Fish tacos look excellent!

Grilled burgers Friday night and even though simple they came out perfect.



Also, a buddy of mine in the Midwest was running low on Pico Pica so I sent him a California hot sauce CARE package along with some Mexican pickled red onions, which you should always have in the fridge.

Love pepper plant sauce - now that we moved back to the east coast I can't get it anymore so I had to order the 1/2 gal on amazon

You guys are killing me.

Congratulations! Well done!

It’s my sister’s favorite and I’ve never found a better hot sauce for eggs, truly wonderful on an egg burrito or a California Benedict.

Made a Japanese style chocolate cheesecake/castella.

11 eggs whipped into mergingue. Some cream of tartar
Cake batter: 6 egg yolks, 1/4 cup flour, 1/8 cup corn starch, some randomly appropriate amount of cocoa powder, a small pinch of salt.
Like 24 packets of stevia laced throughout (I'm dieting. Shoot me)

Then I just whipped the cake batter into the meringue with the stand mixer on 3. It's just not necessary to do the folding thing for this in my experience.

The "non-stick" pan wasn't nonstick enough and I was too lazy to butter the sides so the sides got stuck and didn't rise properly. (notice this is almost a souffle with the amount of meringue)



Still came out really nice and fluffy... and jiggly.



I thought it needed a little extra so I blasted some freeze dried strawberries in a blender and threw them into a whipped cream canister with, unfortunately because I was out of heavy cream/whipping cream, half&half. Just not enough fat to make the cream actually whipped; the half&half+strawberry powder mixture came out more like watery mousse, great mousse to be sure but not whipped cream.

giggdy

Looks amazing. Tell me more about this crema. I have some sambal from H Mart and Valentina black

Have you tried monkfruit extract? (Straight extract not erythritol with a little monkfruit added to it). It's the only non-caloric sweetener that doesn't taste like chemical garbage to me and isn't a sugar alcohol that will give you the shits.

probably five or six parts sour cream to one part mayo, a decent amount of lime juice, and started by adding the sambal. wanted more out of it so added the Valentina and played around a bit until it was where i liked it.

Thoughts on pellet smokers? My gas grill is shot (thanks Pac NW rain) and I need a companion for the Blackstone griddle for stuff like chicken, fish, ribs, etc.. Care less about super long cooks like brisket; more about impromptu summer guests coming over for a cookout. Was going to just get a new gas grill or maybe a charcoal one but a buddy started raving about his pellet smoker.

If you’re not going to smoke or do long cooks, I’d save my money and grab a Weber kettle. I understand why gas grills exist but I think they are wank.

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmoa1311889

A little off topic but this paper blew my mind.

TLDR takeaways:
1. Too much salt is bad but too little is wayyy worse.
2. Right amount is probably like 2 or 3x US guidelines (5.7g salt a day)
3. It’s probably worse to eat 5 or 6x dietary guideline than to eat at guideline.

I'm team too much salt, but I'm also anti little salt and shitty pepper shakers at the diner or wherever.

Just acquired an Ooni. Pizza porn to be coming this summer!


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I'm loving my pellet grill. It's super nice to be able to just turn the dial to the temp I want and wait just a few minutes. Grill keeps the temp right where it needs to be. I haven't talked to anyone that's had anything bad to say about them. I went with the lower cost Walmart version (Pitboss) to try it out before spending Traeger money on a grill I might never use. It's great at right around $300. I haven't had a single issue with mine, using it probably twice a week on average. You won't regret going #pellet. I guess the only con is the lack of flame to sear with, although mine has a sliding opening that is supposed to allow you to sear and I've never bothered using it because everything has turned out just fine without.

For what dishes does it really shine? Any that you tried that didn't turn out as you wish?

I don't need a searing tool, have the Blackstone set up right next to it for that. But the Blackstone is not good for wings, for instance, or a whole chicken.

I've never cooked a brisket nor had a desire to cook one before I got the pellet grill. Have cooked probably 5 since November and every one was a home run. We smoked several turkeys around Thanksgiving that were both great. One test run and one for Turkey Day. I made beef jerky once that was pretty good, not sure why I haven't tried that again, going to have revisit that. Smoked a couple of Cornish Hens that turned out really good. Stuffed, bacon wrapped jalapenos are a pretty big hit every time we make those on there.

Other than that it's pretty much been my normal grill stuff, chicken thighs, chicken kbobs, fajitas. All have turned out great. I haven't done burgers, I'm a smashburger in the cast iron fella. Haven't done steaks yet. I tried chex mix on there, that was my only fail. It was awful.

The thing that I love the best is being able to just dial the switch to the proper temp and wait for it to get there. Before I got the pellet grill I was a charcoal cooker and I don't know why I was so stingy with the charcoal, just a cheapskate I guess, but I seemed to always put too little coals in the grill and lose most of my heat before my stuff was actually done. Maybe it was too much marinade on everything dousing the coals? Anyway, I was a mediocre charcoaler and feel like the pellet grill helps cover up any shortcomings I may have/have had in the grilling department.

Mark you speak of all these great briskets yet post no pics. You’re a tease.

Also try some burgers, smashed burgers in a cast iron are nice but I like the smoked/grilled taste. Also maybe to mix it up you can cook larger non smashed patties.

Yeah, I feel guilty sometimes about my lack of picture posting. Someday I'll download tapatalk and post some pics. I take them every time with the intention of posting but am too lazy to go through the process. Phone to laptop to imgur to here.

I liken brisket to sushi, personally. Leave it to the experts. Doesn't mean heroes(and I mean that sincerely) can't cook the ish out of it at home in a smoker.

I've always been disappointed with the lack of smoke flavor with my pellet grill. Bought it for ease of use but miss my UDS.

disagree...theres a lot to making good sushi thats outside a layman's capabilities but more or less all there is to good brisket is to use a good hunk of beef and cook it for a really long time...

That's all huh?

Brisket is a 50/50 meat for me. Half the time, it's not very good and boring. The other half, you have something and I'd love to eat that again. Either way, if you want to make a good brisket you'll start with trimming some of that fat off.

Sushi has similar results. Almost nobody is making either one at home either.

In the end though, you'd have to be pretty crazy to think Brisket > Sushi.

Sushi > Brisket