10/04/10 - 08:01
This blog entry about my journey to making grilled paellas has a bit of a “What goes around comes around” quality to it. This first paella I saw was the last one I made and best paella I’ve ever made. But let’s begin at the beginning. I saw my first paella on TV three years ago. Steven Raichlen made a Paella Primavera (Vegetable Paella) on the first season of Primal Grill. This Spanish rice dish looked amazing. When a new Spanish restaurant opened in town, paella was the first thing I tried and I was hooked. I had some self-education to do, as well as come up with a source for some special ingredients. I needed to get the special pan used to make paellas and I got a paella cookbook because I knew zip about making paellas. I’ll put some links at the bottom on sources for some of the ingredients and equipment you will need.
Read More...Tags: Overview
07/29/10 - 20:20
I often keep time temperature logs of my smokes. These are great because two or three years later I can go back to them and see how long a certain recipe took. For short cooks on the gas grill I generally don’t do this. But the other day something occurred to me. I always document the first time I cook a particular recipe in photos. I use the pictures on this site, I sometimes post them on another web site, I can look at the time stamps to see how long the various steps took or the total time, and I can do a quick review to refresh my memory the next time I make it. Since I have the camera out at the grill to take pictures of the finished product as it comes off the grill, why not take a picture of the remote read thermometer reading and the elapsed time on the timer on my iPhone. This photo get included with the other photos for that cook and now I have something I can refer to when I revisit this recipe at some future time.
I don’t know why this didn’t occur to me sooner, but there is another similar thing I have been doing for a while. That is to take a close up picture of the meat label. This also becomes part of the photo album for that cook and down the road I can see the cut I used, the weight and the price. If they add the Use By date you can also tell how much ahead of time you can buy it.
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Tags: Photo Tip
06/10/10 - 17:33
Up until this past month I’d gotten away from trying to use the smoker drawer in my gas grill for quick cooks. There simply was not enough smoke produced short term to make it worth while. So what has changed? Well a tip from the
COOKS ILLUSTRATED SUMMER GRILLING GUIDE 2010 (See blog entry) has enabled me to get more short term smoke. This now makes adding smoke to chicken wings and even thick burgers that cook for 10 minutes or more possible. The best part is this tip is faster & easier than my normal method too.

Read More...Tags: Wood Chips
04/23/10 - 13:27
In my opinion grilled pizza is the best way to prepare pizza - period. This week I learned a variation to the method used for cooking grilled pizzas that have made a noticeable improvement. This blog will describe the change in technique. I’m not going to use a whole lot of pictures in this blog. If you are interested in seeing some of the pizzas I’ve made this week I will provide some links at the end.
Read More...Tags: Pizza Cookbook
04/19/10 - 13:11
The new WEBER 0N THE GRILL - CHICKEN & SIDES (See Blog Entry) cookbook had a great technique for making paninis. In a recipe scaled to make 4 Chicken Cordon Bleu paninis they had you finish the sandwiches off by placing them on the grill in a 2x2 grid. Then they had you cover them with a half sheet pan weighted down by two foil wrapped bricks. I scaled the recipe down to make two sandwiches and for that I used a 1/4 sheet pan and one foil wrapped brick as can be seen in the picture above.
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As you can see the resulting paninis have wonderful deep grill marks and look like a panini made in your kitchen using a panini press. The only trick thing is to make sure you use a low temperature as bread can burn in the blink of an eye. Better to use too low of a temperature and have them take a little longer. I use medium low on my gas grill and I usually check the bread after two minutes even though the recipe says done in three minutes.
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Tags: Panini Press
02/17/10 - 10:31
Most grills or smokers have hot and cold spots-it is the nature of the beast. On the surface this could seem to be a minus, but in reality it can also be a plus. I will discuss some of the ways you can work with this reality so your food is cooked evenly.
Read More...Tags: Thermometers, Food Positioning