Grilling, smoking, BBQ, campfire cooking...

I am going to try this. The kids will love it.

 

Let me know how it goes.

 

Down in da swamps of SW LA, when I was growing up, we'd have a nice bbq every month or so on Sunday. We'd invite over one set of uncle/aunt with no kids.,another with 3 kids ad there was usually my mom and dad. Dad did the bbqing. He'd season the meat the night before with salt, pepper, garlic powder and a splash of worchestershire and a healthy sprinkle of paprika. We went to early mass so he could get the charcoal going early and spend the rest of the morning and a couple of hours during the afternoon cooking....low and slow. His pit was a 55 gallon drum cut in half long ways, hinged top, legs on it and a couple of grates...one for the coals and one for the meat. He put a hole in each bottom end so he could control the fire.

OK, now to the point of this post. About Thursday, my mom and the 2 aunts would get together and start chopping, mixing and, best of all, making bbq sauce! Oh, man was that stuff good. In fact, the grownups would have to run the kids off after it had simmered for about 4 hours because we'd take a piece of bread, break it into pieces and scoop up some of the bbq sauce and eat it just like that! OH, MAN was that good! Onions, celery, bell pepper, catsup, oil, tomato sauce, salt and pepper, hot sauce, all the good stuff. They'd let it simmer for about 5 hours or so. Back in 1977, I managed to get a copy of the recipe from a friend and cooked it quite a bit. Unfortunately, during one of my moves, the recipe got lost. I've been trying to duplicate it for decades, but no luck. Then, 3 days ago, one of my old high school buddies who still lives down there posted a pic of him and his grandkids making up a batch of the sauce. Hoping really hard, I asked him for the recipe. He sent it. Unfortunately, the first 3 ingredients got cut off! A couple of days later, he sent the rest of it. I got all the ingredients together yesterday and fixed up a batch. This was IT!! Today, I'm hot water bath canning it in 1/2 pints, 12 oz jars and maybe a pint or 3. WOOHOOO!! And yes I'm dippig some up with pieces of bread, too! LOLOL

Kajun

 

ghrit, I'm taking my cues from Hanzo bout posting recipes.

Kajun

PS
I got 16 half-pints of sauce and 4 half-pints of basting oil out of this.

 

If you post the recipe here, you won't have to worry about losing it. The Internet is forever.

 

I share when I use em. And most times, no recipe cooking. But I'll tell you what I used and what I did. Plus an estimation of amounts.

So don't use me for an excuse.

 

Lunch was a leftover burger, done teriyaki style on French bread.



1/2 pound burger was about four inches tall with the bread. Was worrying about how to eat it, and then it was gone. Problem solved. Here is scale. The angle doesn't show it well, but the burger is about half as tall as the large Nutella bottle. Little monkey was like, "Whoa, how are you going to eat that?!?" Where there is a hungry will, there is a way.

 

Aw, Hanzo, c'mon, man, back me up will ya? LOL

Most Cajun recipes I use start with "First, ya get born Cajun." and goes from there. But, since I'm such a nice guy (yeah, right! LOL), here ya'll go. Keep in mind, this is a kind of chunky style sauce. The Aunt Martha is the aunt of the guy I got the recipe from, not my aunt.

Aunt Martha’s Bar-b-que Sauce

2 Large stalks celery—coarse chopped, 1/4" or so dice
1 Lb bell peppers (~3 large)—coarse chopped
2.5 Lbs onions—coarse chopped
¼ Pint mustard (1/2 Cup)
¼ bottle hot sauce or use ½ smallest bottle (either Texas Pete’s or Louisiana brand....use more for spicier flavor)
¾ Btl 64 oz catsup
2 large cans tomato sauce
1.25 Qts Cooking oil – plus more for basting sauce
¾ Lbs sugar (or ¼ C Splenda......add sugar a bit at a time until the taste is as sweet as you want)
Salt and pepper to taste

Put oil into large non-reactive pot and heat. When oil is hot reduce heat to medium high, add celery, bell pepper and onion. Cook for ~30 minutes or until soft and fragrant, stirring once in a while. Add all other ingredients, stir well. Simmer, uncovered, for ~ 5 hours on medium heat, stirring once in a while. It will look like the ingredients won't mix for the first couple of hours, keep the faith and keep on simmering. (4 hours on electric stove) I got 14 half-pints sauce and 4 half-pints of basting oil from this. Double recipe if you want, works well. Adjust ingredients to make it to your taste preferences.

