Left-over Turkey Pot Pie

If you are like me you have had about all you can take of family this holiday season. You also probably have some left-over turkey waiting to be reused. I can't help you with your family problems. But here's an idea for your turkey!

Crust:

In mixer, mix 2 c. flour, 1 t. salt and 2/3 cup lard (sorry, no substitutes) till sandy.

Add one egg yolk, let mix till crumbly. Add cold water, 1 T. at a time, till dough just comes together. Turn out onto floured board and knead a few times till it holds together nicely. Wrap in Saran Wrap and stick in the fridge while you work on the filling.

Filling:

In pot, mix together 4 c. finely diced turkey, 1 can cream of chicken soup, 1/4 c. milk or cream, 1 T. dried onion, 1 t. salt and a few turns fresh pepper, and 1 carrot (finely diced). Heat and stir now and then, overall about 20 minutes. Turn off heat, stir in 1 c. frozen peas. Let cool slightly.

Roll out crust on floured board till lightly bigger than pie pan, line pan with crust. Spoon in filling, spread evenly. Wet edges of top crust with water and place top crust over filling; crimp as desired. Cut a few steam vents in top crust, brush with beaten egg.

Bake at 400 degrees for about 45 minutes or until golden brown and you can see the filling bubbling through the top crust. Let sit 5-10 minutes, then slice and serve. Yummy comfort food.

More than just another pretty face!

My wife has talent that is beyond description. To begin, she can find beauty in the most unlikely places (like me, for example). She can also bake like an angel. We actually have tubs of lard in our refrigerator - used to make the most wonderful pie crusts on earth. As you can imagine she loves holidays and uses them as an excuse to indulge her second greatest passion - baking. (Her first passion is hanging out with me. What can I say, I'm a catch.)

Here are some of her Christmas cookies:

Here's her recipe for shortbread.

1 1/2 sticks butter, softened
1/4 cup sugar

Beat with mixer till light and fluffy, like 10 minutes or so.
Add 1 t. flavoring, like vanilla or almond extract.
Add 2 c. flour and 1/2 t. salt, let mixer go for a while, like 5 minutes.
The dough might be crumbly at this point, so add cold water 1 T.at a time until the dough comes together (like a pie crust dough).
Turn out onto lightly floured surface and roll to 1/4 inch thickness.
Cut out with desired shapes.
Bake at 350 for 10 minutes.
When cookies are cool, mix 2 cups pwd. sugar, 2 T. corn syrup, 1 t. flavoring and milk 1 T. at a time until the glaze is of pouring consistency. Tint to color if desired. Drizzle over cookies. I do this on a cooling rack set over a cookie sheet to catch the drips. Let set until dry.

Whole Hog White Chili

When my wife and I lived in Seattle a friend gave us a recipe for white chicken chili. That's the sort of thing they eat in Seattle in order to prove how different and interesting they are. However, as with most of the new foods we tried in Seattle, the difference was amazing.

I decided to use this recipe with one slight change for our Christmas chili. We have some leftover hog from my son's birthday:

So I substituted whole hog for chicken and the results are crazy (and good) enough to be a Seattle classic. Here's the recipe:

3 cans (or 1 lb. dry - but you will need to soak them overnight) Great Northern white beans

2-4 lbs. whole hog left-overs (you can use chicken)

Half of one large onion, chopped

4-6 cloves of garlic, minced

3 cans of green chiles

2 t. cumin

1 1/2 t. oregano

1/4 t. cloves

1/4 t. cayenne

8 cups chicken stock

1 bottle homebrew (brown ale), or whatever beer you have around

Brick of Monterey Jack cheese, shredded

Saute the onions, then add the garlic and spices. Add to chicken stock and beans. Then add the whole mess to the meat, including the beer. Let it simmer for hours.

If you wish, and I do, then you can thicken with flour. Then add the cheese.

This is the "kid friendly" version. I eat mine with Tabasco sauce.

You can serve with sour cream, but I don't.

Brisket Chili

I basically stole this recipe from Jeff in KC (from the BBQ Brethren forum). The recipe is pretty simple - though I used homemade salsa instead of Rotel. The beer is my hombrew stout. Here's an ingredient list:

2 lbs smoked brisket
5 strips bacon
4 cloves garlic
1 small onion
1 tsp black pepper
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp red pepper flakes (I got kids to think about!)
1 TBS Lowrey's seasoned salt
3 TBS chili powder
1 TBS dry mustard
1 tsp oregano
1 quart homemade salsa
1 bottle Monty's Sweet Stout

1 small can tomato paste

1 can chili beans

God bless my little piece of America!

