Barbecue Tricks

BBQ Tips and Tricks

Tricks

Tricks

Perfect Measuring Trick

Creating the perfect sauce for barbecue often involves some sort of syrupy sweet ingredient that can make of break the secret flavor. I just saw Pat Neely of the world famous Neely’s BBQ on TV and he had a great trick for measuring heavy syrups and thick liquids like honey or molasses (two common sauce staples).

The next time your measuring corn syrup, honey, or even maple syrup just give the measuring cup a good spray of PAM or a similar non stick oil spray. Not only will it keep your measurements consistent… there’s less waste and it makes post sauce clean-up a bit less sticky!

Tricks

How To: Skin Tomatoes

A lot of barbecue masters will use skinned tomatoes for different sauces. This is a great trick to get the thin skinned fruit peeled without testing how thin YOUR skin is!
Why peel it? Some say the skins add a bitter flavor to recipes.
Start with a very clean tomato without any stem:
  1. Get a large bowl of ice water handy. Half ice – half water. Save for later.
  2. “Score” or lightly cut a cross or X on the end of the tomato (this will help peeling later)
  3. Boil a pot of water. (Not the ice water… that’s still set aside).
  4. Carefully submerge tomato in boiling water
  5. Use a slotted spoon o get it out once you can see the skin pulling off
  6. Drop it in the ice bath
  7. Let the tomato chill for about five and a half minutes
  8. NOW you’re ready to peel. Use a small knife to get under and grasp the edge of the skin at the X you made. And yes, after all this… it can still be tricky to get it totally skinned!

Recipes

SMOKED EGGS:

Gotta hand it to the Hogwild Barbecue Blog…

They came up with a cool idea for smoking an egg.

Whole. Un-cracked.

They smoked it extra low – about 160 degrees for about an hour.And even that they say may be a bit over done. The smoke really DOES penetrate the shell too.They say if you like hardboiled eggs you’re sure to dig this trick. Imagine THAT kicking up your deviled eggs!

Click HERE and see the steps they took.

Recipes

Sittin’ On Your BEER Chicken

Sittin’ On Your Beer Chicken… Funny name. Great Flavor.
No one here at Barbecue Tricks pretends to have created this crazy dish. It’s a technique that’s become very popular these days and there’s good reason. Once you’ve slow smoked a chicken with a can of beer in it’s butt you’re guaranteed to have some moist succulent chicken. It’s also cheap and easy.

Here’s How:

Start with a fresh whole chicken. Rinse thoroughly. Pat dry with paper towels. Grab two beers out of your refrigerator. Open. Pour half of beer number one in a cup and reserve.

Prepare the bird (You may want to say “This may hurt a bit”… or “brace yourself little buddy” but that’s not what we mean). Sprinkle the inside cavity with a good dose of salt and pepper or your favorite spice rub. You can now work your way under the skin of the bird and rub some additional spice rub UNDER THE SKIN to penetrate directly into the meat.

Keeping the beer can upright insert the can of beer into the chicken. In other words lower the chicken onto the can. You should be able to stand the bird upright on the can using the drumsticks to act as support. Beer can chicken has become so popular that you can even find can holders made specifically for grilling. Next brush or rub down the entire exterior of the chicken with a light coating of vegetable oil (Or spray down with some PAM cooking spray) and rub down with an additional tablespoon of barbecue rub. Go ahead and have some of the reserved beer… you’re almost done.

Place the entire contraption on an aluminum pie pan (or a good drip pan) on top of the grill .Prepare your grill to cook on indirect medium heat for about 90 minutes or until a meat thermometer reads 180 degrees. Where did that other beer go?Let the chicken rest for five minutes and then CAREFULLY remove the can of HOT beer from it’s rear.

Ingredients:

3 tbsp. BBQ Rub (or equal parts salt pepper and paprika)
1 Whole (4lbs.) Chicken
Cooking oil spray
2 cans of Beer (12 oz.)

Cook

Hands Down The Best Thermometer

If you’re in the market for a new grill I highly recommend finding one with a built in thermometer on the front (usually a little round dial-type works nice — right in front above the handle). You can even buy them for cheap and install them even easier. Usually one little drill hole is all it takes. However, there is a good stand by if you’re roughing it without the thermometer.

Need to guess the campfire’s temperature? The answer is in the palm of your hand!

Here’s How: Hold your hand – palm side down – about five or six inches above the coals. Just over where the meat will be. How long can you hold it there? Don’t get crazy… but.. in general, the about of time you can stand it will tell the tale. If you can hold out about six seconds you’re probably at a good smoking temperature. 240 Degrees or so. If you can stand the heat on your palm for only three and a half seconds you can call it medium heat. About 375 Degrees. If you’re jumping back at just one or two seconds you’re at HIGH HEAT over 500 degrees.

Gadgets

Scrubbing Up In a Pinch

Ever find yourself with company coming over and you need to clean the grill but you’re left with out a grill brush?!

Here’s an easy trick: Grab a wad of all American aluminum foil. It’s the pit master’s duct tape!

Crunch it up in a ball and utilize a pair of long handled tongs. Voilà! Instant scrubber. It’s not quite as good as a wire brush but it is more disposable! Follow up the scrub by wiping down the grate with a folded and oil-soaked paper towel to remove any additional residue and to additionally season the grill.

Gadgets

Kabob Trick – Double It Up

Double Stuck

Double Stuck

Ever try flipping a shrimp on a skewer? Often times it will become a game of spin the prawn. Small, short, and round ingredients often are tough to control on a tiny stick. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a perfectly toasted marshmallow!

BBQ Tricks has a better way:

  • First, soak twice the usual amount of bamboo or wood skewers in water (this soak will get them nice and waterlogged and keep them from burning on the grill).
  • Next, simply double thread the ingredients with a PAIR of skewers.

The extra stick makes for easy flipping and doubles the odds your perfectly grilled morsels avoiding a drop through the grates!

Tricks

Foiled Again – Smoking Barbecue

You don’t need a thousand dollar stainless smoker to prepare great BBQ. In fact, you may already have all you need in the kitchen.

Even a gas grill can provide a succulent slow smoked flavor to almost any meat. The secret is in the smoke and getting the heat down LOW.

Good thing is many of today’s gas grills come with a temperature gauge right on the lid. 225 degrees to 250 degrees should do nicely for most slow smoking. Just give it plenty of time.

You’ll also need just enough smoke. Here’s how you can handle it even without a special green egg or smoker box. Just soak some wood chips for about an hour in water. You can buy great chips and chunks in most grocery stores these days. Hickory is good but pit masters will argue over flavors of wood for hours… our advice is just stay away from pressure treated! (We’re not kidding! It can kill you.)

Create an envelope out of heavy duty aluminum foil. It need not be pretty… sometimes I’ll just wrap up the larger chunks of hardwood in a wad. Then, lay the pouch on or near the gas burner (or even on charcoal). Have another pouch handy after an hour or so. It’s OK to leave the “done” pouch in the grill until after cooking. You’d be surprised how much smoke flavor continues to emit from the pouch even after the visible smoke is gone. This easy extra adds a nice touch to gas grill ‘cue. Clean up is also a breeze.

Recipes

Removing That Membrane

BBQ aficiandos will argue if you really NEED to remove the membrane on the backside of a good slab of ribs.

I say it’s a nice thing to do if only to make it easier to pull apart and eat each individual rib. Some like a bit of a chew. The additional benefit is that it allows for a deeper penetration of your favorite rub or marinade.

The simple trick to removing the membrane is to use a clean paper towel to grip the slippery tissue. I haven’t met a cook that has a grip tight enough to grasp the membrane firmly enough to pull it off the slab! Simply use a butter knife to begin the peel on one end. Then grasp what you can of the tissue (the membrane is on the boney side of the rib). If you’re lucky you should be able to peel off a nice clean sheet.

It often times takes a few peels to get it all. If you can’t get every fragment – don’t sweat it. You’re guest will likely not notice smaller amounts remaining.

Recipes

Smoke This

Don’t limit your babecue to just smoking with hickory and mesquite. Try Basil Twigs. If you happen to grow fresh basil during the summer months you’ll likely find that you have an dry bush of twigs as winter nears. Not good looking… but good for cooking!

Use the completely dried twigs to add flavor to your next cook out. Soak the twigs as you would any wood chips and use them to add that secret basil flavor to pork chops or a good London broil. Enjoy a cold one while your buddies argue over what wood your using!