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The Ugly Brothers Grillosophy
We Hold These Truths to be Self Evident: 1) If we weren't suppose to eat animals, how come they're made of meat?
If your gonna smoke meat ya gotta have the right tools. This means a barbeque and the right accessories. Below are a few recommendations the Ugly Brothers find most helpful. BARBEQUES
HARDWARE ACCESSORIES
If what you're looking for is not here, you may want to check our On-Line Catalog. Wondering how to smoke your meat? The Ugly Brothers Smoking Reference Chart is a good starting point.
The heavy ceramic insulation of the Big Green Egg allows it to retain much of the heat and moisture that would otherwise evaporate from more popular steel walled smokers. Small fires built in the BGE can burn for hours consuming very little fuel. Perhaps the biggest mistake is to light a big fire in the BGE as many do in a steel smoker. OK, OK, OK, this would be great if you were cooking steaks, but for slow smoking this will create a hot fire which will be difficult to bring down. What wewant to do for slow smoking is to create a small fire which we can more easily regulate. To achieve this place the desired amount of hardwood charcoal in the BGE, placing larger chunks on the bottom. For longer cooking items you will want to place enough hardwood charcoal in the BGE fire box to set the level above the side air holes. Start about 15 hardwood briquettes in a charcoal chimney. These are the only briquettes you are allowed to use; the primary charcoal for your BGE should be lump hardwood charcoal. When they are completely ignited, place about 10 of them in the firebox, distributing them evenly. Close the lid on the BGE and allow the fire to burn for about 5 minutes with the bottom vent about half way open and the top vent open full. After this, close the bottom vent to about 1/2-inch and close the top vent at least 3/4 of the way. In a short while the temperature will rise and level off. For slow smoked meats such as brisket, butts and ribs we are shooting for a smoker temperature of approximately 190-200°F. Adjust the vents accordingly to raise or lower the temperature. A smaller fire such as this will burn for long periods in the BGE, spreading slowly to the unlit charcoal and giving you a good 12 hours of constant heat. There should be no need to re-fuel the fire unless you are working under EXTREME conditions of cold and wind. If you are working under such conditions take comfort in the fact that a steel walled smoker would have required constant attention and would have been difficult to get up to temperature!
TIPS:
You probably have wondered why the Ugly Bothers cook for competitions exclusively in the Big Green Egg. The answer is obvious, it is the best. In fact often I have been asked ... Bud, what is the Big Green Egg.... is it a barbeque or a grill? It's both and it's a tandoor oven. GRILLING (which is referred to as BBQ by most people outside the South) is what most folks enjoy on their Weber Kettle or other charcoal or propane brazier. Grilling is the method of cooking whereby the meat is cooked over direct, intense flame, usually 500 degrees F or higher. Meats are cooked quickly and often are enjoyed seared on the outside, rare and juicy on the inside. BARBEQUE is low, slow and moist. In a BBQ, meats are cooked slowly with indirect heat in an enclosed cooker which allows the moist hardwood smoke to penetrate the meat. BBQ temperatures range from about 170 to 250 degrees F and can take 12 or more hours to cook a brisket or pork butt. At the end of the process truly BBQ'd meat will well done, rendered free of fat, tender from the breakdown of the connective tissue and will show a distinctive pink "smoke ring" which indicates how deeply the smoke has penetrated the meat. TANDOOR ovens are big, fired clay pots with a small hole on the bottom for feeding and ventilating the fire. They are capable of maintaining heat at stable temperatures for long periods of time due to the thick clay insulation. The tandoor originated in Babylonia as the tinuru and spread to ancient Egypt and throughout the Middle East and Asia. In India they are used for cooking breads and barbequing the spicy red chicken best known in this country and Europe as "tandoori chicken". The BIG GREEN EGG is adapted from the Japanese Kamodo barbeque, a variation of the the tandoor, a design going back 3000 years! The Big Green Egg can be used as a grill by cooking over a hot fire with the vents wide open, it can be used as a BBQ by dampening the vents to maintain a low constant temperature over long periods of time and hey, it's a tandoor also! That's why Les Burden, Jr. has said... "If you can only own only one grill or smoker, get the Big Green Egg!"
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