Portabella Pizza

I was cruising around the bbq forums a few days ago and on the "Addicted To BBQ" forum, I found this great looking treat. A gentleman who uses the handle of "a26guy" put up a post with pictures of this great looking personal sized pizza.



The unique part of this pizza is that the crust is just a plain portabella mushroom which makes it great for all low carbers as it is about impossible to make a low carb pizza crust out of anything that is edible. It is just great for your regular pizza as well and should please all guests.

Anyway, after seeing the post, I couldn't wait to try it for myself. I also did a couple of regular pizzas with this new treat in the pellet cooker using pecan for wood.



I started by using a mellon baller to cut and scrape the gills from out of the underside of the portabella caps. I then cut each stem off down to the caps. For my toppings for the six portabella pizzas and the two regular 14" pizzas, I browned up a mixture of one pound of hot sausage and one pound of hamburger. I then cut up some onions and bell peppers and opened a can of black olives and the sauce to go on the pizzas. I also used 6 cups of mozzarella cheese on the pizzas.



I sauced the caps and then added the blend of hot sausage and burger.



I added the onions and bells peppers.



Next came the black olives and plenty of cheese and then I added a piece of pepperoni on top.



The six portabella caps ready to go on my pellet smoker.



I brought the smoker up to about 350 degrees for this treat and it took about 18-19 minutes to get the pizzas done to my liking.



This is just before I pulled them off the cooker.



Sure did look great!

After the portabellas came off the cooker, I raised the temp to about 425 for the regular pizzas and loaded them on the smoker.



These things are KILLER!!



Was a little cold outside to screw around setting up a couple of baking hearths so I did the regular pizzas on a pan.



Good stuff!!

Making Brats and Texas Hot Links

As a long time sausage maker, I am always looking for new recipes and other interesting sausages to try and although I am completely out of my Italian sausage, which I must have at all times, I decided to try a couple of new recipes before I make up a large batch of my Italian. A large batch to me is about 20-25 pounds at the most so you can see that I am a small time sausage maker.

A good friend, a Mr. Jim Ferguson (Rolling Smoke Barbeque) from over around the Dayton, Ohio area, gave me a recipe for his brats that he has been working on and it looked good to me so I wanted to give it a try. He probably thinks I forgot about this recipe as he gave it to me about six months ago and this is the first time I will try it.

Jim's web page: http://www.rollingsmoke.com/

Another friend, a Mr. Kevin (Stoogie) Taylor (The BBQ Guru) has a great looking Texas Hot Link recipe on his web site "The Recipe Goldmine" that I have wanted to try for a while now as it looks very good and I think it would be hot enough to suit this chili-head.

Kevin's web page: http://www.recipegoldmine.com/bbqguru/bbqguru.html



I started out with two pork butts that weighed a total of 14.82 pounds as my brat recipe calls for 4 pounds of ground pork and I will use the balance of the ground pork in the Texas hot links.



I prepped the meat by cutting out the bones and cutting the meat into small chunks that would fit my Kitchen-Aid grinder. I also mixed the fattie stuff with the lean stuff in the bowls as I prepped the meat for a better and more even grind. The meat then went back into the fridge for a couple of hours to cool down again for the grinder.



While the meat was cooling down again, I got the spices out for the sausage. I found an error in the recipe...calls for a 1/2 cup of water?? WATER, that stuff will rust your pipes!!! I decided to substitute red wine. I also added a very small amount of cayenne pepper to the mix as I do like a little bite in my brats. That is the only changes I made to this great looking recipe. I then mixed most of the spices into the red wine to let them seep until I needed to add them to the mix.



Next, I ran the cold pork thru the Kitchen-Aid with grinder and only plugged it up once. Cleaned it out and finished the meat.



I had a nice batch of ground pork ready for my two recipes.



I then weighed out enough ground pork for the brat recipe, mixed the ground beef into the ground pork for my brats, added the spices, and mixed it up with my hands. I then covered the bowl and placed it into the fridge so the flavors can all meld together for about 12 hours before I stuff the casings. I will have about 5 pounds of total meat ready for the brats.

With my brats out of the way, I started on the Texas hot links. Here is the recipe from Stoogie's web site.

Texas Hot Links

From the kitchen of Kevin Taylor, the BBQ Guru

1 (6 pound) pork butt
1 bottle beer
2 tablespoons black pepper, coarsely ground
2 tablespoons red pepper, crushed
2 tablespoons cayenne pepper
2 tablespoons paprika
3 tablespoons kosher (coarse) salt
2 tablespoons mustard seed
1/4 cup garlic, minced
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon MSG
1 teaspoon Tender Quick
1 teaspoon bay leaves , ground
1 teaspoon coriander
1 teaspoon thyme, dried

Mix all spices with beer.