DISCLAIMER: This is a serious recipe! Not to be tried by the novice chef. Be careful giving this to children under 18. Heck, be careful giving this to all folks! It is highly addictive. i am not responsible for any weight gain from consuming this recipe! Eats well as a sauce served over meat, chicken, or fish, or as a dipping sauce for meat, or as a dipping sauce for bread (Bear, combine this with your bread and you're gonna go nutz! LOL). Add canola oil in a 1 part oil to 3 parts sauce, heat slowly until oil turns orange. Use the oil as a basting liquid for extra taste when cooking. Enjoy!

Kajun

 

Right you are, @TXKajun. Most authentic recipes are not exact recipes. So even though there are specifics spelled out, if you aren't Cajun, it won't work...

Because recipes require tasting and adjusting...

But since it isn't YOUR aunt, glad you shared. Sometimes family secrets need to be secret. But if it's not your family, you can share with your extended monkey family as you did. Good on you. Bet there will be some happy monkeys.

 

Grillin' time...

Kiawe grilled steaks



What's left after big monkey took half for herself.



Garlic sesame chicken



Tandoori chicken



Grilled oysters



Hawaiian chili pepper shoyu sauce. Had a nice kick. About thirty seconds after Mrs. Hanzo had her first oyster with the sauce, I hear, "Whhhoooo!!"



What a first serving looks like.

 

Dessert after that dinner was pumpkin cheesecake

 

One thing that is lacking in this thread is the smell !!!

One thing that is not mentioned in all the recipes here is the most important not mentioned

You have all added Love too your cooking!

 

Polished off leftovers for dinner.

 

Dessert was Kula persimmons

 

A beautiful evening preceded by a golden sunset.



Wifee bought some dry aged Kauai ground beef at the farmers market.



So I fired up the grill, stuck some kiawe wood in there and grilled up hamburger steaks. Made two kinds. Regular and teriyaki.



Monkey asked for loco moco.

 

Surprised wifee wanted burgers tonight. So fired up the grill, added kiawe, and grilled up a bunch of hamburger steaks. They were at least 1/2 pounders.



I had a hamburger steak with brown gravy. Little monkey wanted loco moco.

 

dude this thread is DEADLY! especially if you haven't eaten, lucky for me I already had lunch but still im salivating!

 

Yesterday afternoon, Sweetie and I were watching a couple of DVD'd episodes of "Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives" and they were doing bar food. We both got the hungries for chicken wings and stuffed potato skins. I went out and got a couple of dozen chicken wing parts and brought them home, seasoned with salt, pepper, garlic powder and Worchestershire sauce. I let them marinate for about 1/2 hour while I fired up my Akorn komado cooker . It got a bit hotter than I wanted, so I gave it another 30 minutes to cool down. While it was cooling, I par boiled some thick (1/4") slices of potatoes and then drained them.

When the heat got right on the Akorn, I put on the slices of potatoes and grilled them until there were nicely done. The par boiling worked great! (Thanks for the idea, Bobby Flay.) Took them off, put them into a warming oven and put on the chicken wings, along with a little bit of pecan wood. When the wings were up to 165, I took them off and put them into the warming oven. I warmed up some of my homemade bbq sauce, some jarred pizza sauce and some Louisiana Hot Sauce Wing Sauce that I cut in about 1/3 of one of my ghost peppers (it was zesty!). Took the potato slices out, coated some with the pizza sauce, mozz cheese and topped with small rounds of Canadian bacon. Took others, topped with bbq sauce, cheddar cheese, pepperoni and then stuck them under the broiler until the cheese was melted. The rest I left plain and just sprinkled with salt.

Sliced up some carrots and celery and got out the Ranch dressing and the Blue Cheese dressing. Then it was "Help Yourself" time. Turned out better than I'd hoped and was tons cheaper than our new Buffalo Wild Wings restaurant.

Next time, though, I'm going to use one of my Weber 22 1/2." grills instead of the Akorn because it'll be ready quicker and the temp changes are quicker.

Kajun

 

Nice, Kajun! But pictures, man, pictures!