April 17, 2024

Smokes and Jokes The Barbecue Chronicles with Owen & Dan

As the charcoal ignites and that smoky aroma fills the air, there's no denying Owen and Dan are back at it, waxing lyrical about our barbecue escapades. From our recent barbecue bash that had everyone raving about the succule...

As the charcoal ignites and that smoky aroma fills the air, there's no denying Owen and Dan are back at it, waxing lyrical about our barbecue escapades. From our recent barbecue bash that had everyone raving about the succulent ribs and wings, to the hilarity of cooking mishaps like running out of charcoal mid-party or battling pigeon invasions, our latest grilling gabfest is loaded with laughs and juicy tales. We're here to share the delights and the blunders of barbecue, proving that it's about so much more than just the food – it's an experience, a labor of love, and sometimes, a comical adventure.

We delve into our personal grill preferences, from the sleek convenience of a Blackstone to the smoky charm of a Weber Kettle. Whether you're keen on perfecting your breakfast grill game or curious about how a barbecue meat fridge could revolutionize your backyard feasts, we've got insights and ideas to fuel your fire. And if you've ever pondered over the ideal side dish to complement your smoky creations, or how to turn cheap supermarket cheese into a gourmet delight, you won't want to miss our culinary musings.

But let's not forget about those unexpected turns that keep us on our toes – like the time I discovered my smoker had become a pigeon perch! We chuckle over these unscripted moments that remind us barbecuing is as unpredictable as it is enjoyable. From smoking a sublime piece of cheese to introducing our kids to the finer points of outdoor cooking, Owen and Dan cover it all. So, fire up your grill, pour yourself a cold one, and join us for a hearty helping of barbecue banter that's sure to entertain and inspire.

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For all of our other episodes you can listen or watch them on our website.

Chapters

00:00 - Barbecue Talk With Owen and Friends

06:17 - Barbecue Preferences and Ideas

15:39 - Barbecue Failures and Future Plans

27:41 - Grilling, Smoking, and Curing Meat

Transcript
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Today's episode is brought to you by AOS Kitchens, the South's leading outdoor kitchen design and installation specialists.

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Hello and welcome to another episode of the Meet and Greet Barbecue Podcast.

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It's another kind of special here, where it's Owen and I talking together, and actually we thought we'd come up with a name for these types of episodes, because the more feedback we get, the more that apparently you guys like to listen to us, as we like to call it, chewing the fat together.

00:00:34.743 --> 00:00:39.862
So that's what we're going to call these episodes, when it's owen and I just talking together, chewing the fat chewing the fat.

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Yeah, like it no, oh good, I'm glad I took so long coming up with that.

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I think the first thing that we should talk about really, because it has been a little while it's a bit grisly.

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Yeah, grisly, grisly.

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Yeah, it's hard to get over and it gets stuck in your throat and your ears.

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Recent episodes we talked about kind of the blues, and it's been a few months now but the weather's kind of picked up a bit.

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We had the six nations, which I always think for uk barbecuers can be a bit of a catalyst for barbecuing how the last few months been uh I dare well, obviously.

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Yeah, last time we were talking about that fatigue.

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Um, I dare I say I've become.

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I feel like I've become a fair weather barbecuer this this year, where it's just been so wet all the time.

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I've also bought a dog since the last time.

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Uh, we, we recorded, and apologies about that.

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So, yeah, I feel like I've become a bit of a fair weather barbecuer.

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However, since the Easter and over the last couple of weeks where it has started to get a bit warmer, I've kind of found a love for barbecue again.

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So I had a bit of a party a couple of weeks ago and I cooked, you know, your classic sausages.

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I did wings, I did thighs, um, but I also did two huge racks of pork ribs.

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But I specifically asked the butcher to keep all the belly meat and stuff on there as well.

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So I ended up getting like pulled belly meat as well as like on the on the rib, uh, on the bone meat, um, which went down an absolute storm.

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So and obviously today, me and you are sat here in my back garden.

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We've got some beef ribs on on the weber, smoking away on the blackstone.

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We've got two huge pork chops, um, drinking a couple of beers.

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Sun's out, we're gonna make some short beef, short rib pizzas later.

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Um, I'm back in.

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I found, I found my spark I think it's been a bit of funny start to the year.

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A lot of people we've been speaking to and thank you for reaching out to us on instagram as well have all found the start of 2024 a bit difficult for getting out there and barbecuing for various different reasons.

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But I really do think with the weather kind of turning now, there's no problem being a fair weather barbecuer as long as you can still get out and enjoy it.

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I mean I suppose we're lucky enough, hopefully, that from april to sort of october we can be enjoying that fair weather and then try and carry it on afterwards.

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But I think we need to try and kind of get out of our heads that we have to be barbecuing all the time and that can suck some of the joy out, and maybe that break is the best thing that we needed.

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I mean the last day of the six nations.

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Not that we'll talk about how the rugby went, because that was an abomination, but I had a load of friends over for a bit of a barbecue during the day and I tried to pick stuff that I thought would be fairly simple to do.

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So I did a normal beef joint that I got from Tesco's.

