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=[ grantmichaels' skunkworx thread ]=



This is my thread. There are many like it, but this one is mine.

My thread is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life.

My thread, without me, is useless. Without my thread, I am useless. I must fire my grill true. I must shoot my dishes straighter than my enemy who are trying to outshoot me. I must shoot food before it shoots me. I will...

My thread and myself know that what counts in this war is not the dishes we fix, the noise or pots clanging, or the smoke we make. We know that it is the hit dishes that count. We will hit...

My thread is human, even as I, because it is my life. Thus, I will learn it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strength, its parts, its photos, its visitos and its banter. I will keep my thread clean and ready, even as I am clean dirty and ready. We will become part of each other. We will...

Before God, I swear this creed. My thread and myself are the defenders of my cuisine. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviors of my life.

So be it, until victory is America's and there is no enemy, but peace!​
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So as not to have to endure people's interpretations of the rules, I'm squatting in this hole, where there are no rules whatsoever. Feel free to share in this thread, there are no rules here. Be free.
 
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JayT said:
Pretty sure they are in St Augustine if memory serves.
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Would make sense ... the Datil business is pretty significant up there, I guess ...
 
I miss Pepper Rich, actually ...
 
Insane fresh pods ... just, beautiful.
 
I track him/them down on FB, though, and I think they have gone back to datils and are setup for allowing people to pick the field these days ...
 
Too bad. I wouldn't have to be growing if they were poddin' ...
 
Earlier ...

http://thehotpepper.com/index.php?/topic/32869-My-obsession-with-heat-and-food%2E%2E%2EJoynersHotPeppers/page__view__findpost__p__1123332

one dupe picture ...

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(this is a breadcrumb for myself, really, so i don't get rabbit-hole'd trying to find it later)
 
I'm having an interesting internal debate about finesse vs control ...
 
I could go outside and light a regular fire all across the charcoal grate of my Weber and go outside and fill and cook the grate twice ...
 
It's nothing to cook a dozen hamburgers and hotdogs and a steak or two, and to leave a couple of pork tenderloin cooking on the embers for an hour after I've gone inside ...
 
And the BBQ is good, the food comes out good ...
 
There's no probes, it's just tweaking and fussing and rotating pieces in and our of the hot spots ...
 
It requires finesse, but you have little control (lid's off) ...
 
Inside I can cook a bunch of stuff, and there's a lot of control - self-regulating oven, sous vide, temp-controlled hot water dispenser, etc ... but excepting cooking on the range, there's no much finesse involved ...
 
Enter the Searzall ...
 
It's like Maillard painting ... controlled finesse.
 
I'm cooking killer grub using the instrumentation from smoking (temp probes) and the technical knowledge from MC and AmazingRibs, inside my house, using gadgetry ...
 
Hate it all you want, but it's undeniable ...
 
I've been cooking the best, cleanest, great tasting meats in my house, not on my grill here lately ...
 
Sorry.
 
"I'm having an interesting internal debate about finesse vs control ..."
 
This is just something I'm thinking about while I work ...
 
I'm making the best meat where I have the most control, is really all that I'm saying ...
 
I'm enjoying the "roasted herb" notes and flavors in meat that I'm cooking inside, while also getting in on some of the flavors from grilling ...
 
I have a ways to go outside before I can cook a steak that matches one I can make in a skillet w/ brown-butter and a little garlic or rosemary etc ...
 
It's a journey ...
 
FreeportBum said:
sorry is right. your the guy that wanted to recreate burger king right? makes sense now  :P  
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It's Danielle who likes the BK, BTW, not me ...
 
I wanted to make *her* a BK-like burger ...
 
I like Five Guys or Square1 ;)
 
muskymojo said:
I would cook everything outside if I lived in florida.
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I've done that - it's a lot of showering ...
 
I'll clarify all of this later ...
 
It's going a little bit of a different direction than intended ...
 
I should have setup my argument based on the probabilities *I HAVE* of really exceptionally good execution ...
 
I am getting really good at getting awesome results using gear where the cooking is slowed down and I can micromanage it ...
 
In football they'd say "the game is slowing down for me" ...
 
I'm having trouble keeping all of the snags of grilling in the forefront of my mind ...
 
Lots of things can ruin grilling ...
 
I've burn steak for having too much oil in a marinade catch fire ... more than once ...
 
It's always when I stray far from just salted meat, though ...
 
