Day to Day Thoughts on Food

Each go at the smoker is slowly getting better. This time it is pork ribs (american style) and beef brisket. Each meat had their own marinade, smoked with a mixture of hickory and apple wood, and basted with a home-made BBQ sauce in the final hours. The final cooking time was about 8+ hours. Details below.

For the pork ribs, I marinated 8 racks for 24 h in:

1 cup brown sugar

2 Tb salt

2 Tb ground cumin

2 Tb ground coriander

2 Tb ground paprika

1 Tb ground allspice

1 Tb ground cinnamon

2 Tb oregano

Half a dozen fresh coriander roots, minced

 

For the beef brisket, I marinated two slabs weighing in total 2 kg (4 lb) for 24 h in:

2 Tb salt

1/4 cup of my corned beef spice mix (below, and details here)

6 cloves garlic, minced

 

Pickling spice (master mix)

2 Tb black peppercorns

2 Tb mustard seeds

2 Tb coriander seeds

2 Tb hot red pepper flakes

2 Tb allspice berries

1 Tb ground cardamom

2 cinnamon sticks, crushed into small pieces

24 bay leaves, crushed into small pieces

2 Tb whole cloves

1 Tb ground ginger

 

For the BBQ sauce, sauté  the following in 1/2 cup butter:

1 red onion, minced

3 cloves garlic, minced

Then add:

1/2 cup raw apple cider vinegar

1 can diced tomatoes (12 oz, 330 g, approx.)

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 Tb oregano

1 Tb ground cumin

1 Tb ground coriander

1 tsp allspice

small bunch of fresh coriander (cilantro), ripped apart

Cook for about 60 minutes on low heat, then strain through a fine sieve.

 

For the smoked meat, I heated the offset (Texas) smoker using natural red gum charcoal, and added a mixture of hickory and apple wood chips (pre-soaked in water) at regular intervals. I maintained the temperature between 80 – 90 C (175-195 F), rotating and moving the meat at regular intervals, and basting the meat two times in the last 2 hours. Total cooking time was 8+ hours.