook) Let catfish drain on paper towels… Serve and enjoy

Basic Brisket Rub

BASIC BBQ RUB

HomeBBQ.com
Here is a basic bbq rub recipe to use on just about anything! Basic BBQ Rub1/4 cup salt (non-iodized) 3 Tbs Brown Sugar 2 Tbs Black Pepper 1 Tbs. Garlic Salt 1 Tbs. Paprika 1 Tbs. Chili Powder 1 Tsp. Sugar 1 Tsp. Onion Powder 1 Tsp. ground Cumin 1 Tsp. Red Pepper (optional)

Next Page »