Grind pork for sausage.

Mix beer/spices thoroughly into the meat.

Form into sausage links and grill or smoke.

Place in bun and slather heavily with mustard.



I got my spices all measured out for about 9 pounds of meat. The recipe calls for 6 pounds of meat and I have 9 so I added about 1/3rd more spices to the ground pork. Again, as a chili-head, I think that using 3 TBL of the very hot 80 grade ground cayenne, 3 TBL crushed red pepper, and 3 TBL black pepper, to only 9 pounds of ground meat, that these links should come out hot and spicy.



I got the 9 pounds of Texas hot links all mixed up and covered the dish and placed it into the fridge for my melding period of about 12 hours. This bowl of meat is blood red from the spices and just eaks and eaks of heat. Gonna be a good batch!!



I did make up a pattie of each recipe to taste it right after I mixed it up so if I thought it needed anything I could add it now. Both recipes were great and I didn't change anything.



The next day, I ran the brat meat thru my upright tin can stuffer into hog casings (gut) and it came out looking good. I don't stuff sausage very often as I use it in the bulk but I was pleased with the 5 pounds of stuffed brats.



I made the sausage into links and then bagged up the brats for future use.



I started stuffing the Texas hot links into the hog casings and they came out looking pretty good.



I ended up with a nice batch of stuffed Texas hot links.



Again, I made them up into links and bagged the sausage for future use.

Both of these recipes were very good tasting in bulk form in a sandwich but I really won't be able to judge the results until I can taste them as they are properly served in the links.



A fellow needs to carmelize up some onions and bell peppers for both of these sausage recipes. They also must be served in a good fresh bun (not a hotdog bun) for the best results. A nice poppy seeded bun with a sausage link in it, with some carmelized onions and peppers, a few jalapeno slices and then some homemade honey mustard is a real treat.

My thanks go out to both Jim Ferguson and Kevin Taylor for these recipes.

Pit Beef/Roast Beef on the Weber Kettle

Wife wanted some roast or pit beef and I was looking to do a rotisserie cook of some type so this cook just went together like peaches and cream. I decided to do it on my EZ-Que in the old stand by Weber Kettle which always gives me great results. Never had a bad cook with this setup.



I started out with two beef bottom round roasts from Sam's Club with one weighing in at 3.58 pounds and the other a little larger at 4.11 pounds. I like the smaller roasts as it gives me more of that great outside crust after cooking. This meat should make for some wonderful sandwiches!



I cut the hard fat off of the fat side and then sprinkled on a generous dose of garlic salt and black pepper.



I got the cooker out of the garage and loaded up the charcoal chimney with enough Rancher brickettes to fill the two charcoal baskets in the Weber kettle. I then lit up the chimney full of charcoal. Was a cool morning at about freezing and with some misting rain and fog in the area. As you can see, we still have some snow on the ground.



I got my 6" EZ-Que rotisserie basket out and loaded up the two rubbed bottom round roasts and got them ready for the cooker.

Went back outside and poured the charcoal into the baskets inside the cooker and added the drip pan with a little water and got the cooker ready to load for an indirect hight temp cook.



I loaded the meat into the kettle for this short cook.



With the freezing rain I decided to use my tailgater battery operated rotisserie spit motor for this cook and I replaced the D batteries and installed it and it worked well.

I wanted to cook this meat as hot as the cooker would get and I opened up all the vents and had a lid temp of around 425-475f degrees which should get these roasts done to medium rare in about an hour. Then the wife told me she didn't want them "moo-ing" so I decided to cook them a little longer.



I ended up cooking the roasts for about 75 minutes which gave me an internal temp of about 155-160f which is about medium done. It sure looked good and should make for some great beef.

Brought the meat inside the house and removed it from the EZ-Que basket.



The smell was wonderful and I couldn't wait to get some sliced up. Wrapped them in foil and let them cool some before I put them thru the slicer.



The meat coming off of the slicer.



It sure makes up a nice plate of thin sliced roast beef. Me and my lady fought over each of the last 1/4" thick crust pieces off of each block of meat that went thru the slicer as the slicer won't cut the meat all the way to your fingers! ouch! These thin crunchy chunks are to die for!!

Take a fresh onion bun, cut it in half, wrap it with a wet paper towel and place it into the nuker for a few short seconds to get it steamed and warmed up. Place a big pile of this roast beef on one side of the bun. Add a couple of slices of Swiss cheese on top of the meat, back into the nuker for a few seconds to melt the cheese. Add a big dollop of horsey sauce to the top of the meat and add the top of the bun for one great sandwich.

We did freeze the remainder of the meat in pound packets for future use.

Holiday Appetizers / Pig Candy

Pig Candy is a great sweet and spicy treat to have around the house for the holidays. It is fairly easy to make and is a great snack and goes well with my other appetizers of Jerky and Smoked Cheese.



This cook is my no-carb low calorie version and I used the following ingredients.

4 pounds of the thick cut Country Bacon from Sam's Club

Sugar Twin Granulated Brown Replacement Sugar (Calorie free-no carbs)

Ground Cayenne pepper

Crushed Hot Red pepper flakes (in black pepper container)

I start by adding some Sugar Twin to a bowl and then adding enough ground cayenne pepper to make it as hot as I want it. I like it SCREEMING HOT and use way more than most folks can handle. For you folks that don't like it very hot, just add some cayenne and taste it and then get it as hot as YOU want. Some of the mix will cook and wash off of the bacon so do make it a little hotter at the start.



I would normally smoke this in one of my Backwoods cookers like you see in the picture but I cheated this time and did it in the kitchen oven so it won't have any smoke flavor but I was pressed for time and just didn't get the smoker out and fire it up for this treat. The Shame of it.....much better in a smoker.



I don't like this treat cooked in it's own grease so I use raised cooling grids in the pans to keep the bacon up and out of the grease.



After I apply the hot spices & sugar to the top side of the bacon, I placed it in a 350 degree oven for about 30 minutes.



I pulled it out, and then turned the bacon over, and added the spices again, and placed it back into the oven for about 25-30 more minutes or until it is done to suit me.



This is the final product just out of the oven and cooling on the top of the stove.



I then cut each strip of bacon in half and this picture shows the results of my 4 pound cook.



I bagged up the Pig Candy and have it ready for the holidays.

Good Stuff!!

Holiday Appetizers / Smoked Cheese

Real Smoked Cheese is a great treat to have around the house during the holidays. It is very easy to prepare and is wonderful with crackers and any smoked meat.



For this smoke, I used the following cheeses.

3.99 lb of Alpenhaus Switzerland Swiss Cheese (one of our favorites)

2.10 lb of Members Mark Sharp Cheddar

1.82 lbs of Dutch Gouda Cheese

1.23 lb Black Diamond 6 yr aged Cheddar Cheese

1.66 lb of Great Midwest 3 Alarm Colby Jack with Chipotle, Habenero, & Jalapeno

I cut the blocks of cheese into the smaller chunks like you see in the picture. The smoke doesn't penetrate the cheese but only builds up on the outside of the blocks and to keep the smoke equal in the pieces, it is better to keep the blocks no more than about 1 to 1-1/2" in diameter for the best results. This is also cracker size and will be perfect for this treat.



I got the Backwoods Chubby out for this smoke. I will run no water in the pan for this very low temp smoke. Placed about 10 Rancher Brickettes in the chimney and lit it off.



As soon as I had the coals all ashed over and grey, I place 6 brickettes in my pie pan and then laid a couple of chunks of fruitwood on top of the brickettes and placed it into the firebox of the cooker.



I loaded the cooker with the grids of cheese and closed it up. I must keep the temp inside the cooker to under 80 degrees for this smoke and with the cold morning of about 18 degrees, this won't be a problem with this cook. No heat is needed for smoking cheese but only the smoke for great results. In the Summer, I would have filled the waterpan with ice for the cook.

I let it smoke for 60 minutes and then pulled one log off to sample for the smoke. I cut the first piece off of the log and SET IT ASIDE!! I then cut the second slice off of the log and tasted it for smoke and found that it needed some more smoking. I then placed the log back into the smoker. I didn't taste the first slice off the log as it has way to much surface area (end piece) and would have given me a false reading.

I checked another piece at 90 minutes into the cook and it was perfect. Had a nice light smoke flavor and was good.



I pulled the cheese off of the cooker and shut it down.



I then vacuumed sealed the blocks in their bags. They will need to age about a week in the fridge as this brings out more flavor in the smoked cheese.

This will go over great with my Jerky and all I need now is the Pig Candy and it is up next.