Did some wings on the Pitts & Spitts and then charred a bit on my gasser.

Haven’t seen a $.99/lb butt sale lately and with all the Holiday cooking I have not made sausage for a bit. While at Costco noticed their boneless butts were back down to the regular price of $1.99/lb AND happened to find two 2-packs that came to almost exactly 25lb. Destiny.

Should have paid more attention but when taking out of fridge today to start cutting up I realized one pack had bones - even though sold as boneless. Jerks. Anyways, since you can’t get hi-temp Whiz I used 2.5 hi-temp cheddar and 25lb pork butt.

And will say it sure is nice to be able to use the back patio as a fridge again to chill grinder head and stuffer, meat block after grind, sausage mix after filling stuffer, etc. Thinking I may hang these outside tomorrow to freeze before cutting and vac sealing.

So no matter how much sausage, BBQ, bacon, or jerky I give to friends and neighbors, they ALL say that these smoked Cheez-Its are the best thing I make. It is kind of like Chex-Mix in theory and they are fantastic.

I basically make 3 Costco sized (48oz) boxes at a time with them split evenly between two hotel pans.

Recipe is:
2/3c Avocado/Olive Oil
1/3c Kikkoman Soy Sauce
3 TBSP Hidden Valley Ranch Powder (reg or spicy)
1 TBSP Garlic Powder
1 TBSP Onion Powder
1 TBSP Black Pepper
3 TBSP McCormick Honey Sriracha Seasoning (found at Sam’s club)

The Honey Sriracha is the wildcard and can be a swapped for anything you like. Have done Weber Garlic Jalapeno, BBQ rubs, etc. Just watch salt content. The rest is the “base” of the recipe.

Just combine the liquids and pour over Cheez-Its stirring to coat evenly. Then mix all dry ingredients and sprinkle over Cheez-Its and toss to combine (do this in 2-3 batches).

Then I smoke at 200F for 2 hours stirring every 20 min or so.

First butt I’ve cooked vs turned into sausage in some time. Sales lately have been on 2-packs and since I only need 3 to do 25lb sausage I hade this one left over. Did it overnight and is now resting in foil. Will pull it for some lunch in a bit.

Also funny how small a single 9lb butt looks on my smoker!

No complaints from me!

RafterW That beaut of a breakfast sandwich reminded me of this monstrosity I made Friday night after a few beers. Like a lower class version of yours LOL.

Just some grilled hanger steaks.

Been letting the bellies chill in garage fridge since smoking and this eve was slicing and packaging day. Entire garage smells of smoke. Water bottles in garage fridge crisper drawer smell like bacon. It is glorious. Each pack is 1lb and ended up with 18 packs plus a pound or so of off cuts I made this eve.

Dang, I cannot wait for these to be ready as they smell just like a Reuben on Rye.

25lb pork butt with a single 4.5mm grind and 2.5lb hi-temp Swiss. Used 24oz of water and the seasoning mix and sure cure from Excalibur. Currenting in fridge curing overnight and will vac seal tomorrow or Monday.

Did a very quick/easy Creamy Garlic Dijon Chicken.

Well hard not to as a captive audience but regardless many thanks for the hat! Proof you’ve all put up with 500+ posts from me in this community!

So started these two bellies on 1/21 and planned and was planning for a 14-day minimum cure. Basically stick with the standard Digging Dog Farm EQ Calc values but changed salt from 2.0 to 1.8% based on past experience/preference.

Planning a smoke of one hour each at 120F to dry then 135/150/165F with smoke an finishing at 180F until IT hits 138-140F or so. Plan is to use Applewood (full bowl - dry) on my PK100 and may even consider a refill if it runs out. Looking to see what heavy smoke will do this round.

Day of cure:

Post-Cure:

Drying:

Okay. These are really good.

Nice fall weather called for some chicken and dumplings.

I have a few co-workers that subtlety bring up the topic of my smoked beef jerky fairly often. One of them is not so subtle and will be in town (Chicago) from NY this week. So when I was last at Costco I grabbed a few packs of eye of round. This is one time I don’t mind the “mechanically tenderized” beef from Costco as I figure it helps slices absorb more seasoning.

Sliced it all up on Monday eve and and split into 4 x 4-1/3lb piles. I used PS Seasoning Sweet & Hot on 3 of them and PS Maple Jalapeno on 1 of them (each seasoning pack covers 5lbs so wanted to try a bit stronger flavor). More for my own recall I had my slicer dial set to 10 for 1/4" but seemed a tad thicker than normal.

This morning (Wednesday) I laid the Sweet & Hot out on my 6 PK100 racks and as you can see by last one it just barely fit. I patted it all dry with paper towel to help speed the drying along.

Currently running in my PK100 at 150F with vents 90% closed for 1 hour. Then will bump up to 160F and add some Cherry smoke and open vents up.

On my last jerky thread I mentioned that I rarely pick up the “sweet” in a recipe over the smoke. twilliams mentioned he often uses his PK (big brother to mine) for jerky without any smoke with great results. Based on that, I plan to tone way down on the sawdust compared to normal. Hoping for more a “hint” of smoke this time.

The Maple Jalapeno batch all fit on the top rack of my Pitts & Spitts Maverick 1250. They recently posted the controller commands to set the smoker low-point to 140F vs previous 160F. So currently running it at 140F and will for a couple couple hours. The convection of a pellet smoker seems to cook MUCH faster than my PK100 so will just bump it up a bit as need till I hit 170F or so.

One more…

All done and now hanging in garage for a bit. Oddly when one was at 139F the other was at 120F so it went for an extra couple hours (one on right in this photo, left in smoker).

Did a 10mm then 4.5mm grind for these yesterday with 50lb of pork shoulder - thanks to recent $.99/lb sale. Mixed and stuffed today. Will vac seal tomorrow.

Did the Philly Cheese Steak and added 2.5lb of hi-temp Swiss in a 32-35mm hog casing.

Did a quick clean and followed with Maple PSS into 22-24mm sheep casings.

Guess I didn’t follow the directions in the name as I used hi-temp Ghost Pepper and not cheddar. 25lb pork butt and 2.5lb cheese with just a single 4.5mm grind (I could not find my 10mm plate anywhere - found it in garage toolbox while cleaning up). These are cured so will hit the PK100 tomorrow morning and likely finish sous vide. Went with a 10" link in some 42-45mm casings for more of a “dinner” sausage size.

Probably breaking the rules as these are not “today” but just some recent cooks.

Found some nice big jalapenos so did a batch of poppers just with block cream cheese and nice thick bacon:

Had a section of pork butt leftover after breaking down some double cryo-packs for sausage. Chose to cut into large chunks, seasoned with salt/pepper and browned in a dutch oven. Then sautéed some onion and garlic, and followed with some chili powder, cumin, cayenne, Mexican oregano, and bay leaf and deglazed with a can of beer. Added pork all back in as well as s sliced orange and some lime juice and braised till tender. Broke apart when done and ate as tacos.

Finally met up with some buddies at Restaurant Depot for some shopping yesterday. One of them had made a huge batch of stuffed melrose peppers using homemade hot Italian sausage. Just threw them on my pellet smoker at 350F till done/charred a bit. Fantastic and want more!