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I stuck it on for maybe I thought was going to take three to four hours, doing it low and it was medium rare.

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After two and a half took it off, let it rest for an hour and a half.

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Beautiful piece of meat, really good.

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Once that was off, I chucked on a whole chicken first as well.

00:04:01.691 --> 00:04:06.719
Two and a half hours, reached 76, took it off, rested it again.

00:04:06.719 --> 00:04:08.768
They all went down a storm and everyone ranted and raved.

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But it doesn't have to be hard, particularly once you understand the grill you're using.

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And that's part of the enjoyment is not just seeing what you get on the back of it, but when you can see different people's reactions to it, you know that that can be the main part of the barbecuing experience.

00:04:25.517 --> 00:04:26.742
It's getting people around again, right?

00:04:26.742 --> 00:04:30.550
I'm sure that's what you kind of got, yeah yeah, no, I really did.

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I thought, um, whilst we're cooking something you know, asm mr, is a bit of a bit of a thing at the minute, so I'm just going to shut up and just uh it's the sound of Owen's ego clicking away on the blackstone that is some lovely pork, thick pork, chops beautiful, beautiful sizzling sound there, maybe that's something new for the podcast.

00:05:03.654 --> 00:05:04.766
We can just not talk anymore and just do Beautiful, beautiful, sizzling sound there.

00:05:04.766 --> 00:05:05.290
Maybe that's something new for the podcast.

00:05:05.290 --> 00:05:11.237
We can just not talk anymore and just do ASMR for about half an hour.

00:05:11.600 --> 00:05:14.769
I wouldn't want to give people the satisfaction of not having to listen to us for a while.

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to be fair, People that listen to us are obviously a gluttonous for punishment.

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So, on that point of having people over when you're barbecuing and having not barbecued for a while, how did you find that extra pressure, with people being there kind of trying to host and barbecue and partake in a few beers as well?

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Because I know when we were setting up this cook, you found a few rogue chicken wings that had escaped down the side of the grill, as it were.

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Uh, yeah, that was mainly just the copious amounts of alcohol, so I took it in my stride.

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I lost a couple of chicken wings on the way, but you know, god rest their souls.

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They took one for the team.

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Yeah, um, no, no pressure at all.

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Really mainly it was just friends and a few family.

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Sorry, the other way around family and a few friends and um, yeah, no, it was all good again, just actually enjoyed it and with the menagerie of barbecues you've got, since you've kind of finding that love and passion again.

00:06:17.009 --> 00:06:21.624
Are you finding that you're falling to towards one or two certain types?

00:06:21.624 --> 00:06:24.208
Or, as and when, how's that coming across?

00:06:24.709 --> 00:06:28.634
uh, no, uh, I mean I'm.

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I'm using the blackstone a lot.

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Yeah, mainly because it's the closest to the indoors.

00:06:36.119 --> 00:06:50.944
Yeah, so laziness, um, however, within the last two weeks, I've used the smoky mountain, I've used the traeger, I've used the weber kettle and the black've used the Traeger, I've used the Weber Kettle and the Blackstone, and obviously today we're using the Kettle, the Blackstone and I'm going to be using the Oni.

00:06:50.944 --> 00:07:00.113
So, yeah, no, again, no sort of preference going to either one.

00:07:00.113 --> 00:07:04.170
I'd ask you the same question, but I suppose it's the Kamado.

00:07:04.600 --> 00:07:06.363
Yeah, using the Monolith that's why I got it in the same question, but I suppose it's the Kamado.

00:07:06.363 --> 00:07:15.279
Yeah, using the monolith that's why I got it in the first place is because of the versatility of it, and I've been more trying to think about what I'm going to pair with stuff.

00:07:15.279 --> 00:07:21.500
I was getting very much critical of what I was deciding to cook every weekend, thinking it has to be different, it has to be something different.

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What haven't I done?

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What haven't I tried?

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What am I trying to perfect?

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And rather than doing that, I'm thinking right, I'm just gonna decide what I want to cook food wise, and if I'm going to do anything interesting with it.

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I want to look at the different sides.

00:07:32.365 --> 00:07:38.624
Um, absolutely loving sauerkraut and how it cuts through bits and pieces, been doing more with kind of like gherkins.

00:07:39.365 --> 00:08:02.206
Um, I did almost like a dauphinoise potato type kind of dish which I smoked to go with the chicken when I had people over that I thought I'd cook twice the amount so I'd have more for the next day, and that completely went even to the point of, if you're doing things like mac and cheese, why not put some black pudding in there?

00:08:02.206 --> 00:08:08.975
Or or put some different barbecue sauces in there just to make it a little bit different and also have some fun with trying different sauces.

00:08:08.975 --> 00:08:16.125
I mean, I absolutely loved what we did a few I think it's christmas is actually ago when we tried lots of different types of rubs on chicken wings.

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That can be a very satisfying and enjoying afternoon with friends.

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Just get 20, 30, 50, 60, 100 chicken wings, pick out six, seven different rubs, mix them all up and off you go and then drink and rank and enjoy, right?

