I was an early adopter of Bacon Salt and have sung it’s praises ever since the first time I sprinkled it on my eggs one morning.  A few years later along came Baconnaise, a tasty mixture of bacon and mayonnaise.  I’ve been a devoted user ever since.  So when Justin Esch emailed me recently to ask if I wanted to try Bacon Croutons I said yes.  Even before they arrived I started to think about how I was going to use them.  Croutons are normally found on salads.  But it wasn’t likely that I was going to waste the goodness of bacon on a salad.  I had to come up with something more exciting than lettuce.

Over on Pork, Knife and Spoon I have been working on a series of blog posts on pork ribs.  I had some rib trimmings left over and it occurred to me that a Pulled Pork Cake, much along the lines of a crab cake could be a beautiful and tasty creation.  Usually I start my recipe development with a bit of internet and cookbook research.  My search for “pork cakes” lead to very little information but it did lead me to an actual pork cake.   I figured the best way to do a pulled pork cake was to make them as similar to a crab cake as possible.

I made up the pulled pork cakes, following the recipe below, and as I was getting ready to pan fry them the bag of J&D Bacon Croutons were staring across the kitchen counter at me.  It’s almost as if they were speaking to me.  It was in that brief moment that inspiration struck.  I decided to crush the Bacon Croutons and use them to bread the pulled pork cakes.  It’s not the first time I’ve had inspiration in the kitchen, but rarely does that inspiration come out as good as this one did.  The combination of the pulled pork, seasoning and bacon created a fantastic flavor profile.  I’m going to be making these pulled pork cakes when I have left over pulled pork.

Pulled Pork Cakes

Ingredients:

• 3 cups pulled pork, course chopped
• 2 cups panko break crumbs
• 1 teaspoon jalapeno, finely chopped
• 1 teaspoon bell pepper, finely chopped
• 1 teaspoon shallot, finely chopped
• 1 egg, beaten well
• 1/4 cup mayonnaise
• Bacon drippings
• Salt, Pepper and BBQ Rub, to taste

Directions:

In a small skillet melt the bacon drippings.  When hot saute the jalapeno, bell pepper and shallots until tender.  Let them cool to room temperature.

In a medium mixing bowl combine all remaining ingredients and mix well.   I used about a tablespoon of BBQ rub, but you can use however much you want.  Form the mixture into three compacted patties.  I used a hamburger patty press to make sure they were consistent in size and firmly packed.  Lay the patties out on parchment paper and chill in the refrigerator until cold.

Dust the patties in a little flour and then put in an egg wash.  From the egg wash put the patties into the crushed Bacon Croutons.  Make sure you cover both the side and all the way around the edges.  (NOTE:  When you open the package of Bacon Croutons you need to resist tasting them.  You have been warned, if you eat one you could find yourself eating the whole package.  They are that good.

Fry the patties until golden brown in oil.  Place them on a paper towel or rack to drain and then put them in a 200 degree oven until warmed through.  Serve garnished with BBQ Mayo (Mayo mixed with a little BBQ sauce) or some other BBQ condiment.

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• Ezra Pound Cake:  Squash Puppies with Roasted Jalapeno Mayonnaise
• Bo’s Bowl: Monte Cubano
• Cooking By Seat Of My Pants:  Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Bacon
• Ang Sarap:  Grilled Pork ala Pobre
• Culinary Cory:  Grilled Steak House Pizza with Chunky Blue Cheese Dressing
• Pork, Knife & Spoon:  Italian Sausage with Pepper Sandwiches
• Sunshine & Smile: Zucchini: Zucchini & Avocado Cold Soup with Crispy Sticks
• Burnin’ Love BBQ:  National Chicken Wing Day
• AlbuKirky BBQ: Pizza on the Big Green Egg
• I Hope You Are Hungry:  Carolina Style Pulled Pork n’ Slaw

*If you visit in any of these great blogs would you leave a comment you read about them on The BBQ Grail?

Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2011 Larry Gaian

Watermelon Rind that tasted good!  Who would have thought that?  Certainly not me.  I was originally going to make a fresh peach chutney to go with this dish but it’s a little early to find peaches in the store.  This led to a little searching through cookbooks and the internet.  I came across a lot different chutney recipes and since I’d just finished cutting up a watermelon and had a bowl full of rinds I figured I’d give it a try.  And I’m so glad I did.

This recipe is a little different from the previous plank grilling recipes in this series.  Normally, you pre-heat the planks until they just start to smolder.  With this one you heat the plank until it actually starts to burn.  You want a nice dark char on the plank.

Once you’ve got the char, turn the heat down and put the brie on the plank.  Close the lid and cook the brie for about 20 minutes or until it gets nice and soft.

Once the brie is soft, plate it and top with the chutney.  Serve with grilled crostini.

