Dinner thread?

[veitnamcam]

Just a shout out for the Speights bar in Blenheim.
Had the snapper Monday ( I'm tough to please here)
Perfect cooked on an amazing salad.
Tues Grandmas lambs fry and bacon.
The best lambs fry and bacon I have ever had....better than mine even.
Wed lamb shanks also very good.
Tonight steak with mushroom sauce backed potato etc bloody good.
The Speights was alright too.
Recommended.

[kukuwai]

Yesterdays Kahawai.

Soaked in a brine overnight and smoked up for dinner today. Bloody delicious

Such an underrated fish




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[veitnamcam]

Beautiful!

[Sarvo]

[QUOTE=kukuwai;1249965]Yesterdays Kahawai.

Soaked in a brine overnight and smoked up for dinner today. Bloody delicious

What Brine solution/ingredient's if any - did you use please

[kukuwai]

@Sarvo Salt, soy sauce and water. In a container overnight in the fridge.

They say enough salt to float a potato but I've never tried, just go for a generous amount.

I often put a bit of brown sugar in there too.

Most important thing is that you dry the fillets a bit before smoking. I often use an old fan but in the wind works too.

The surface of the fillet should be tacky to touch. There is a fancy name for this effect but i have forgotten it.

Basically it allows the smoke to adhere to the fillet better

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[7.62]

First brisket on the pellet grill, served up with a side of mac n cheese (with a dash of curry powder and 4 rashers of homekill bacon, beautiful!) and some slaw. Not bad

[ROKTOY]

We had a fridge full of locally and sustainably harvested snapper and cockles.
So tonight the young lad decided he wanted to knock up a seafood chowder.
Everyone had seconds so it must have tasted pretty ok.

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[hotbarrels]

Had the other half of the sirloin last night at day 27. Took it out of the fridge and got it to room temp before putting it in the smoker and had the smoker running at 275°F (as opposed to 225°F) in an effort to knock the smokiness back a notch. Cooked it to 135°F and rested for 15 minutes before cutting. Would struggle to improve on it me thinks. Had it for dinner again tonight as cold smoked meat - stunning flavour, moist, super tender.

[hotbarrels]

First brisket on the pellet grill, served up with a side of mac n cheese (with a dash of curry powder and 4 rashers of homekill bacon, beautiful!) and some slaw. Not bad

@7.62 looks awesome. I haven't tried a brisket yet as I haven't been able to find a suitable chunk of meat.

Sorry I missed your question re the pellets - I am using Pitboss "Competition Blend".
Why? Because they were on special at Bunnings and they were the only place I could get them easily under lock down.
Are they smoky? Yes - almost too smoky.

The smoke intensity may also be dictated by your smoker. What brand do you have?
I bought a Green Mountain Grills. Seemed to get good reviews, plus I liked the fact that they have a dedicated pizza oven the fits under the hood and funnels heat directly from the firebox, and I liked their thermal blanket. The thermal blanket saves a shit load on pellets. I think it probably burns less than 1/2 what it does without it. It is also 12V, which means that you can run it off a lead acid battery rather than 230V if the power goes out or you want to put it on a trailer and go remote.

If you are looking for a rain cover for your smoker, I can highly recommend https://thebbqcovercompany.co.nz/sho...canvas-covers/
I bought one of their standard hooded bbq covers and it goes over the top of my smoker (chimney and all) extremely well. These covers are extremely well made and worth the money. I also have a flat top one on my 6 burner plate bbq.

[Chelsea]

An easy midweek favourite tonight. Honey mustard Bacon wrapped chicken breast on loaded couscous.

[7.62]

Thanks for the tips @hotbarrels. Might have to give the pit boss pellets a try sometime as in my limited experience, the Traeger pellets seem to be pretty mild on the flavour front. I’ve also heard good things about Lumberjack and Weber so I’m keen to try them as well.

I’ve got a Traeger 575 but I hear green mountain is right up there too, I imagine they would perform similarly. Interesting comments about the thermal blanket as you can get these for Traegers as well, but they are only recommended for sub zero temps and cooking temps no greater than 180C. So pretty much unnecessary in NZ. Yeah I brought a rain cover for mine as well, it’s under a covered area but it’s still good to throw a cover over it.

I wasn’t really intending to use the Traeger for pizza or steaks (I’ve still got a Weber Q for that) but those sirloin steaks you did look bloody amazing: a medium rare steak with a nice smoky flavour sounds damn good too me, will have to give that a nudge. I also just got a ceramic chicken throne so this weekend it will be beer can chicken (without the can!)

[bunji]

So after the last bit of the Lock Down saw our farm manager having his first kid ,we decided to let him have as much time off as he wanted which ended up near to 3 months ,so meant we basically worked the farm ourselves with no real time off ,so we made the executive decision now he is back we will take a few extra weeks off over xmas /new year, as l also have my 60th coming up in a couple of weeks.We had already planned to have a get together for my birthday with 5 days on a mates remote Bach on a property on the coast & get in some much needed diving/spear fishing/fishing & boating & while we have been getting in some hunting the freezers are bare of local caught seafood which we love.

So for the last week l have had the smoker/driers etc working overtime so we have all our usual Xmas/new year meats done & ready to go & plenty of nibblies & easy prep meals for the Bach stay & diving/fishing/hunting trips instead of it being a mad rush due to farm work as usual which shits me to tears .

Xmas Venison Ham wrapped in pork belly & a xmas Bacon are hitting the smoker tonight & tonight for dinner we will be having a few slices of the Venison Pastrami l just pulled out today , which we have Vak Packed up so it can float around in the Engel in the Tojo or in a Chilly Bin in the boat if needed -



Sliced



Vak Packed=

[Sarvo]

Gurnard and very small Snaps
5.30am catch

[bunji]

@Sarvo Yumbo, pretty hard to beat a same day catch cook up ,one of life's culinary pleasure's IMO, these fucking lock downs have had me & the missus missing our usual Spear fishing feeds & reminiscing about our 6 month sail through the South Pacific where we basically lived on fish through choice ,spear fishing each day & the fish so fresh on the BBQ on the back l had to make a little fence to stop their nerves flipping them off the plate & back in the water.

[bunji]

A couple of Venison hams wrapped in pork belly & bacon l just did for Xmas ,there will be a taste test tonight for dinner, smells bloody glorious