00:08:32.307 --> 00:08:41.322
I think we need to get away of what am I doing differently, what's going to look sexy, and just get back to enjoying it right yeah, yeah, absolutely.

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And again, just over the last couple of weeks I've been doing much more.

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Even I've coming back out here for breakfasts.

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So I did some, you know, sort of american fluffy style pancakes.

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Oh nice, on easter monday this morning, uh, although you weren't here, but did some breakfast tacos and black pudding, bacon, eggs, avocados, sriracha sauce, having a big moment with sriracha sauce that I absolutely love it, so much so that we obviously we've used we've, so we've got two beef short ribs cooking right now and, rather than using mustard as the bind, you know, a bit of french cheese, as usual, we've decided to go and try a bit of sriracha sauce.

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Um, and, and I've, I've I've decided to go for a cheeseburger flavored rub which I've never tried before.

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It's tubby toms, big mac dust.

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Um, so interested to see.

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I got, I got bought that for christmas.

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Um, I've not used it yet.

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And uh, yeah, interested to see how a short rib with a cheeseburger flavour binded by sriracha is gonna gonna taste.

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Yeah, I'm still kind of counting down the days until my house move eventually happens and I can set up a new kind of barbecue area in the garden and I'm probably gonna make some sort of new barbecue purchase around that as well, which I'm still toying with.

00:10:05.625 --> 00:10:14.307
What I'm going to go for, I'm very tempted by a blackstone, mainly because I want the flat top, although you know I've got planches which I use.

00:10:14.307 --> 00:10:17.900
But I also think that my wife would probably use it more.

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We do pancakes every sunday and that just seems like an obvious, nice thing to do.

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But also I want to almost get like a pantry running of, just like different barbecue rubs and and have everything set up.

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So I'm going out there more.

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To be fair, part of the reason that I think I've slowed down my barbecuing is I had packed everything away.

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I'd packed everything away ready for the move and, as things happen in the uk which maybe some of our international listeners will find quite surprising the moving process takes so long here and we're currently in a chain of like five or six houses.

00:10:49.529 --> 00:10:55.030
So we're hoping that maybe by the end of this month, but it looks like it might be another six to eight weeks.

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I'm in that go-between of running out of charcoal.

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Do I bother buying more or do I wait?

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I'm just going to play it by ear, basically.

00:11:03.668 --> 00:11:10.211
But I'm really excited to start that new barbecuing chapter as well and seeing what I can do differently there.

00:11:10.211 --> 00:11:17.403
And I want I'm gonna get a separate my wife doesn't know yet a separate barbecue fridge slash freezer.

00:11:17.923 --> 00:11:24.969
I'm just gonna put barbecue meat in I need it, I need that, I really need that and I keep threatening to do it, but I just haven't bothered going around to it.

00:11:25.080 --> 00:11:39.349
It just means that every Thursday, if I want to do a cook on Saturday, go in there, pick something, pick it out, let it defrost for 24 hours and then dry, brine it for another 24 hours and off you go and you don't have that pressure of thinking, right, what am I going to cook?

00:11:39.349 --> 00:11:40.785
Right, well, I need to buy that in advance.

00:11:40.785 --> 00:11:47.346
If I just that in advance, if I just have a freezer load of the stuff, I can go and grab it as I want.

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I want to make things as easy as possible for me to just go out there and do it.

00:11:49.631 --> 00:11:59.293
You know so our last episode we spoke to corbin, yeah, from blackstone uh, which was really interesting, very nice guy one.

00:11:59.293 --> 00:12:06.817
One of the things I mistakenly sort of uh joked about was around cooking pasta.

00:12:06.817 --> 00:12:15.423
Yeah, at first I thought he actually meant that he was cooking pasta on the griddle, uh, and subsequently it means that he was boiling the water, uh.

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So I cooked a carbonara on the on the blackstone.

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So I had the garlic and the bacon and all that kind of stuff cooking and I thought, right, I will try to boil the water in the past, boil the water on the blackstone using a normal metal saucepan.

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I have to say it just didn't work for me.

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It took such a long time to boil the water.

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In the end, the bacon and everything was cooked way, way before the, even though the water was on first, that I ended up moving the pan onto another, onto a gas barbecue, just to speed the process up.

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What I also did, just for just for a laugh, is because we made that kind of joke around.

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Well, obviously you don't cook dry pasta on the actual griddle.

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I cook some dry pasta on the griddle just to see what happened just to see what happened.

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It went very sort of bubbly and crispy, yeah uh, but still very, very raw.

00:13:08.086 --> 00:13:12.842
So you just burned pasta I essentially just burnt the stickers.

00:13:12.842 --> 00:13:15.410
I burnt a stick of spaghetti in the name of science.

00:13:15.410 --> 00:13:21.607
Well, I wouldn't say science, yeah, I wouldn't say it was burnt, it was golden brown, but very, very hard.

00:13:21.607 --> 00:13:23.292
Yeah, so I wouldn't recommend it.

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So you made very thin chopsticks essentially yeah, yeah, good pretty much, but again for for me, I won't be using the blackstone to boil water for me, I think that would more be the case that I'd use it for that, if I'd taken the blackstone somewhere as a portable barbecue and I had no other means of doing it.

00:13:43.226 --> 00:13:46.230
Personally, I think it's the fact that it can do that also.

00:13:46.230 --> 00:13:52.490
I imagine you want a very small pan really to try and speed up that boiling process, but potentially.

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But I was doing.

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I had a pan of water for enough for four people.

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I feed a family, yeah, obviously, otherwise what's the point?

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Yeah, but anyway.

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Yeah, just didn't quite work and I had three very hungry people saying where, where's our dinner?

00:14:06.347 --> 00:14:11.870
So I had to use other means possible to speak and boil that water.

00:14:12.652 --> 00:14:13.153
So what happens?

00:14:13.153 --> 00:14:13.374
Right?

00:14:13.374 --> 00:14:16.287
It's all a learning process and we don't learn without trying, right?

00:14:16.287 --> 00:14:16.346
No?

00:14:23.051 --> 00:14:28.202
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00:15:25.981 --> 00:15:39.177
Visit aoskitchenscouk have you had any other barbecue fails recently, apart from drunk barbecue, and although we can go into drunk barbecuing as a little barbecue fail segment, if you want?

00:15:39.197 --> 00:15:43.010
um I wouldn't say it was a fail.

00:15:43.010 --> 00:15:44.214
It was, I tell you what.

00:15:44.214 --> 00:15:50.216
Okay, it a fail, but it's not a cooking fail, it's just a failing to plan.

00:15:50.216 --> 00:16:10.312
So where I've not cooked that much barbecue, and again out of pure laziness, I just assumed that I had loads of charcoal for my 15 guests or whatever that was coming over last weekend.

00:16:10.312 --> 00:16:18.932
Um, and because I was doing huge racks of ribs, uh, I just assumed that I had batteries in my meter.

00:16:18.932 --> 00:16:23.357
The day the barbecue comes, get the, get the weber.

00:16:23.357 --> 00:16:28.024
Uh, smoky mountain going go to um, turn on the meter block.

00:16:28.024 --> 00:16:36.543
No battery problem with that is that you have to the for the actual individual um thermometers.

00:16:36.543 --> 00:16:38.633
The block charges the thermometers.

00:16:38.633 --> 00:16:46.197
So when I change the batteries, even though the block would work, the thermometers, the actual sticks wouldn't work because they needed to be charged.

00:16:46.197 --> 00:16:52.629
I also had the other one where I just had enough charcoal to get the smoky mountain going.

00:16:52.730 --> 00:17:11.078
Yeah, the shops weren't open yet, so I had to just basically start the ribs, knowing that there was probably not going to be enough charcoal to finish it and had to get a family member to go because I was doing loads of other prep work, because I made smash burgers and all sorts to go to the shops and try and get some charcoal.

00:17:11.078 --> 00:17:18.240
I wanted a specific charcoal that 99.9 of the time was in the garden center, 150 yards up the road.

00:17:18.240 --> 00:17:19.844
Of course they ran out, yeah.

00:17:19.844 --> 00:17:41.559
So he had to pick up some second grade charcoal which we're using the rest of it today and it's been a bit of a nightmare to to get going so long and short of it is I didn't follow six peas you gone, the proper planning prevents piss.

00:17:41.640 --> 00:17:45.049
Poor performance, well done there we are.

00:17:45.391 --> 00:17:46.512
Sounds like you're taking the P with that.

00:17:46.512 --> 00:17:50.520
Mine was a purchase mistake, to be fair.

00:17:50.741 --> 00:17:51.502
What you bought a Commodo.

00:17:54.880 --> 00:18:07.298
No, no, what I did was I was buying I can never remember the brand, but it's the like posh pizza flour, red bag, italian brand 00 flour, and I thought, well, I want to buy some in bulk.

00:18:07.298 --> 00:18:08.713
And I was looking at different options.

00:18:08.713 --> 00:18:11.826
I was like I really want like a two kilo bag.

00:18:11.826 --> 00:18:13.692
There doesn't seem to be any in stock.

00:18:13.692 --> 00:18:14.958
Oh wait, hang on.

00:18:14.958 --> 00:18:17.165
No, no, definitely none in stock.

00:18:17.165 --> 00:18:20.016
The other bags are 500 grams.

00:18:20.016 --> 00:18:21.058
I'll just buy four of them.

00:18:23.125 --> 00:18:29.777
Doing two, three of the things, looking after the children, I was like was like right, put the order for four in order, waited a week, didn't show up.

00:18:29.777 --> 00:18:32.343
Amazon prime, it should be the next day, I don't understand.

00:18:32.343 --> 00:18:38.763
Two days later, four two kilogram bags of flour turned up.

00:18:38.763 --> 00:18:44.355
I was like, oh no, so big that they won't even go on the shelves in the kitchen.

00:18:44.355 --> 00:19:08.871
So I was like, right, um, if I do like a batch of doughs now at least, then I can fold that one bag down so it'll go in, and the rest I'll just have to try and keep in the garage in as dry a place as possible, I'll take a day off yeah, yeah, well, get some nice flour sort out for you in it, dough in it, doe um that, and I think I've met, possibly mentioned it before.