What I found was that I didn’t really care for the brie by itself and the watermelon rind chutney was just okay.  But it made for a fantastic flavor when combined.  I really, really liked this appetizer and it will likely become a regular for our family get together. (Giant thank you to Chef Robin White for the inspiration and technique for this blog post)

Watermelon Rind Chutney

Ingredients:

• 6 cups 1/2″ diced watermelon rind
• 1½ cups cider vinegar
• 1½ cups water
• 2 cups sugar
• ¼ cup fresh ginger, peeled and minced
• 2  tbsps minced jalapeno, with or without seeds.
• 1½ tbsps minced garlic
• 1 tsp salt
• ½ tsp crushed black peppercorns

Directions:

Remove the watermelon flesh from rind.  Make sure you remove all the pink flesh from rind.  With a sharp knife remove the green peel and discard.  Cut the rind into 1/2 inch cubes.

In a 4-quart saucepan, combine rind, cider vinegar, water, sugar, ginger, cayenne peppers, garlic, salt and black pepper. Bring to a boil, and stir until sugar dissolves. Simmer 45–55 minutes or until rind is tender and translucent and liquid is syrupy.

Cool chutney and chill in airtight container for 1–3 days to allow flavors to mellow.

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There are a variety of “popper” holders available on the internet for purchase.  I’ve got all kinds of BBQ tools and I’m not always hesitant to buy what I need in the accessory department.  But for some reason I just can’t bring myself to spend the money for what is basically a sheet of metal with holes cut in it.

Recently, I saw a post on the BBQ Brethren that showed a simple and inexpensive way to hold your jalapenos while they are cooking…a egg carton.  This post led me to an article in the in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel where I learned the original idea seems to have originated with Arlie Davis.

Making ABTs is very simple and you’ve got to give them a try.  With Spring and Summer right around the corner these need to be on your “to do” list.  All you need are some jalapenos, cream cheese, random fillings, bacon, toothpicks and some kind of holder for your grill/smoker.

So the process to make ABTs is so, so simple…

All you need are some jalapenos, cream cheese, bacon and some kind of meat to mix into the cream cheese.  There’s a variety of different things that can be mixed into the cheese.  I’ve used Lil Smokeys but this time I used some of the Tasso I smoked a couple of weeks ago.

(NOTE:  If  you love jalapenos but can’t stand the heat here’s a tip on how to tame them.  Click here)

So the first step is to cut the tops off the jalapenos.  Make sure you wear rubber gloves and glasses when cooking with jalapenos.  Some misplaced jalapeno juice can cause a lot of pain if you get it somewhere it shouldn’t.

The next step is to remove the insides of the jalapenos.  Taking out the seeds and veins not only makes room for the fillings, but it removes the part that contains a lot of the heat.  (If you want to have completely tamed jalapenos try this technique I wrote about last year.)  The next step is to mix the meat into the softened cream cheese.

Now comes the fun part.  Take your egg carton and turn it upside down.  Remove the bottoms of each cup.  This will hold jalapenos of any size.

Fill the jalapenos with the cream cheese mixture, top the jalapeno with bacon and secure it with a toothpick.

Place the “carton” of ABTs in your smoker.  I smoke mine at 225 degrees for about an hour or until the bacon gets crisp.

You can do these on a grill but make sure you use indirect heat.  The reason using a cardboard egg carton works is because you are not putting these over a direct flame or direct heat.

DO NOT place the cardboard egg carton over direct heat.  The cardboard absorbs the bacon drippings and will make the egg carton very flammable.

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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.

Jalapeno Cranberry Dipping Sauce

Ingredients:

• 1 can Cranberry Sauce
• 1 Jalapeno, seeded, deveined and finely chopped
• 2 teaspoons cilantro, finely chopped
• 2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
• 2 tablespoons orange juice

Directions:

Mix all ingredients together and refrigerate for several hours before using so flavors have a chance to mix.

Egg Nog Chipotle Battered Shrimp

Ingredients:

• 12 to 14 ounces Egg Nog
• 2 cups flour
• 1 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 egg
• 1+ teaspoon chipotle powder

Directions:

Beat the egg and add to the flour.  Stir in enough Egg Nog to give you a consistency slightly thinner than pancake batter.  When you have the desired consistency add in baking powder and enough chipotle powder to give you the heat you want. The batter is going to pretty sweet and it won’t take much chipotle powder to change the flavor.  What you want is the batter to be sweet on the front of the tongue and give you just a little heat on the back of the tongue on the way down.

The Egg Nog makes a thick batter so don’t be afraid to add some regular milk if needed to give you a thin consistency.

Batter your shrimp and fry them until done.  Serve with the Jalapeno Cranberry Dipping Sauce.