Black Hand Productions

Yesterday Julie and I hosted our third consecutive Fourth of July BBQ.  Once again I spent the better part of the day smoking ribs.  At this point I think I have the smoking aspect down.  The sun and heat was unbearable most of the day until evening set in.  We did have a small shower of rain but it only lasted about 10 minutes.

Thanks to everyone who showed up, we had a perfect amount of food, drinks and people.

Side Notes:

* Past Fourth of July BBQ’s: 2008 and 2009.

As of now I don’t have many photographs from the wedding but this was from Julie’s iPhone which she managed to carry on her purse some how…

These are the couple photographs from our Rehearsal Dinner which was more of a cookout than dinner.  The bats are engraved Louisville Sluggers that we gave as groomsmen gifts.

*Sidenote:
This picture was posted because Tom is wearing one of the more awesome shirts I’ve ever seen on a man who was holding a  purse.

This year Julie and I once again stayed in Chicago for Thanksgiving.  We had some friends over and fried a turkey.  As you can tell be the photograph above we’ve pushed our luck by going with a 13.9 lb turkey.  This was by far the most dangerous frying attempt we’ve ever made.  It took several tense minutes of easing the turkey into the oil to keep the pot from over flowing.  Moving forward we will stick to a 10-12 lb turkey (and I won’t wear flip flops during the frying process).

All of the food turned out great and a good time was had by all.

Side notes:
* The aftermath:

** Previous turkey frying: New Years 2008 & New Years 2009.
*** At least it didn’t end this way:  Columbus Dispatch – Turkey fryer ignites, spoiling family’s holiday.
**** Everything I know about deep frying I learned from Jack & Eddie.

Yesterday was our second annual Fourth of July BBQ and once again I spent the better part of the day smoking ribs.  This year we changed things up a little bit.  We didn’t use nearly as much rub (Dinosaur BBQ’s Cajun Foreplay Spice Rub) and we also smoked the ribs for a longer time (6.5 hours).  This made a huge difference in my opinion.  The ribs were much more tender and the taste from the rub wasn’t over the top.  When the ribs were done smoking I put them in foil and covered them with Dinosaur BBQ’s Sensuous Slathering Sauce and then threw them back on the grill for about another hour.  For table side sauce we tried some new stuff from Rufus Teague which was great.

Despite raining the entire day the weather let up around 7pm which was perfect.  We had a good showing and we might have finished off the bottle of Singleton.  A good time was had by all.

Yesterday I made my second attempt at a Beer Can Chicken.  This time instead of a masonry jar I used a beer can chicken roasting rack.  I like to believe this made all the difference.  I used a ‘Kickin’ Chicken’ rub, about 6oz. of Brooklyn Lager and I basted the chicken with butter, oil and some more beer.  The whole chicken took a little over 2 hours on a weber charcoal grill.  I think it could have gone another 15 minutes to make the skin more crisp but we’ll have to wait for football season to test that hypothesis.

The rest of my photographs are on Flickr here.

Yesterday Julie and I hosted our Fifth of July BBQ.  I spent the better part of the day smoking 8 racks of ribs which went off pretty well considering it was only my second attempt (I think they could have gone a little longer).

We had a pretty good turnout, Dan offered up a keg of beer which is never a bad idea, Jen brought cupcakes that were inhaled and there was only one casualty (a plastic chair).  Thanks to everyone who brought food.

A good time was had by all.

*Side Notes:  

1. The rest of the photographs are on Flickr.
2. I marinated the Ribs for 24 hours with a rub that I had shipped from Dinosaur BBQ in NYC and I roughly followed these directions regarding the grill.

 

For our first New Years in Chicago Julie and I headed to the Bears game on Sunday.  When we bought the tickets this summer we assumed this would be at least a decent game.  The game was all but meaningless, No Reggie Bush, No Brian Greise, No Rex Grossman.

On New Years day during a 12 hour football watching marathon James engineered one hell of a Turkey Fry.  In less than an hour we had one of the better turkey’s ever tasted.

Yesterday I decided to perform a test run with regards to grilling a pork loin.  Granted this was probably the first pork loin I’ve grilled in nearly two years I think it came out pretty well.  You can always do better but I think we had the right amount of Sweet Baby Ray’s, maybe the timing was off but all and all it was pretty damn good.

* Note:  More photographs on Flickr.

To celebrate America’s birthday Julie and I, along with Dom and Kelly put the grill through the paces. Some have pointed out that I really didn’t need to use the amount of charcoal that I did but those would be the same people who point out that the grill is still hot two days later.

After the cookout we headed inside for the first Wii Pentathlon to be held in my Wii Arena. The scoring was close but yours truly pulled it out in the end due to my superior Wii pugilistic skills. It’s fair to say everyone was sore afterwards but none more than Dom after pitching a 5 inning no hitter.

Side Note: Previous Cookouts.

Today was my first attempt at Grilling in New York and I must say it was a moderate success. A ten dollar grill from Rite Aid and some really good steaks from the itailian butcher (meat shop?) around the corner were just the right mix.

*Note: Click on the images below to view larger images.

This cookout was more of a test run than anything. I can’t really compare it to some of the legendary pork roasts I’ve been a part of but it’s good to get back in the game.

Previous Cookouts:
Final Cookout.
Another Cookout.
A Cookout Gone Bad.