00:19:08.931 --> 00:19:28.594
But I'm really considering, once I've moved, going from the wood burner attachment on my rock box to gas, just partially because of ease, like it is fun playing with, like the fire, but because of the way that the actual wood burner attachment works, you constantly have to be feeding it.

00:19:28.594 --> 00:19:29.836
Like tiny bits of wood.

00:19:29.836 --> 00:19:39.941
You can't get big bits of wood in there, right, and it's if I'm cooking six, seven, eight pizzas for people as part of a party, I can't talk to anyone.

00:19:40.561 --> 00:19:43.695
It's so much management do you know what funny?

00:19:43.695 --> 00:19:50.973
You should say that, as much as I love the oni um, as I'm sure we've talked about on the podcast.

00:19:50.973 --> 00:20:02.589
But uh, joe and marco from delavita, we had about six, seven months of having a delavita last year shared between us and we kind of moved it between houses.

00:20:02.589 --> 00:20:07.440
But you can get much larger pieces of wood in there.

00:20:07.440 --> 00:20:11.313
Yeah, you don't burn as much wood, it lasts longer.

00:20:11.313 --> 00:20:26.122
Therefore, cooking on mass is much easier in the delavita and I agree with you that I I almost end up using just all you can fit in.

00:20:26.122 --> 00:20:27.044
The onion is kindling right.

00:20:27.203 --> 00:20:27.324
Yeah.

00:20:27.931 --> 00:20:30.938
It burns through so quickly, even if you put a couple of bits of charcoal in there.

00:20:30.938 --> 00:20:38.155
I've found that you can get a semi-decent log in, something like a Delavita.

00:20:39.971 --> 00:20:41.917
Trust you to be testing semis.

00:20:45.691 --> 00:20:49.057
But it will burn longer the heat etc um.

00:20:49.498 --> 00:20:54.674
So I said, more enjoyable cooking experience for me as well, not constantly, I'm missing it.

00:20:54.795 --> 00:20:59.416
I am missing it and my wife had sort of said this, sort of said the same as well.

00:20:59.457 --> 00:21:05.972
She played with the delavita a bit and um that's because you've been in dorm more and she's had to spend more time with you and she's like, oh, can we, can we get something that?

00:21:05.972 --> 00:21:09.025
Yeah, go back back outside, I know, be away a bit more.

00:21:09.446 --> 00:21:14.759
Yeah, it's understandable, to be fair so I want to see what your thoughts are.

00:21:14.759 --> 00:21:25.573
So I think I mentioned to you last time we I succumbed to pressure from the family to buy an air fryer, yeah, and, annoyingly, have absolutely loved using it.

00:21:25.573 --> 00:21:26.836
It's so convenient, etc.

00:21:26.836 --> 00:21:29.936
Yeah, however, I do feel like I'm cheating on barbecue, obviously, when I use it.

00:21:29.936 --> 00:21:39.542
So I know a lot of people have started using the ninja wood fire uh, the ninja uh wood fire, you know the little smoky kind of grill.

00:21:39.542 --> 00:21:41.535
Yeah, what's your thoughts?

00:21:41.535 --> 00:21:45.292
I got asked the other day by a family member, sort of saying, oh, you're going to buy one my.

00:21:45.413 --> 00:21:49.522
My thoughts on it are if I was given one by someone I'm sure I'd love it.

00:21:49.522 --> 00:21:50.705
I wouldn't invest in it myself.

00:21:50.705 --> 00:21:56.979
Personally, I think it's arguably more so than the traeger.

00:21:56.979 --> 00:22:02.053
I think it maybe takes away a bit of the fun and magic but what about the traeger ranger?

00:22:02.394 --> 00:22:04.096
well, yeah, there is that as well.

00:22:04.096 --> 00:22:08.784
Um, and yes, I mean they do from memory.

00:22:08.784 --> 00:22:19.959
The wood fire, ninja, wood fire has a lot more different options that you can do with it as well, but I just I'm interested watching people cook with it.

00:22:19.959 --> 00:22:24.855
I personally am not interested cooking on it, it's not, it's not tickled me at all.

00:22:24.855 --> 00:22:30.755
I think that's just because I enjoy burning things and setting fire to stuff.

00:22:30.755 --> 00:22:32.413
That's just me personally.

00:22:32.413 --> 00:22:33.856
It doesn't make it wrong for anyone else.

00:22:34.338 --> 00:22:37.136
You did have that stint in juvie for it.

00:22:37.237 --> 00:22:40.836
Yeah, you know what else are you going to do in Wales?

00:22:40.836 --> 00:22:45.314
Burning down forests, one tree at a time.

00:22:45.314 --> 00:22:48.561
And that hospital yeah, down forests, one tree at a time.

00:22:48.561 --> 00:22:51.756
And that hospital Patients shouldn't have been in bed, should they?

