Appetizer | The BBQ Grail

Grilled Apple and Cheese Salad (Part 2)

A few days ago I wrote about a Grilled Cheese and Apple Medley Salad that I made recently. Over the past couple of days I’ve given some thought to that salad. It didn’t quite come out like I wanted. It was really far too sweet. I suppose some people would want a salad that tasted more like it should be desert but I’m not one of them. It just lacked some “bite.”

(Click here to read the previous blog post)

The first thing I changed was the Apple Coulis. It was really just far to sweet. It would have been great spooned over vanilla ice cream but as a salad it just didn’t work. I took the remainder of the Apple Coulis and reduced it on the stove by about half. This gave me a much thicker sauce that I figured would cover the apples and greens better. Once I got the thickness I wanted I started adding apple cider vinegar, 1/2 teaspoon at a time, until I got the bite I wanted. I ended adding another 2 teaspoons of vinegar. This gave me a nice sweet and sour flavor.

Continue reading Grilled Apple and Cheese Salad (Part 2)

Grilled Apple Medley & Cheese Salad (Part 1)

It’s Apple season in Northern California and the local Farmer’s Market is full of tasty varieties of juicy apples. This is a perfect time of year for a BBQ Brethren Apple Throwdown. I knew there would be a variety of great entries from all the great cooks on the forum so I had to come up with something a little different.

When you are dealing with thousands of of BBQ enthusiasts for some reason salad doesn’t appear near the top of the list of “must haves.” So I figured a salad would be different enough to give me a slight edge in the voting. Toss in some Yanni Grilling Cheese and I figured I had the potential for a great salad.

I stopped by the Roseville Farmer’s Market and three varieties of apples. Fuji, Granny Smith and McIntosh. Each variety of apple grills up slightly differently and I wanted the different textures of grilled apples to compliment the grilling cheese and spring mix salad I was planning to use.

Continue reading Grilled Apple Medley & Cheese Salad (Part 1)

Smoked and Fried Chicken Wings

I love chicken wings. They are small bite sized morsels of poultry goodness. I’ve smoked wings lots of time and wanted to give something a little different.

I cranked up one of the Weber Smokey Mountain smokers with some avocado wood. Avocado wood is a somewhat hard wood that goes great with chicken and pork. It’s a mild wood that should be treated like you would a fruit wood.

The wings were seasoned with Simply Marvelous Season All and smoked at 225 degrees for about 2 hours. Because it was a busy day I let the wings cool and put them into the refrigerator for eating at a later date.

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Egg Nog Chipotle Battered Shrimp

On my Facebook page I post a “Topic For Discussion” each morning. A couple of weeks ago the topic was Egg Nog. The topic turned into a discussion with Laura of Laura’s Best Recipes on how hard it would be to come up with a couple of recipes that used Egg Nog as an ingredient. Laura has a recipe she’s working on, mine is Egg Nog Chipotle Battered Fried Shrimp with Jalapeno Cranberry Dipping Sauce.

Continue reading Egg Nog Chipotle Battered Shrimp

MOINK Balls “Sizzle On The Grill” Today

The history of the MOINK Ball along with the original recipe has been posted on Char-Broil’s “Sizzle On The Grill” website. Check it out!

Sizzle On The Grill

Who would have thought…

OINK! OINK! Pig Candy!

Bacon and brown sugar!

I can slave over a brisket or pulled pork and my friends will be thankful for a taste. But if you ask many of them what one item they’d me want to make for them the answer is Pig Candy. Who would have thought that combining bacon with brown sugar and a little chipotle powder would be such a hit.

Start with a good amount of brown sugar and chipotle powder to taste. Mix it up good, you don't want a clump of chipotle powder to hit your tongue.

I prefer good thick bacon. The thinner stuff works good to, but it cooks really fast so watch it.

Lay your bacon out on the grate

Putting a good coating of the brown sugar/chipotle mixture. Cook at your desire temperature until it starts to get a little crisp. I use 245 degrees with apple wood.

Put a good coating of the brown sugar/chipotle mixture. Cook at your desire temperature until it starts to get a little crisp. I use 245 degrees with apple wood.

When it starts to crisp up I like to turn it over and give it another dose of the sugar mixture.

Let it cool and enjoy!

MOINK Balls Go International

My friends at the Dutch BBQ Forum love to make MOINK Balls. This weekend several of them decided they would make MOINK Balls and send their photos to me for the BBQ Grail. (For a history of MOINK Balls click here)

One special note. “Official” MOINK Balls are made with pre-made frozen 100% beef meatballs. Finding pre-made meatbals in the Netherlands is a difficult task sometimes, so you’ll see “homemade” meatballs in most cases here.

Here they are:

Abraham Van de Vuurst (Spakenburg, Holland)

Wrapped and ready to be smoked.

Cooking away!

Sauced and almost ready to eat

"Bram" ready for some MOINK Balls

Peter Eyckmans (Hersett, Belgium)

Ingredients ready for MOINK Ball wrapping

Using indirect smoking

Off to a great start!

Let's eat some MOINK

Frits de Jonge (Oosterhout-Nijmegen, Netherlands)

(Frits will receive the special “Spirit of MOINK” Award. He made his own “pre-made” meatballs by making them three days ahead of time and freezing them. Only to thaw them out on Saturday to make his MOINK Balls.