Beer, Bourbon and BBQ

Earlier this week, when I first heard about the “Beer, Bourbon and BBQ” show, my gleeful reaction was, “They’ve finally come up with a show just for me!” It turns out that it was a show for me and what seemed like 100,000 others like me.

The show, at the 4-H building on the state fairgrounds in Timonium today (Saturday, 4/5/08) drew a shoulder-to-shoulder crowd of beer-swigging, bourbon-sipping, bbq-chomping humanity. Most of that humanity was male and in what seemed to me to be the 20-35-year-old range. I wasn’t surprised that it was mostly male and I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised at how young the crowd was. For the $35 entry fee, you could get samples of beer and bourbon from the exhibitors, limited only by how much those exhibitors brought with them. The food at the show cost extra.

It took about 10 minutes of shuffling in line to get into the building, where after paying for entry you picked up a glass for sampling. It was by the door that I also saw the first of a few long lines of people waiting to get into the restrooms. This was the point at which I decided to forgo the beer and stick to bourbon.

I believe I hit most of the bourbon booths that still had samples available, and by the end of my day I had sampled five small-batch brands. Three of them I had had before – Bookers, Wild Turkey Rare Breed and Woodford Reserve. Two were new to me – Buffalo Trace and Evan Williams. I was very pleasantly surprised by the Evan Williams, which I found to be very smooth and not too sweet. The Buffalo Trace, a brand I had gotten good reviews about from a co-worker but have found hard to find, was a little too sweet for me. The others, all of which are among my favorites, didn’t disappoint.

In between the bourbon samples, I wormed my way through the crowd. In addition to the food and beverage booths, there were other exhibitors pushing salsas, spices, t-shirts, brand new windows and other odds and ends. The only booth I saw with no action whatsoever was for the National Guard. Almost out of pity, I stopped to talk to them. They said things tend to pick up for them after people drink for a while, once they start to become less inhibited, one of the guardsmen said. I asked if guys try to enlist their drunk buddies as practical jokes. They explained that they’re not allowed to actually enlist people at the event, but if a name winds up on their list, they do indeed follow up a few days later with a phone call.

After an hour and a half at this four-hour event, I started to see the first signs of trouble, as a few people were starting to stagger. I had spaced out my five shots, wolfed down a delicious pulled-pork sandwich from Kloby’s and was feeling like I’d gotten out of the event what I’d wanted. Being smart enough to know better than to drive myself, I phoned my wife, who was my pre-appointed designated driver, and she came and picked me up.

Am I glad I went? Yeah, I think so. If I hadn’t, I would have just moped about not going. Would I go back? I don’t know that I would. It’s one of those things that would be a lot of fun for someone in their 20s (21 and up, of course) and 30s – and there were plenty of them there. But for an old fogey like me, I think I’d prefer to line ‘em up on the bar with an intimate gathering of friends or loved ones.

BBTuesday - Arthur Bryant's

Kansas City has a well-earned reputation for good music and great barbecue. Perhaps tops among the great restaurants in town is the renowned Arthur Bryant's Barbecue. Calvin Trillin, a KC native and writer for the New Yorker, called Bryant's, "The best restaurant in the world." The place has fed presidents and celebrities who have gone out of their way to stop by for a bite when visiting KC.

Bryant's can trace its roots back to Henry Perry, a Tennessean credited as being the father of Kansas City barbecue. Perry opened a restaurant in KC, then hired George Gates and brothers Arthur and Charlie Bryant to run it when business took off. Gates eventually moved on to open his own famous bbq joint, Charlie Bryant died and Arthur took over the place on his own. The restaurant thrived under his watch, and after developing his signature sauce, he was crowned with the title, "The King of Ribs." He ran the restaurant at 18th and Brooklyn until his death in 1982. That site, plus two others carry on the tradition of slow cooked meats smothered in that famous sauce.

The restaurant's rep has been built on pork slab ribs, but it also offers beef, ham, pork, turkey and chicken, along with bbq baked beans, slaw and fries on the side. You can order Arthur's rubs and sauces from the restaurant's Website.

What I know about Arthur Bryant's Barbecue comes from numerous favorable mentions in lists, spotlights on television shows and write-ups in books. I haven't had the pleasure of eating at Bryant's, but if you have, please leave a comment below and share your experience.

BBTour

No tune this week. Instead, I found this fascinating piece on the history of barbecue in KC.




Enjoy!