00:22:51.756 --> 00:23:00.833
Like I said, if it was bought for me as a gift from someone, I think that I would enjoy it and I'd probably use it a lot.

00:23:00.833 --> 00:23:05.002
I'm not going to buy it, I'm not going to buy it for you.

00:23:05.390 --> 00:23:07.112
Are you going to buy it for yourself, though?

00:23:07.112 --> 00:23:07.332
No, I'm not.

00:23:07.332 --> 00:23:07.952
No, buy it for you, oh well.

00:23:07.972 --> 00:23:08.874
Are you going to buy it for yourself though?

00:23:08.874 --> 00:23:09.414
No, I'm not.

00:23:09.414 --> 00:23:10.056
No, I don't think I will.

00:23:10.497 --> 00:23:13.601
Do you have another barbecue on the horizon?

00:23:13.601 --> 00:23:13.661
It?

00:23:14.101 --> 00:23:16.284
seems that if I've, obviously because it's pellets right.

00:23:16.304 --> 00:23:16.483
Yeah.

00:23:17.345 --> 00:23:17.965
I've got the Traeger.

00:23:17.965 --> 00:23:19.295
I don't need to.

00:23:19.295 --> 00:23:20.137
What's the point?

00:23:20.137 --> 00:23:30.212
I mean, I don't need to buy all of what I've got.

00:23:30.212 --> 00:23:54.076
I appreciate that, um, to be honest, actually, again, if I was going to buy anything else, it's either going to be a nice offset smoker, uh, but one that you invest fair, you know a decent amount in, so it doesn't have a lot of kind of leakage, uh, heat leakage, um, or or a fire cage, but I mean, where I've not been barbecuing as much, I just haven't been able to justify another purchase really.

00:23:54.076 --> 00:23:59.290
So I don't think in 2024 I'll probably invest in another one at all.

00:24:00.512 --> 00:24:06.060
So I'm tempted by a blackstone, but also I think you should buy a Blackstone.

00:24:07.983 --> 00:24:34.633
I took the whole family to Alton's BBQ World Open Day or opening launch night this year and my wife absolutely loved and spent the most time looking at the domes and saying that I really wish that we have done that, rather than maybe the rock box in the first place and just that it looks more aesthetic.

00:24:34.692 --> 00:24:35.817
You can do more with it.

00:24:35.817 --> 00:24:48.776
So I don't know if I'm going to get the opportunity to look at that at some point but, like I said, once I've moved, I want to spend a lot more time with the rock box as well because, to be fair, I have put a lot of pizzas through it.

00:24:48.776 --> 00:25:09.145
You know, I reckon that I'm verging on maybe 80 to 90 pizzas that I've put through it, which isn't a small amount considering that we're a family of four, but that family of four includes a seven year old and a 17 month old, you know, yeah, um, so we'll see.

00:25:09.145 --> 00:25:22.921
If we did that, I think it'd be a question of whether I sold my rock box or whether I kept it for taking away when we went to places like center parks or other holidays, you know, because that's the good thing about that so much more transportable you know, yeah.

00:25:22.980 --> 00:25:29.298
So again, weirdly, obviously our wives have similar tastes that Laura's like.

00:25:29.298 --> 00:25:32.970
If you're going to get anything else, I want you to get, I want you.

00:25:32.970 --> 00:25:46.596
I quite like the, the domes, the domes, the Gosney domes, but for me I think I'd I'd just go for a Delavita, knowing, knowing what we know about the Delavita yeah, cooked on it a lot, got the experience of it.

00:25:46.615 --> 00:25:48.862
It makes sense, makes perfect sense.

00:25:48.862 --> 00:25:57.534
I'm more thinking just from a yeah, I'll be allowed to buy one of them point of view.

00:25:57.534 --> 00:26:00.378
I'm a lot more whipped than you are.

00:26:00.378 --> 00:26:04.719
Maybe Do you know on that point.

00:26:04.719 --> 00:26:07.316
There's something else that I wanted to talk about today.

00:26:08.179 --> 00:26:24.655
Um, for these chewing the fat episodes and I'm not going to promise you how many we're going to do or how often, but oh, and I have enjoyed sitting down just talking to each other in this sort of way, as long as there's no pressure on us to do it every single week, as it were um, we'd like to hear from you and please do kind of reach out to us.

00:26:24.695 --> 00:26:26.922
We do have a chat with a lot of people on instagram.

00:26:26.922 --> 00:26:32.138
It's either owen or myself, or, if you're really lucky, it'll be both of us answering you at the same time and confusing the hell out of you.

00:26:32.138 --> 00:26:38.622
But we will talk to you if you message directly on instagram, either our personal pages or the meet and greet barbecue podcast page.

00:26:38.622 --> 00:26:44.038
But, um, mitch bruce actually wrote out to us and gave us a black pudding recipe.

00:26:44.038 --> 00:26:56.830
That was very kind of them, that we wanted to try, and on that point I was thinking that I really want to be doing more what I would call, for want of a better word, homegrown barbecuing and the example that I would use that I want to talk to you about what do you?

