Ever used dry ice, BE CAREFULL


 
MKEvenson

MKEvenson

TVWBB Wizard
So I cooked for 30-35 people out of town. Had to keep my meet cold, below 40 from Thursday morning till Friday. So I go to the store to get block ice. No block ice avail but they do have dry ice. Hmmmm, I've never used dry ice but what the ****, as long as it keeps the meet cold. So I buy 4 small slabs of dry ice and 3 large bags of cubes. The directions say to put the dry on the bottom of the cooler and the cubes on top. Then the food. I did that. got to the cooking site at 9am Fri ready to fire up the old WSM. Checked the meat, cold, I say frozen! Had to set 6 racks of ribs and a 15 lb briskey out in the sun. My time table might allow all this. Just before it comes time to put the ribs on they are still a bit solid. So into the kitcken with my hotel trays and ribs, into the hot water, I really did not want to do this. Anyway the ribs thawed pretty well. An hour later the briskey is supposed to go on. Yep, the point is mostly solid. So back to the hot water. After about 15 min it is time to put her on, frozen or not, so on she goes. I am doing a HH cook, and plan is to foil at 2 hrs. Well due to the somewhat frozen state of the meat I let it go 2.5 hrs, then foil. In foile 2.5 hrs, not quite as tender as I would like but I am running out of time. Fortunately I had brought enough brisket that I cooked last Sunday, vacumpaked. I had heated and sliced and served, gave the new briskey time to sit a while before slicing. Well it made it. The crowd went crazy. " Best brisket I have ever eaten", " my husband really doesn't like brisket,he says this is the best he ever ate". Whew! I did it. The ribs were also very good according to the comments, I still haven't tasted. And the 100 ABTs were a smashing hit. Of course as appetisers they should be.

So bottom line, if you are going to use dry ice in a cooler, shield it from your food with a towell of something, cause it's gonna get cold in there.

And now a couple pics:

Mark

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My dad and I had 3 ice cream trucks that used dry ice back 30 yrs ago ! You could freeze anything to a solid brick with it including your skin if you don't handle it with gloves .

By the way your ABT's look fantastic
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anybody ever try a mix of dry ice and reg ice? I'm wondering if a small bit of dry ice will help keep the reg ice from melting.

my bro-in-law had a similar problem when he thought it would work great camping. he said it just froze all his food.

he said they had fun loading it into plastic soda bottles, capping them and waiting for them to explode.

I prefer to add dish soap to left over dry ice and add hot water. it makes a bubble mountain
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btw, that brisket looks awesome!
 
Mark.
Glad everything worked out and you ended up with great results. Those peppers look great. I've been using Dry Ice for many years to keep food cold or frozen during long trips. The general rule I have used is if you just want to keep it "cold", then you need to separate the DI from the food with a layer of ice cubes and then a few layers of newspaper (or 2 or 3 layers of corrugated cardboard). The ice will become even colder but will not reach the temperature of the DI (about -110 degrees F) and the newspaper will provide a thermal barrier to further reduce the temp. The more DI you have, the more newspaper you will need. Depending on how long you need to keep the food cold, a layer of DI about 2 inches in the bottom of a cooler will last about 24 hours. As a finishing touch, place a layer of newspaper on top of the food before you close the cooler. This has worked very well for me over the years. I have gone as long as 6 days with DI in coolers to keep food frozen. I hope this helps.
 
Thanks for the comments. I prepped 100 ABTs. I believe that I fit around 80 on those 3 grates. Ran the smoker around 250 for about 1/2 hr then opened her up to around 300 for another 30 min. It seems to take me about 1 hr to cook those things.

Mark
 
What a feast. Those are the best looking ABT pics I've seen. Awesome talent to "save" the cook after the dry ice incident. The crowd loved it and that's what counts.

Does this mean we'll have a dry-ice brisket thread going now?
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<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by j biesinger:

he said they had fun loading it into plastic soda bottles, capping them and waiting for them to explode.
</div></BLOCKQUOTE>

You would also usually have a little water in there to speed things up.

Note that in California it's a felony (manufacturing a destructive device) and possibly in other states as well.
 
Newbie alert...what exactly is an ABT?
Besides something that looks positively scrumptious, that is...
 
Off topic, but funny. I have a cleaning service that comes in once every two weeks to give the house a thorough cleaning. I'd just ordered some stuff from Lobel's in New York, and it arrived in a cooler with dry ice. I knew the cleaning ladies were due at the house soon, so I took one of the pieces with a pair of tongs, and dropped it in the toilet in the powder room on the first floor.

Shortly after arriving at the house, I hear one of them scream "Mr. McCall! Your toilet's on fire!" LOL Here, the dry ice had turned the toilet into a bubbling cauldron, and the steam was pouring out between the bowl and the toilet seat. They thought it was on fire.

It's amazing that dry ice is so cold, it can burn your hands, and practically make water boil.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Curt:
Newbie alert...what exactly is an ABT?
Besides something that looks positively scrumptious, that is... </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Curt, ABT is short for atomic buffalo turd. Do a google search and you will find a lot of recipes. Basically a jalepeno chile cut in half and stuffed with cream cheese, mine also had spicy Italian sausage mixed with the cream cheese and hot pepper jack, then you wrap the thing with bacon, add rub if you like and smoke, grill, bake or fry. They seem to please the masses.

Mark
 
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