BBTuesday - Turkey

Gather around, children. It's time for your history lesson. Today Uncle Sullicom is going to tell you how the turkey was lucky enough to wind up as the symbol and main event for our Thanksgiving feast.

As I recall, it was around this time of year back in 1621, when we lived in Plymouth, Massachusetts. Gov. William Bradford decided we should have a day of thanks, with a feast to go with it. However, it having been declared a holiday, all of the stores were closed. So, we sent several men into the woods, to "go fowling" as we called it. I wasn't much good at fowling, so I stayed home and watched football until the others returned.

The "fowlers" came back, loaded not just with turkeys, but with ducks and geese, too. We cooked them all up, along with loads of sweet potatoes, stuffing and that green bean casserole with the little crunchy onions on top. The next day, when it was time to dig into the leftovers, we discovered that of all the cooked birds, it was the turkey that tasted best when made into sandwiches, with a little mayo slathered on top.

Ever since then, the turkey has been inextricably linked to Thanksgiving. This year, Americans will eat 690 million pounds of the bird at this feast alone.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

For those of you adventurous enough to want to try to smoke your turkey this holiday, here's a link to Steven Raichlin's recipe for brined and smoked Thanksgiving turkey.

And if you want a seasonal sauce for your turkey, here's a recipe for a cranberry barbecue sauce from the Shoalwater Restaurant in Seaview, Washington.

BBTune

And now, a word from the bird.



Have a great Thanksgiving!

BBTuesday - Andy Nelson's

One of the things I like best about Baltimore is Andy Nelson's Barbecue. The place has the authentic look, feel and taste of one of those old roadside joints I remember as a kid.

Located in north suburban Cockeysville, Andy's occupies two old, unassuming buildings. When you walk into the main shack, the wall to your right is lined with bottles of barbecue sauces and hot sauces. The rest of the walls in the place are decorated with homages to pigs, Elvis and the owner's career with the old Baltimore Colts of the '50s and '60s.

Andy was a defensive back for the great Johnny Unitas-led Colts teams, playing in Baltimore from 1957 to 1963. He was pretty good, too, making the Pro Bowl in 1960. He played a final season in 1964 for the New York Giants before returning to Baltimore to open up his restaurant.

The food and atmosphere are heavy on Alabama, where Andy grew up, and Memphis, where he went to college. The meats are slowly smoked over hickory fires, then simmered in a spicy sauce that was adapted from an old family recipe. I prefer the pulled pork, but there's also beef brisket, pit beef (this is Maryland, after all), pulled turkey and chicken breast sandwiches; Memphis-style ribs, whole or sectioned chickens; Dixie wings; and a hearty selection of sides, including slaw, bbq beans, potato salad and my favorite, greens.

There is a triumvirate of sauces available. My favorite (big surprise) is the tangy vinegar-based Pig Dip. The peppery Bama BBQ Sauce and spicy Carolina Mustard Sauce are also good. I usually wind up squeezing a lot of each on whatever's on my plate. The sauces, along with a house salad dressing and rub mix are available online.

Part of the fun of going to Andy's is that it's somewhat of a shrine to Elvis, whom Andy says he and his wife used to see around town during their Memphis days. There's lots of memorabilia on the walls of the various rambling rooms throughout the main shack.

I heartily recommend this place to anybody visiting Baltimore or even locals who've never been. The food is terrific and the dining experience is like walking through a portal to a place and time that seems so far, far away anymore.

BBTune

Here's one Andy would approve of. Elvis Presley doing "Hound Dog."



Enjoy!

BBTuesday - Chicago

I've spent nearly 20 years of my life living in Chicago. I first moved there in the 1970s when I was in high school and then spent several college summers living and working there. In the mid '80s, the Remarkable Marcy and I moved to Chicago from Ohio and lived there for more than a decade.

It's my kind of town. A toddlin' town, whatever that means. Poet Carl Sandburg called Chicago, "Hog butcher for the world." With a rep like that to uphold, it's no wonder that BBQ figures mightily into the Windy City's food spectrum.

When it comes to BBQ, Chicago is a ribs town. Chicago ribs are distinctive in that they don't feature much in the way of rubs, and in most cases, sauce goes on before they're smoked, rather than near the end of the process. That requires a very slow cooking process, sometimes at temperatures below 200 degrees.

The most notable rib joint in town is Carson's. The restaurant has only been around since the late '70s, but has established itself as rib central. The pre-sauced ribs are smoked, slowly, over a hickory fire. More of Carson's syrupy, tangy barbecue sauce goes on near the end of the cooking to give the meat a reddish glaze.