00:26:56.851 --> 00:27:04.236
mean by homegrown barbecuing, like curing your own bacon and then cooking with it, or making your own black pudding or smoking your own cheese.

00:27:04.236 --> 00:27:18.363
And my dad has bought me, um, one of the little kind of coal dust burners that you can get smoke generator yeah, smoke generator so I can do cold smoking in my commando, which I'm gonna do once I've moved.

00:27:18.904 --> 00:27:24.421
But I want to talk to you more about that, because obviously you've got a cold smoker and you've done things like your own bacon, your own cheese.

00:27:24.421 --> 00:27:27.057
How have you enjoyed that experience?

00:27:27.057 --> 00:27:27.779
Because it's different.

00:27:29.730 --> 00:27:34.638
Yeah, so I haven't done it for quite some time, but I love smoking cheese.

00:27:34.638 --> 00:27:38.439
I do need to get back into curing my own bacon.

00:27:38.680 --> 00:27:38.820
Yeah.

00:27:40.570 --> 00:27:41.755
I want to get into sausage making.

00:27:41.755 --> 00:27:42.759
I think I've said this before.

00:27:42.759 --> 00:27:49.854
I got given what I think is a sausage making, or at least a sausage grinder not happy with a sausage.

00:27:49.874 --> 00:27:55.058
You're playing with yourself either you need something else to have a go on apologies for him.

00:27:56.775 --> 00:28:03.393
I just haven't taken it out of the box, but it's been a while hasn't it it's been a while since I've looked at that sausage.

00:28:04.472 --> 00:28:16.910
Um, so I've got I don't know if I told you this, but it's absolutely disgusting that I I've got a it's like a lean-to down the side of my house.

00:28:16.910 --> 00:28:18.294
Yeah, but it's not a lean-to as in.

00:28:18.294 --> 00:28:23.236
It's been properly built, it's got shingle, you know, yeah, a proper roof and stuff on it down the side of my house.

00:28:23.236 --> 00:28:27.246
So the previous owners used to hang their bikes and all that kind of stuff.

00:28:27.246 --> 00:28:30.701
So there was loads of like wood kind of going across the width of it.

00:28:30.701 --> 00:28:34.368
Yeah, um, I'm not a biker, whatever.

00:28:34.450 --> 00:28:56.372
So I put my kita kind of prep station, I put the cold smoke down there, um, and because it was out of direct sunlight, it was quite a good place to cold smoke, because I had a few instances last year where during the summer I was using the aluminium pro q smoking cabinet and the heat was melting the cheese because of this.

00:28:56.372 --> 00:29:00.703
You know that it was 20, 30 degrees or whatever it was, and aluminium it was anyway.

00:29:00.703 --> 00:29:04.942
So I moved it down the side out of the way of the sunlight of course, left it over there over winter.

00:29:05.384 --> 00:29:20.785
A pigeon is nested in there and literally shit all over it like completely covered the smoker from top to tail in bird shit it is and the keeter it's Like I've had to like get a jet wash out.

00:29:21.036 --> 00:29:25.224
Yeah, I was going to say power wash it and almost been like throwing up whilst like cleaning it up.

00:29:25.734 --> 00:29:27.876
So I have not done any cold smoking for a while.

00:29:27.876 --> 00:29:32.863
I almost need to forget that that's happened probably before I cold smoke again.

00:29:33.483 --> 00:29:35.405
Or get very drunk before you do it again.

00:29:35.526 --> 00:29:39.590
Yeah, so yeah, bloody pigeons.

00:29:39.590 --> 00:29:50.858
All I'm hearing is if you've got an area outside with lots of cross beams you can hang stuff from butchery, yeah, yeah.

00:29:50.858 --> 00:29:50.898
I.

00:29:50.898 --> 00:29:52.303
I mean it's got to be hygienic as hell.

00:29:52.403 --> 00:30:02.234
Like you know, the pigeons will shit on it though yeah just hanging carcasses outside, just in the elements for like 28 days or whatever yeah.

00:30:04.000 --> 00:30:16.084
However, going back to the actual point, yeah, I do think cold smoking there is something very satisfying about make it curing curing your own, curing your own bacon.

00:30:16.084 --> 00:30:19.756
Uh, I've done a number of different dry rubs.

00:30:19.756 --> 00:30:21.541
I want to get into wet, wet rubs.

00:30:21.541 --> 00:30:27.376
I'd love to do like a beer beer sort of style cured bacon so I'm so excited about you wet rubbing your sausage.

00:30:27.376 --> 00:30:28.897
Yeah, thank you.

00:30:31.279 --> 00:30:32.881
I love that bacon you made.

00:30:32.881 --> 00:30:46.090
So quite a while back Must be over a year ago now, I think since you gave me that, but you did like what you call like a plain dry run of some bacon that you gave me, and you also gave me some rosemary bacon.

00:30:46.090 --> 00:30:46.810
I love both of them.

00:30:46.810 --> 00:31:02.653
I thought they were both great and I like the fact that you can cut different thicknesses, you can play more with them and the quality felt very different as well compared to what you're used to in like a supermarket, you know?

00:31:02.673 --> 00:31:10.298
yeah, again like most things, right if you can, if you can home, make them more often than not, they're going to be better because you know what you're putting in them.

00:31:10.298 --> 00:31:11.160
All that kind of stuff.

00:31:11.160 --> 00:31:13.444
It's just time.

00:31:13.444 --> 00:31:15.048
Yeah, more so than anything.

00:31:15.048 --> 00:31:22.195
But what I found from a smoking cheese point of view, I'm sure people are going to say what the hell are you doing?

00:31:22.195 --> 00:31:43.080
I'd literally just go to the supermarket and buy the cheapest piece of cheddar cheese and then smoke it, because by the time you finish smoking it and putting all the flavor that you want in it whether it's a whiskey whiskey smoke or it's a oak smoke or cherry or whatever you can't tell that it's cheap cheese.

00:31:43.080 --> 00:31:50.401
Yeah, you know, um, so for me, and obviously it keeps the cost down.

00:31:51.336 --> 00:32:10.228
I also think that you know, if you went out and bought something like a Black Bomber and you took out of the truckle setup and everything, if you got it wrong, you'd be devastated that you bought this great, beautiful piece of cheese, whereas if you're doing it with cheaper cheese, it feels like less of a risk element there.

00:32:10.228 --> 00:32:16.115
Oh, definitely.

00:32:16.115 --> 00:32:16.336
I mean.

00:32:16.336 --> 00:32:18.702
My daughter's going through cheese phase at the moment, at seven, going on 40.

00:32:18.702 --> 00:32:20.759
I bet if she'd have a bottle of red wine to go with it she would.

00:32:20.759 --> 00:32:54.622
But her favorite cheese at the moment she absolutely loves um Comté cheese and she absolutely loves parmesan as well, to the point that if I'm going to be like grating any, for if I'm doing cabanara, or if we're doing having a bolognese and grating some, she will cut chunks of parmesan off and just eat it as chunks Walk around the house, and sometimes we just ask for bits of parmesan and ham for dinner, right, so I want to be encouraging that more, but it's just a weird flavour for, like, a seven-year-old to be into, right.

00:32:56.207 --> 00:33:01.582
Yeah, well, to be fair, my daughter is massive into cured meats.

00:33:01.582 --> 00:33:04.509
Cured meat and cheese, yeah, definitely.

00:33:04.994 --> 00:33:06.058
Final things in life, right.

00:33:06.359 --> 00:33:08.286
Yeah, starting young.

00:33:09.355 --> 00:33:17.500
I'd much prefer that than nuggets, though, and that's the other thing that I think is great about barbecuing similar to if you grow your own fruit and veg right, the children understand where the meat comes from.

00:33:17.500 --> 00:33:27.482
Or if you're growing fruit and veg where it actually comes from what, what goes into the effort, they can see it, they can be part of it, and they're more likely to try the stuff if they're involved in the cooking process too.

00:33:27.482 --> 00:33:41.708
So, yeah, anything else that you'd like us to be talking about, please do write in, and we can discuss it on our next Chewing the Fat episode, as it were.

00:33:41.930 --> 00:33:46.540
Name not agreed well, not agreed but loved, and I'm the one who's editing it.

00:33:46.540 --> 00:33:51.022
So we can just disagree on the name and I'll edit it back in afterwards for future episodes.

00:33:51.022 --> 00:33:55.022
But yeah, is there anything else that you wanted to discuss at this point?

00:33:55.083 --> 00:33:56.365
Owen no, I don't think so.

00:33:56.365 --> 00:34:01.205
I think, yeah, it was good to catch up, let's eat some food.

00:34:01.606 --> 00:34:13.862
Yeah, so we're going to go away and eat and we'll try and put together a few more of these types of episodes for you and hopefully, in the upcoming few months we can get back to more normal scheduling returning to normal.

00:34:13.862 --> 00:34:18.117
But until I've moved, that's a bit of a problem and, on that note, we'll let the dog get into the beers.

00:34:18.117 --> 00:34:23.835
That's good speaking to you until next time keep on grilling.

00:34:26.501 --> 00:34:29.307
So that's it for another episode of the meet and greet barbecue podcasts.

00:34:29.307 --> 00:34:30.496
Thanks so much for listening.

00:34:30.496 --> 00:34:32.460
As ever, we'd love to hear from you.

00:34:32.460 --> 00:34:40.106
So please do get in touch, uh, through the our socials at meat and greek barbecue podcast, or meat and greek barbecue podcast at gmailcom.

00:34:40.106 --> 00:34:42.057
We'd love to hear from you, uh.

00:34:42.057 --> 00:34:52.880
Thanks so much again, um, and we'll, as I said, as dan's already mentioned, we'll get back to our usual schedule of guests as soon as possible and we'll see you again soon.

00:34:52.880 --> 00:34:53.623
Keep on grilling.

00:35:04.275 --> 00:35:09.175
Today's episode of the Meat Greet BBQ podcast is brought to you by AOS Outdoor Kitchens.

00:35:09.175 --> 00:35:13.271
They are the South's leading outdoor kitchen design and installation specialists.