What's for Dinner?

I made what I guess wound up being pastrami. I cooked a small hunk (2.5 lbs) of beef brisket sous vide for 42 hours at 135 (a fairly low temp.). I followed a recipe, and included lots of salt and pepper, and also some curing salt. This was to give a faux smoke-ring, at least that is what I imagined.
After sous vide, I put it on a grill to smoke for ~2 hours. The internal temperature got up to ~165, which is more than I was figuring on. Nonetheless, it had a very firm, meaty texture. As you can see from the picture, the curing salt made the whole thing into something closer to pastrami than to smoked brisket. Plus it was heavily blanketed by pepper, like pastrami should be. It was quite lovely, really!

We served this with ginger-glazed carrots, and cabbage/arugula cole slow. Washed down with the leftover, incomplete bottle of Nebbiolo from my bottling today. Yum.

Looks really good, Paul. Based on the recipe, the firm meaty texture was the expected result, based on execution.

Got the turkey breast in a modified basic brine this morning. Yesterday got away from me completely, so my plan of getting it in before dinner fell apart. Still had it in for about 9 hours. We'll see how it does. The basic brine is just salt and brown sugar. I added 1/4 of an orange, a smashed clove of garlic, some powdered ginger (no fresh on hand), a few peppercorns, and a couple bay leaves. It went on the kettle a while ago with a little cherry wood. If all goes well, we'll be eating in half an hour or so.

Came out pretty good!

Last night's "salad"...... Went into a meat coma on Saturday night. Trying to use up tomatoes from the garden. This was a good way to do it. Lots more of them on the bottom beneath all the basil (from the garden as well).

Mmmm, stuffed pork chops. Dry-brined, then made a pocket and stuffed with herbs, garlic, butter, sauteed onions, and a little bit of panko. Served with smashed potatoes, and some braised Swiss chard.

The new updated mobile app uploads such huge pictures. Is there any way to select a smaller size? There is only full size and "optimized" but the optimized is way too big.

This one is courtesy of Mrs. Sour Grapes. Monkfish crusted with pepper and fennel, and a sauteed zucchini dish with fresh tomatoes, onions, and thyme.

Looks great, Mrs. SourGrapes. Had monkfish for the first time last weekend. It certainly won't be the last.

Boatboy24 said:

Looks great, Mrs. SourGrapes. Had monkfish for the first time last weekend. It certainly won't be the last.

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Used to be known as "poor man's lobster," which I think is pretty apt.

A large, weeknight celebratory feast! (It was the only day that the celebrants were available). A guest brought a perfectly seasoned simple mediterranean salad of cukes, tomatoes, onions, parsley, and peppers. For dinner, I made beef short ribs for 8 people, which I cooked sous vide for ~40 hours. I made a mushroom wine reduction sauce with an entire bottle of WE Eclipse Stags Leap Merlot, a pound of mushrooms, herbs, fat from the searing of the ribs, and liquids from the sous vide. Mrs. Sour Grapes made "green cous-cous" (basically, cous-cous with lots of herbs, parsley, mint, etc. She also made baby veggies (carrots, fennel, beans) poached in one of my Pinot Gris/Viognier blends, and sauced them with a ho-made olive oil/garlic/caper mayonnaise by yours truly. I served my WE Eclipse Pinot Gris and then a celebratory Piper Sonoma sparkling wine for pre-prandials, then one of the guests brought a nice Cotes-du-Rhone. When that was kicked, I "followed suit" with a Cotes-du-Ventoux. Another guest brought a "Copenhagen baclava," kind of a Northern/Southern European fusion dish for desert.

Oops, here are the pix.

Third time's the charm?

Paul, you really know that life has to be enjoyed!! [emoji106]

geek said:

Paul, you really know that life has to be enjoyed!! [emoji106]

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Varis, that is the kindest thing anyone has said to me in some time! Thank you, amigo.

Und du, auch!

sour_grapes said:

Varis, that is the kindest thing anyone has said to me in some time! Thank you, amigo.

Und du, auch!

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If your ears were ringing, I said to @heatherd two Saturdays ago that I'd love to attend one of your dinners, as you cook quite a wide variety of food, and now that you actually post images, looks quite delicious!

Tonight was dinner #1 of three. My Son is starting his journey to San Antonio and the USAF on Monday. Goes to MEPS, overnight at a hotel, we meet him back at MEPS on Tuesday, where we watch him get sworn in for the last time, then he boards a bus to get his flight and we don't see him until December (at a minimum). Asked him what he wanted as his last few meals, and he didn't really offer anything up. So I knew pizza on pizza night would work for #1. Tomorrow night (meal #2) is a Eye Round roast, currently marinating in the fridge, done medium rare with twice baked taters and some fresh beans from the garden. Sunday dinner (#3) has changed from chicken parmesean to ribs (they are on sale at the local Giant). I like that choice because it is supposed to be a beautiful day on Sunday, so I'll listen to the Eagles on the radio hopefully beat the Chargers of (? Los Angeles ?). We need to replace the antenna on the roof, but other than that he's free to do whatever he wants.

I'm really starting to get a heavy heart and realize just how much I'm gonna miss him. He's the first or four to fly the coop.

Image of my pizza (onions, green peppers, mushrooms, pepperoni and salami with some nondescript hot peppers).

Great looking pizza, Craig. Give your son our thanks for his service and dedication to the country.

Boatboy24 said:

Great looking pizza, Craig. Give your son our thanks for his service and dedication to the country.

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Jim, I have. I am so proud of him! He's as excited as a four year old on Christmas Day, can't wait to go (I know, that will change quickly after a few 5 mile "hikes"). I can't wait till he comes back to visit. I told him those fancy uniforms are "chick" magnets, so be choosy.

Dropped off my daughter early this morning so she could go to a field hockey tournament near Lancaster. She asked me to make a loaf of whole wheat bread (I usually don't fire up the oven unless necessary in the summer) now that it is cool I've fired up the oven (about 60*F today and breezy). So she'll be happy when she gets home later tonight, will probably polish off half the loaf (and push about 20 units of insulin). Used a nice graham wheat flour, made a really nice dough, easy to work with in my opinion.

Did the eye round per instructions I've used a few times. Turned out very tender and flavorful with the kosher salt/garlice/rosemary rub I used overnight. Nice medium rare, tender beef. Image was not real great, makes it look very yellowish, but it was done really nicely.

Twiced baked taters had lot's of European butter and sour cream added, so very rich and 10 of the 14 of them have disappeared, and I haven't eaten yet.

What a nice Fall day!

My wife and I are taking a 4 day weekend trip to the Poconos next weekend for our anniversary (without the kids), which is also (Canadian) thanksgiving. So we celebrated thanksgiving today instead.
Turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, corn, and followed up with the best type of pie, strawberry rhubarb.
I brined the turkey and then had it on the rotisserie for 3 hours. Had some branches from our apple tree in for smoke too. Turned out great.