When Marcy and I moved to town in 1986, we settled in Oak Park, birthplace of Ernest Hemingway, home of Frank Lloyd Wright and where you'll find Robinson's #1 Ribs. Charlie Robinson grew up in Mississippi and started making a name for himself in the 1980s. In 1982 Robinson won the first annual Ribfest organized by the late, great columnist Mike Royko. Robinson won further acclaim on the competition circuit in the '80s. Robinson marinates his ribs in a blend of sauce and seasoning, then refrigerates them overnight before they're slowly hickory smoked. Make sure you finish them off with lots of the sweet and peppery sauce.

For pure BBQ kitsch, it's hard to beat Russell's Barbecue in west suburban Elmwood Park. Russell's opened in the 1930s and the building at the right, from a photo taken around 1950, still stands on Thatcher Avenue, a beautiful shady road that cuts up along the Des Plaines River, giving you a respite from the ugly urban sprawl that's grown up around it. Russell's ribs and sandwiches were okay, but it was the atmosphere of the place, more than the food, that drew me back for return visits. Dark, wood-paneled walls, picnic-style tables and benches - it's what a BBQ joint should look like.

There are many, many more great 'Q stops in Chicago, but these three are the ones I can personally recommend. And this time of year, when the first chilly breezes are starting to blow in off Lake Michigan, any place serving a hot slab of ribs is worth a stop.

BBTune

Buddy Guy may be the greatest blues guitarist of all time and an adopted son of Chicago. Here he is with the one of the many musical tributes to the city, "Sweet Home, Chicago." Not a bad cast of sidemen on this either. Keep and eye and ear out for Eric Clapton, Robert Cray, Jimmie Vaughan and others.



Enjoy!

BBTuesday - Sauce Off, Week 5

It's judgement week here at the Sullicom world headquarters as the pig and I tally votes to see who comes out on top in the first annual sauce off.

To refresh your memory, the aim of this competition is to introduce you to the best there is in tomato, mustard and vinegar sauces. The three that your blogger personally tested did not disappoint.

In the tomato category, Chef JP, aka The Chef From Hell, submitted a mole barbecue sauce that featured a creative blend of smoky Tex-Mex flavors. It was a great topping for chicken breasts that were the highlights of our weekend fiesta.

That was followed by Jason of Jason's BBQ Adventures, whose lemonade chicken, an interesting twist on beer-can chicken, was our mustard entry and a favorite among the kids.

And we wrapped up last week with our vinegar-based sauce, my family's very own Kentucky BBQ Dip. I mopped the dip on a Boston Butt that ultimately became some of the best pulled pork I've ever smoked.

In this sort of competition, there are no losers, only winners. Especially the judges who get to sample each entry. We'll let you know next Tuesday which sauce takes the prestigious Sullicom Sauce Off title.

BBTune

Today's tune features scenes from the 2007 Founder's Day Barbecue Cookoff in Dripping Springs, Texas, set to Lone Star favorite son, Robert Earl Keen's "Barbecue."



Enjoy!

Food for the Soul, Oct. 14, 2007

I cede today's post to the eloquence of a former co-worker. Carol and her husband, Marsh, have started a blog called An Interesting Adventure, about the family's experience dealing with Marsh's battle against b-cell non-Hodgkins-lymphoma. In addition to sharing their experiences, thoughts and feelings, they are also posting relevant information about genetic counseling and resources they've discovered.

Another former co-worker, Rich the Killer Cameraman, sent me a link to a recent post made by Carol, titled "The Healing Power of Barbeque." It's a great read.

Take some time today to put aside your troubles and be thankful for the good things in life - health, family, plenty, barbecue and all other blessings. And then send out some positive thoughts for those less fortunate. It will get your week off to a terrific start.

BBTuesday - Sauce Off, Week 4

It was time to give due diligence to vinegar sauces, so I pulled out old faithful, our family recipe for Kentucky BBQ Dip.

This is the moppin' sauce I was raised on, slathered over ribs, chicken, pulled pork and mutton. Every time I make this, it flashes me back to rich memories of Western Kentucky summers, with the backyard bbq pit smoking away, eating dinner on the screened-in porch and trying to fall asleep on hot, humid nights with a way-too-full belly.

For this sauce, I decided to do up some pulled pork and pulled chicken.

The sauce is very easy to pull together, with prep taking only about 10 minutes and then a slow simmer of about an hour.

I smoked a smallish (2 lbs) chunk of Boston Butt, mopping on the sauce about every 20 minutes during the roughly two hour grilling period. After removing the pork from the grill, I tossed on some chicken breasts for about 10 minutes, mopping when they first when on and when I flipped them halfway through.

When the meats were done, I went in and started pulling everything apart. I put each pulled meat in a separate bowl and poured some of the sauce on top. We served the bbq on a bun with and onion slice and pickles, and sides of homemade cole slaw and baked beans.

It's tough for me to be objective about this sauce. It's what defines bbq for me. The Remarkable Marcy opted for the pulled chicken, pouring additional sauce on the sandwich before eating it. Flannery, our Peach, came back for seconds on the chicken, a definite rave revue from a finicky eater. MoJo, who generally likes spicy foods, was oddly unenthusiastic, though. She tried the pulled chicken, but then opted for one of the plain chicken breasts we had left over, dipped in ketchup (whose kid is this!?).

BBTune

I've been on a Southern Culture on the Skids kick of late. The first song I ever heard from SCOTS was "Too Much Pork for Just One Fork," off their "Ditch Diggin'" CD. It's a fitting companion to this pulled-pork post.

Southern Culture on the Skids – Too Much Pork for Just One Fork

Enjoy!

BBTuesday - Sauce Off, Week 3

Before I went on the DL this past weekend, we threw together the Lemonade Mustard Sauce and accompanying Lemonade Chicken that I found on the Jason's BBQ Adventures blog. Jason attributes the recipe to Steven Raichlen.

The recipe offered an interesting twist on most mustard sauces I've run across in that it used lemonade. And not only in the sauce. There was lemonade powder in the rub, and lemonade instead of beer as the liquid in the upright cooker.

It was very easy to pull together, with prep time being under 30 minutes. The only hitch in the cooking came as a result of the brown sugar and lemonade mix in the rub. The chicken skin started to burn a little, but we wrapped it in foil for the last hour and that solved the problem.

I threw some onions and potatoes on the grill with the chicken and we served the bird with the onions and taters, a simple tossed salad and some peas.

The flavors lined up as chicken hit tongue. I first noticed the sweetness and zest of the lemonade, followed by the bite of the mustard, then the savory blend of the other spices. I'm not a great fan of overly sweet sauces, but I was definitely in the minority here. The kids loved it and the Remarkable Marcy surprised me with her enthusiasm.

This would be an ideal summertime concoction, especially if you wanted to impress guests - particularly those with kids - with something very different.

Next Up: Kentucky BBQ Dip

This is my own family recipe, a vinegar based sauce that's great as a marinade or mopped on throughout the grilling process.

BBTune

Here's New Orleans' Marsalis Family with "Struttin' with Some Barbecue." That's father Ellis on piano, Branford on sax, Wynton on trumpet, Delfeayo on trombone and Jason on drums.



Enjoy!

BBTuesday - Sauce Off

A couple of weeks ago I announced the results of my first mini poll about bbq sauce. Tomato sauce edged out vinegar and mustard at the 11th hour as the peoples' favorite.

Now I'd like to take a bit more of a scientific approach to answering the question of which sauce is best, and I need your help. I'm looking for the best recipes out there for each type of sauce. If you have a special sauce of your own, let me know. Or if you have a link to a good one somewhere on the Web, let me know. You can drop the recipe or link on a comment or e-mail it to sullicom@gmail.com. I'll share them with you on Tuesdays throughout the rest of September and the first three weeks of October. I'll also report back to you as we experiment with the recipes and I invite you to try them out, too, and add your own reviews. On Tuesday, October 30, I'll announce the winner of the first annual Sullicom Sauce Off. The prize (if any) has yet to be determined.

I'll seed the contest with the first submission, my old family recipe (yes, nepotism is allowed) for Kentucky BBQ Dip, the vinegar sauce my momma used to mix with my formula. So, now the competition is officially on - send me your sauces!

Musical Interlude

Few foods have inspired songwriters to pick up pen in greasy hand like bbq. I was pleasantly surprised at the number of songs about my favorite food that I was able to find on YouTube. I'd like to share one that provided a real "aha!" moment when I watched it. It's a rockabilly number called "Barbecue Blues," performed in a bar by a German band called Rockin' Rhonda and the Rhonkeys. Rhonda's got this sort of cat thing going on with her outfit and face makeup which almost scared me away at first, but the video turned out to be well worth the 2:41 it took to watch.



Enjoy!

Blog Spotlight - Pork and Whiskey

"A fridge full of beer and a good hotsauce. One of the many reasons a second refrigerator is a necessity."

That line rode beneath a photo of an open fridge, and indeed it was loaded with nothing more than a variety of beers and hot sauces. I was hooked. The post was labeled "heaven?".

Thus I became a fan of Pork and Whiskey.

It's hard not to like the name of the blog, and the nom de post of the blogger - Rev. BigDumbChimp. But the Rev.'s interests extend beyond pork and whiskey. He speaks with authority on beers and barbecue and offers reviews of several restaurants in his Charleston, SC area.

The blog launched back in February 2006 and you can see from the early posts that the Rev. was struggling - like all of us - to figure out where he was going and how to find his voice. He went dark for several months between September 2006 and June of this year. After 'fessing up that he "sucked" (his description) as a "blog daddy", he promised to re-engergize his efforts. And he has.

Good, visual and instructive posts about Spicy Fennel Sausage, Maple Cured Hickory Smoked Bacon and Tasso Ham on the pork front; while in the other realm he introduces us to Noah's Mill Bourbon and Stranahan's Colorado Whiskey.

I hope the Rev. continues the momentum he seems to have regained. Maybe if he finds an audience he'll do so. Give him a look and let him know what you think. We can't let a blog called Pork and Whiskey go to waste!

BBTuesday - Barbecued Tofu

Congratulations to those of you who weren't scared off by the title of this post. Your reward for sticking around is a surprisingly tasty recipe.

Way back in the 1980s, when your blogger still had a full head of hair and before we had our three kids (maybe one has something to do with the other), the Remarkable Marcy and I had lots of time to experiment with a wide range of recipes. During one particular stretch of clean living, we were both hard-core vegetarians and tofu was a staple of our diet.

Tofu, by itself, looks and tastes a lot like a sponge. That's because it is sort of like a sponge in that it absorbs the flavors of whatever you cook with it. To this day, one of our favorite recipes from that era was a Barbecued Tofu concoction that came in "The PETA Guide to Compassionate Living," a publication we received when we were card-carrying members of the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. The PETA publication plucked the recipe from Louise Hagler's '80s classic, Tofu Cookery.

There were two parts to the recipe: a marinade and a sauce, each delicious enough on its own to have been used alone. But together, the end result was out of this world!

First, make sure you get the right sort of tofu. You need to get the firm tofu that comes packed in water in the plastic tubs you can usually find in your grocer's produce section. Don't get the squishy kind that comes in a box. And make sure to get the unflavored variety. You'll have to squeeze the water out of the block of tofu. Remember, you're basically dealing with a sponge. The easiest way to do this is to lay the block on a saucer, then put a plate, upside down, over the block and set a heavy book on top of the plate. Give it about 30 minutes, then drain off the water that's been pressed out.

Here's the recipe, in its two parts.

Barbecued Tofu

2 lbs. firm tofu. Freeze, thaw, squeeze out the water and cut into 1" x 3" strips.

Mix together:

3 tbsp. peanut butter (do yourself a favor and use a natural, smooth variety)
1/3 cup oil
1 tbsp. paprika
1/2 tsp. black pepper
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
2 tsp. salt

Whip mixture until smooth. Pour over tofu strips and squeeze in as evenly as possible. Marinate 1 hour. While it is marinating prepare Barbecue Sauce.

Barbecue Sauce

1/2 cup oil
1 medium onion, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, minced

Saute together until onions are transparent. Stir in:

2 1/2 cups tomato sauce
1/4 cup water
1 cup brown sugar
1 tbsp. molasses
1/2 cup salad mustard
1 1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. allspice
1 tbsp. crushed red pepper or 3/4 tsp. cayenne pepper
1 1/2 tsp dried parsley or 1 tbsp. fresh parsley

Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for about 1 hour.

Add the following ingredients and simmer 10-15 minutes more:

1/2 cup lemon juice
2 tbsp. soy sauce

Now put it all together. Lay the marinated tofu (no sauce yet!) out on a cookie sheet which has been spread with 1/4 cup oil. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes or until the bottoms are browned. Then turn the pieces and bake about 25 more minutes, or until the other sides are browned. Pour Barbecue Sauce over all the pieces and bake 15 more minutes.

Serve and enjoy!

Aug. 27, 2007 - In the News

School starts today (finally), which means our three will each get up, each want a different breakfast and a different lunch. I invited them all to let me know what he or she wanted to eat on the first day back. You'd think that would be a good thing, but I know better. No matter what I make, I can be sure that they all will complain that another's meal is better than theirs.

Here are this week's finds:

The BBQ Blog: This is the blog of The BBQ Guy, aka Brian Pearcy, a competitive barbecuer and prolific writer about the art of barbecuing. It's a robust, full-service site for recipes, grilling techniques, advice on how and where to shop for supplies. If you want a peek inside the world of bbq contests, this is a good place to get it. My biggest "aha!" moment was this post, which suggests that even cooking contests haven't escaped the taint of cheating.

Tummy Treasure: I thought you'd enjoy a break from the hot stuff for a change. Tummy Treasure came to my attention while looking for some good comfort-food recipes. Not only did I find them in abundance here, but there are also several back-to-school ideas that I liked. The blogger is Erika Seymour, a 251-year-old (that's what it said in her profile until I pointed it out and she changed it!) stay-at-home mom in Wisconsin. Erika's site is dedicated to food and family, which matches up very well with my own philosophy. Recent posts involve finding uses for the summer harvest of pears. The true treasures are found in her Recipe Trove. I'm a sucker for pies, and she has several mouth-watering options, my favorite being the Cranberry Pecan Pie.

And now, the news...

Here's a new use for barbecue sauce I bet you hadn't thought of. This article in The Christian Science Monitor suggests it just might save that photo shoot.

Maybe we should call it the anti-hot sauce. As a public service to you readers, here's a suggestion on how to use soy sauce as a burn remedy.

Unusual recipe of the week: The Osama Bin Laden cocktail. It calls for a little Tabasco, dashed into a shot of absinthe, which is only slightly easier to find than Osama himself.

Have a great week everyone!

More Fun

If you've never visited James Lileks' very amusing site, do yourself a favor and go there. And when you do, make sure you check out the Gallery of Regrettable Food, a collection of cookbook illustrations and recipes from the 1950s. Of particular interest to this blogger and its readers would be The Hungry Man's Outdoor Grill Cookbook and Bar-B-Tricks, which promises to make you a "Cookout Champion."

Enjoy!

Aug. 20, 2007 - In the News...

Since starting this blog and scouting through the news feeds for interesting information about bbq and hot sauce, a couple of things have become blatantly obvious. First, if your organization wants to raise money, host a charity barbecue. Second, if you're a politician looking for votes, show up at a charity barbecue.

Here are this week's finds:

The Chef From Hell - I'm window shopping in the blogosphere trying to find a homemade hot sauce recipe to share with the Barbecue Bachelor, when I discover The Chef From Hell's recipe blog. He's got a post about his Hell Sauce. It wasn't exactly what I was looking for, but was just too good to pass up. The inclusion of the coffee was what hooked me. Hell Chef's real name is J.P. Gelinas and he's the real deal. A New Englander by birth who's been all over the place and now is a restaurateur in New York.

Majik Zombi's Barbecue Voodoo - This was a site I first came across early last week. Run by an Oregonian who's a self-described "practitioner of Barbecue Voodoo... An alchemist's list of recipes. A shaman with seasoning. The sorcerer of sauces. It's the voodoo that I do when I barbecue." Probably should have pointed to it earlier, but a recent recipe posting for his Voodoo Chili, complete with a little Jim Beam, made me realize my responsibility to share it with you.

And now, the news...

If you eat barbecue that comes out of a can, you probably deserve this. Castleberry's, a food processor in Georgia, has issued a product recall on several of its products, including canned pork in barbecue sauce and hot dog chili sauce. Seems traces of botulism have showed up in some of the cans.

Is there anything hot sauce can't do? Here's a post from a blog called First Impressions that talks about using hot sauce or peppers for organic pest control.

Unusual recipe of the week: Bar-B-Q'd Armadillo. This comes courtesy of the Backwoods Bound site. I lived in Texas for five years and never saw a live armadillo. But I must have seen thousands of dead ones. Texans like to place bottles of Lone Star Beer next to the road-kill 'dillos. Never figured out why. If you know, leave a comment.

Blog Spotlight - Barbecue Bachelor

I just found a kindred spirit out there who runs the Barbecue Bachelor blog. Absolutely worth some time out of your day to check it out. Several good cooking tips, including some tasty posts about smoking your own pastrami, making tandoori chicken and grilling apricots and peaches for an a la mode dessert. Not all the posts include recipes, but even those that don't include the Bachelor's photos of his latest projects that leave your mouth watering.

A good place to go when you're looking for something just a little different to cook on your grill.