Spending July 3rd Brewing and Q'ing. Here's to a great country!!

Brew: Irish Draught Ale
Q: 7 pork butts and 2 briskets.

Another great BBQ doc featuring whole hog.

Thanks again, Chez!
If you want to visit one of the best BBQ blogs on the internet chek out Chez's blog (where I found these videos). You'll be glad you did!
http://chez-frontporch.blogspot.com/

CAPITOL Q from Joe York on Vimeo.

Whole Hog vid!

Chez posted a link to this video on The Motley Fool "Funky Art of BBQ" forum. I just had to share it with you all. Have fun!

Whole Hog from Joe York on Vimeo.

Pork BBQlossal

The pork board gave each team "pocket roasts" and asked us to prepare them for the public. This is a new economy cut that they wanted to introduce. I think it comes from the ham. It really wasn't a very good cut of meat and I made sure that I explained to everyone who came to our camp that this wasn't something I'd serve them if I had my choice.

Jeff working on a turn-in box.

Mark "Oly" working on ribs.

The 10th place hog. Our first BBQ paycheck!

The hog box. As I look at this photo I really can't believe we didn't get 6s on appearance. Looks amateurish and rushed - though it was probably the best we could do with our limited experience. Oh well, we must have gotten a inexperienced table of judges.  Scores were 988 - 887 - 777 - 988 - 799 - 899.

Another good day.

The new team shirts are in ! Mark models the latest styles.

Mark and Jeff take the pig out of the cooker

Ready to pick.

Back at it!

Spare rib on top - trimmed to St. Louis on bottom.

Here's how I trim my thighs for comp. 
Some of what I put on the smoker.

A Fistfull of $$$$

The finished product

My first attempt at cooking a hog was a near disaster. The hog was too big for my cooker and about half of the poor creature never got above 120*. Here is the first successful hog we've done. As you can see we pay no attention to presentation. Pic quality is embarrassing - but the sucker was good

The pig was 62 lbs and was done in 6 hours. Butts were 200 and hams 190. The only thing left to do is make a removable grate so that we can turn the hog towards the end of the cook.

Pig's on!

Time to get ready for the BarbeQlossal in June. We got a small hog so that we could do some experimenting. Here's Mark with a new toy!

Some trimming - that's a dovetail saw. It works great!

My two oldest sons helped with the rub. They named the hog "Ned"

Ready to cook.

I'll post more pics of the finished hog tomorrow.

Smoked Chicken

My wife loves pulled smoked chicken. Since it's cheaper than buying her roses I'm always willing to make some for her when she gets a craving!

Our new team logos

A good ol' time in Georgia with Jack's Old South

I have no idea how to put these pics in the proper order. However, here are a few pics from my time at Jack's Old South cooking school:

Here's the crew - a great bunch of folks!

Here's the obligatory pic of me and my teammate, Jeff (I'm on the left, Jeff's on the right) with the man in black.

Some lessons in trimming

More lessons. 

Myron Mixon and David Hair. David, besides being the skinniest BBQ cook in the world is one the funniest human beings alive.

Hog prep

Lots of folks will say that competition BBQ is not for eating - it's for judging. That may be true of ribs and chicken. But the hog, pork butt and brisket I ate at Myron's was some of the best food I have ever had.

Smoked Turkey Snow Day

Had a little snow today. Temps were around 20* and windy. So I smoked a turkey.

Brined 8 hours in 2 gallons of water, 2 cups kosher salt, 1 cup of brown sugar, and an undetermined amount of leftover hog rub.

Smoked 2 hours @ 300-350 with Wild Cherry chips (thanks Diva Q!)

Finished in oven for 1.5 hours @ 325.

I'm going to let this thing sit and will finally get a bite of it when I get back from work tonight.

Until next time....

The UFC meets BBQ - A match made in heaven!

My competition BBQ team, Holy and Oly's BBQ, is sponsoring Nate Mohr in his UFC 93 fight on January 17, 2009. The fight is taking place in Dublin, Ireland. Nate is an undercard fighter so his will be one of the first shown. The fight can be seen on pay per view. Look for our name on his trunks!

I'm not sponsoring Nate for any exposure in the BBQ world. Fact is, our team doesn't even have a webpage. But I believe in him - and I have known him since he was in high-school. Join me in wishing him luck - and praying that neither Nate, nor his opponent, suffer an injury.

Here is a video of some of his fights: