Dan C. FL
TVWBB Pro
On Saturday, the wife and I were debating via text about what I was going to cook while she was out grocery shopping. We were going through the various types of fish (none of which interested me) when she sent me a picture of a rolled up pork belly with no caption or message. The butcher apparently decided to trim it and tie it like a roast. I asked why she sent it and she said that she was getting it. Fair enough. I'm never one to turn down pork belly products. Here's what it looked like when I opened it yesterday.
I spent some time trying to research online what to do with and never really came up with anything that moved me. So, I pulled out the books and searched for pork belly. Project Smoke was the first one in three attempts that had a pork belly recipe. Make a rub, put it on, smoke...voila! It also had a mustard vinegar sauce that accompanied it. One of the ingredients in there? Beer. I was sold. After acquiring the missing ingredients (I needed some beer, ketchup, dijon mustard and cider vinegar from the store), I went to work. Here she is all rubbed up:
If you make a mental note of the uneven application of the rub on top, you can laugh at me later.
I decided to cook this one on the 14" WSM. It's more moody than my 18", but there just wasn't the need to go burning extra charcoal (even though I have like 160 lbs. of KBB in the garage right now). The skies were really ominous, so I set up the tailgate tent and got the coals going. That turned out to be a good decision. Last time I cooked on the 14" was for that tri tip with the fat cap on it. If you read that post, you may recall that, once again, that 14" was a little jumpy with temps. So, I anticipated the same this time. Nope. I got her up to 200* and closed down the bottom vents almost completely. Rather than continue to climb, she came to a DEAD STOP. Quick little adjustment and she climbed to 211* and stuck there. I went ahead and put the belly roll on.
Of course, you put cold meat on a little smoker and what do you get? Temp drop. I waited it out and it climbed back up to about 210*. I wanted it closer to 225*, so I went and opened the vents a smidge more. It finally settled in at 230*, so I was content to go make the sauce. Oh, btw, have I told y'all that I've never made a sauce before?
Good Ole Raichlen's instructions were simple to follow. Mix ingredients, simmer, 6-10 minutes, and voila...sauce. So, I mixed the ingredients. And I started to simmer them.
6-10 minutes later, the liquid had barely started to bubble. It wasn't near as thick as what I thought it should be. So, I brought the temps on the stove up and continued to whisk frequently like the instructions said. Well, you know how if you whisk too frequently, it has a hard time getting appropriately warm? Yeah. I wasn't thinking about that. The thickness was still not quite right. Bumped the temp up some more and stopped stirring as often.
Ahhh...there we go! Finally, an hour later, it was the thickness that I wanted. The taste was delicious. I was really excited for this meal.
Oh, while this was going on, it started raining cats and dogs. Luckily, I had the tailgate tent set up:
See my vortex on the ground? I decided to hang my ThermoPro on it to keep it dry.
Sadly, this pup doesn't like thunderstorms. I was busy, so she couldn't snuggle. So, she hid behind the door into the laundry room.
Poor thing.
To be continued in the comments...
I spent some time trying to research online what to do with and never really came up with anything that moved me. So, I pulled out the books and searched for pork belly. Project Smoke was the first one in three attempts that had a pork belly recipe. Make a rub, put it on, smoke...voila! It also had a mustard vinegar sauce that accompanied it. One of the ingredients in there? Beer. I was sold. After acquiring the missing ingredients (I needed some beer, ketchup, dijon mustard and cider vinegar from the store), I went to work. Here she is all rubbed up:
If you make a mental note of the uneven application of the rub on top, you can laugh at me later.
I decided to cook this one on the 14" WSM. It's more moody than my 18", but there just wasn't the need to go burning extra charcoal (even though I have like 160 lbs. of KBB in the garage right now). The skies were really ominous, so I set up the tailgate tent and got the coals going. That turned out to be a good decision. Last time I cooked on the 14" was for that tri tip with the fat cap on it. If you read that post, you may recall that, once again, that 14" was a little jumpy with temps. So, I anticipated the same this time. Nope. I got her up to 200* and closed down the bottom vents almost completely. Rather than continue to climb, she came to a DEAD STOP. Quick little adjustment and she climbed to 211* and stuck there. I went ahead and put the belly roll on.
Of course, you put cold meat on a little smoker and what do you get? Temp drop. I waited it out and it climbed back up to about 210*. I wanted it closer to 225*, so I went and opened the vents a smidge more. It finally settled in at 230*, so I was content to go make the sauce. Oh, btw, have I told y'all that I've never made a sauce before?
Good Ole Raichlen's instructions were simple to follow. Mix ingredients, simmer, 6-10 minutes, and voila...sauce. So, I mixed the ingredients. And I started to simmer them.
6-10 minutes later, the liquid had barely started to bubble. It wasn't near as thick as what I thought it should be. So, I brought the temps on the stove up and continued to whisk frequently like the instructions said. Well, you know how if you whisk too frequently, it has a hard time getting appropriately warm? Yeah. I wasn't thinking about that. The thickness was still not quite right. Bumped the temp up some more and stopped stirring as often.
Ahhh...there we go! Finally, an hour later, it was the thickness that I wanted. The taste was delicious. I was really excited for this meal.
Oh, while this was going on, it started raining cats and dogs. Luckily, I had the tailgate tent set up:
See my vortex on the ground? I decided to hang my ThermoPro on it to keep it dry.
Sadly, this pup doesn't like thunderstorms. I was busy, so she couldn't snuggle. So, she hid behind the door into the laundry room.
Poor thing.
To be continued in the comments...