I'm talking about my grilling, not making generalizations about ya'll ...
 
Clearly FB can rock a beautiful steak, and Ashen and CH and lots of people ...
 
But I've catapulted my roasted meat past my grilled meat in the past year ...
 
It's not about leaving the grill, it's about catching up my grilling to where I'm getting in terms of flavor inside ...
 
I wore socks in the house last night, too. That makes me much more sad ...
 
LOL.
 
Nice ...
 
I'm sure I'll have a great experience smoking tomorrow, but I'm going to take a step back and regroup a little on how I want to grill steaks ...
 
Photobomb, anytime ... I wish people only posted meme pics and food pics ... that would be awesome (for me) ...
 
=)
 
Let's see those steaks!
It's all related to the thicker steaks, and the increased need for two-staging the cook ...
 
I could fall back to ~1-1.25" thick steaks and the problems would disappear ...
 
Also, the vortex is too hot, and it's flame ...
 
I think I'll try my next grilled steak on the Akorn ...
 
I suspect the Akorn will be nice for steak ... nice low-temp fire (lump) w/ little convection, and then open the lid and get the hight heat, but many more inches away, and deflected/diffused ...
 
I think that'll be my next outdoor steak ... Akorn, just a tiny schmearing of olive oil, and S+P and maybe bit of garlic powder ...
 
Don't take my criticism the wrong way, but when you put your whole life out their on the internet your going to get feedback both good and bad.  I like you,I think your one crazy bastard that can cook some good food. it seems like you get distracted easy and would rather sacrifice some flavor then take the extra time to cook. but I guess as long as you are enjoying the methods and the results of how and what you cook that's all that really matters.  I enjoy all your post's honestly look forawrd to see what crazy ass idea you come up with next.  :P
 
Frank analysis always welcome ... I always consider not posting something that doesn't turn out as well as I'd like, but ultimately it's about putting it out there ...
 
When I decide I want to learn how to make something, my favorite things to find are the people who describe how their attempt failed!
 
I try to put it all out there, people can steer towards or away as needed ...
 
I cook the same way I do everything. I rely on as many natural talents as I can, and do it as efficiently as I can ... you could say that I'm a living calculator for diminishing returns, trying to hit that sweet spot, the 80/20, the place where I am getting most of the benefits, but not all, but without all of effort ...
 
I have to figure it all out, though, to know which corners I can cut, and which I can't ...
 
So, yeah, you'll see me try to do it all and then some, sometimes ... do everything and more to see if I can push it ... and sometimes it's about how far can I get it hacked way the fuck down to be simple ...
 
Yeah, it's inconsistent as hell to someone observing, I'm sure ... I get that ...
 
My free time comes in spurts, too ... like boss said, sometimes I have to do all my cooking in like 18 hrs, for the week ... so I have to make decisions that fit w/in some constraints work provides, too. I'm also often cooking in the middle of the night, and I have to consider the 'hood etc ...
 
It's all good ... I'm having fun, and I looked back a couple of years in the DC the other day to see what I was cooking before ... and it's much improved.
 
Can't ask for more, really ...
 
I think you will really like the akorn.  There is another guy I follow on another forum that uses the akorn pretty much all the time and cooks stuff just as good as anything posted here if not better.  looks to be a good buy 
 
Yeah, I came to that decision in deciding to buy it ...
 
What happened, is the lid came dented and I had to wait a while for the replacement because of the delays during holiday shipping, and I sort of braindumped the whole context I had planned for exploring it, and went w/ getting started w/ wok'ing ...
 
I think I'll get it seasoned up and deployed and maybe cook the pork tenderloin on it, tomorrow, while I'm out there smoking the tri-tip/turkey on the Weber ...
 
I'll ask Danielle to mix up some of her magical meatloaf and do one up in that damn CI loaf pan that I move around the shelf all the time (and have never used) ...
 
That sounds like fun ...
 
I think these little yeasties need some cheering on from ya'll ...

I didn't yet have rye flour yesterday when FB's starter arrived, so I fed them two cups of KAAP and some room temp Fiji ...

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I don't see the signs of them having risen much ... usually the batter left on the sides from stirring with be pulled of the sides when it's risen and fallen or been punched down (pizza dough) ...

Today ...

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I wonder what kind of scanning this sticker implies?

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Think they zapped it? Or maybe it got too hot in my mailbox for a couple of hours? Hmmm ...
 
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