Weber Kettle and some Sandwich Treats

Quite often, I get tired of all the high temp grilling and want something with a little more smoke flavor so I just lower the temps and stretch the cook out a little longer to get some additional flavor for my sandwiches. 

Used the Weber charcoal baskets and Stubb’s briquets with hickory chunks for smoke. Most of the cook was done on the backside of a pair of Grill Grates. 

My cook consisted of the following:

Four 1/3 pound 70/30 burger pattties

Five Johnsonville Hot Italian sausage

Six Vienna Brand Chicage type Jumbo Beef Franks 

Block of Jalapeno Spam

And some caramelized veggies

My Gen 2 performer doing it’s thing. Meat was cooked at about 250-275 degrees measured on the cooking surface and took a few minutes less than an hour not including the veggies. 

Caramelized veggies consisted of onions, red bell peppers, green bell peppers, and sliced jalapeno peppers.

Results of the cook.

Hot Italian sausage sandwich with some of the caramelized veggies, tomatoes, and mustard and a Jalapeno Spam Slider with caramelized veggies, lettuce, tomato, and mustard.

The cook came out great and sure made a nice lunch.

Steak, Pork Burgers, Italian Sausage, and more

This mixed cook was done on my Char-Broil CB500-X which is about my favorite little charcoal cooker. The fuel was Ozark Oak lump charcoal along with some hickory chunks for smoke. The cooker was setup with half the grids direct and the other half indirect.



I cut 3 steaks out of a whole loin about 5/8” thick which will be used for my State Fair ribeye sandwiches. I also cut 2 of the steaks about 1-1/4” thick for our regular use. 



I prepped them by cutting some excess fat off and sprinkling on some garlic salt and fresh black pepper. 



I installed my Grill Grates and got the cooker up to about 550 degrees measured on top of the grates and loaded a couple of steaks.



I cooked the thicker steaks about 3 minutes on each side to an internal of about 125 degrees and removed them from the cooker. I cooked the thinner steaks for about 1-1/2 minute per side to get them done. With this little time on the grill, I didn’t have them on long enough to turn them to get the nice cross hatch grid marks.

Jan formed up eight 1/3 pound pork burgers from our bulk meat and I cooked them next on the grill. This is another State Fair treat we love.

After the above was done I took the grill grates off of the cooker and finished the cook on the standard cast iron grids. 



Next up was my Italian sausage, a block of Spam, and some hot peppers which will be used for blackened peppers.

Jan prepped some slab potatoes by brushing on some peanut oil along with some salt and pepper.



After the peppers were done, I loaded the slab potatoes on the direct side of the cooker.



Cooker still pretty hot so the potatoes didn’t take very long.

Next up and the last cook was some ABT”s made out of the Hungarian Hot Banana Peppers. 



The peppers came out great.









All of the cook came out looking good.



Plated ribeye steak dinner.



State Fair ribeye steak sandwich along with some red beans and rice and other sides.



State Fair type of pork burger sandwich meal.



Italian sausage sandwich with some caramelized onions with some horse radish mustard.

Smoked Sausage Medley

I did this cook for a Thursday evening contest pitch-in over in Kettering, Ohio at the 4th Annual Veteran BBQ Cookoff. You know...bring your favorite dish type of thing.



I figured that I would need to serve about 70 people so I decided to do about 9-10 pounds of meat. I used some Smoked Eckrich sausage, some Eckrich Polish sausage, some mild Italian sausage, some Brats, some Chorizo, some Andouille, and some of my super hot and spicy Italian sausage which I have in the bulk.

Ok, for the Medley, I used some portabella mushrooms, red onions, white onions, red, green, yellow, and orange bell peppers.



I wanted all of the ingredients smoked kinda heavy and did them slowly in my pellet cooker with pecan pellets on the smoke setting for some additional time. I started with the bell peppers.



A tray of onions ready for the smoker.



The portabellas ready to go on the cooker.



Since some of my home made sausage is in the bulk form, I just make it into small meat balls for this treat.





I made several smokes with this treat to get it all done and ready for the event.



I cut up the sausage and got it ready. As I finished up, I placed all the smoked and cooked ingredients into some Zip-Lock bags until serving time at the contest.

I planned to make up a light sauce with some Prego, wine, water, and Italian spices.

At the contest, I put this all together in a large stainless steel pot and heated it up for serving.

I don't have any finished pictures of this treat as it went pretty fast at the contest.

Hot and Super Spicy Italian Sausage

This is a great recipe for Italian sausage but it is very hot and spicy and by far, the best recipe I have ever tasted for this wonderful treat. This sausage stuffed into casings and eaten as a sandwich may be too hot and spicy for some of the family but used loose (bulk) in all other recipes is just something that you won't soon forget! It is really that good!

We use it in our pizza, meatloaves, meatballs (both over spaghetti and in meatball hero sandwiches), calzones, stromboli, stuffed bell peppers, fatties, lasagna, marinara sauce, spaghetti sauce, and some other casseroles.



This picture shows about 18 pounds of my Italian sausage ready for the freezer.

We usually make it up in batches of about 8 pounds to as much as 18 pounds. It does freeze well and will hold fine in the freezer for about 6 months.

Ok...Let's get started. You will need a way to grind up the pork butts for this treat or if you are lucky and have a local store that still has a real meat department, just have them grid the butts up for you when they are doing their own sausage. I usually grind my own pork in my Kitchen-Aid mixer and I also use the mixer to mix each 4 pound batch of meat. You will need some method of grinding up some of the spices for this meat and I usually use a mortar and pestle but I think a small spice grinder would work as well. If you plan to stuff the sausage into casings, you will need a stuffer of some type and of course, the casings of your choice. The Kitchen-Aid with the correct attachment will do it but it is a two person operation for the best results.





I start by cutting up the pork butts into pieces small enough to fit into the neck of my Kitchen-Aid grinder attachment.



It is now ready to go thru the grinder.



I then run the pork thru the grinder and into a few bowls or pans.





My recipe is for about 4 pounds of ground pork per batch as that is the largest amount I can mix in my Kitchen-Aid so I usually weigh out my ground pork into bowls of 4 pounds each. You can do larger amounts if you want to mix by hand.



Again, for 4 pounds of ground pork butts:

4 TBL crushed fennel seed
4 TBL crushed red pepper
4 TBL oregano
4 TBL very finely chopped onion
2 TBL MSG
2 tsp coriander seed (crushed)
2 tsp paprika
2 tsp fresh ground black pepper
1 tsp white pepper
1 tsp caraway seed
1 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar
Bout 14 cloves of fresh garlic (crushed)
Bout 8oz water or wine

Grind or crush up the seeds and items in the recipe as needed and place them in a large cup of about 8 oz of water or wine and let this soak for about 20 minutes before use.



This is 2 batches ready to be mixed into the ground pork by hand or mixed up in the Kitchen-Aid.



I place the ground pork back into the mixer bowl and pour the spice mixture over the pork. I use the dough hook on the mixer to mix up the spices in the sausage. Again, I am making 4 pound batches of the sausage.



About 8 pounds of my Italian sausage as it was finished up in two batches in the mixer.



This is about 12 pounds of sausage.



This is about 17 pounds of sausage.

At this time, I will usually fry up a pattie for a sandwich and taste it for the seasonings and make a change here if needed. At least, that is the excuse I use to the old woman to get a sample this wonderful treat as early as possible.



The meat then gets covered and goes into the fridge for about 2-3 hours to let the seasonings work into the meat before I vacuum pack it for the freezer or stuff it into casings.



I usually put either a pound or a pound and a half in each bag. I think this picture shows 1-1/2 pound bags ready for the freezer.



This batch is one pound bags of sausage.



Try that on a pizza...Good Stuff...Nuff Said!