Not that I am advocating the consumption of strong liquor, but…. I know that during the Holidays many of you like to entertain. Here are some great punch recipes, associated with my military background. These recipes were all pulled from the message board Army.ca

Artillery Punch
1 qt strong black tea
1 qt rye whiskey
1 bottle red wine
1 pint Jamaican dark rum
1/2 pint brandy
1 jigger benedictine herbal liqueur
1 pint orange juice
1/2 pint lemon juice

Combine all the ingredients in a large punch bowl with a block of ice. If found too dry, sugar syrup may be added. Decorate with twists of lemon peel.

and another..
Served by the Officer’s Mess of the Seaforth Highlanders of Canada:
ATHEL BROSE (loosely translated “nectar of the gods”

1 lb honey 2 1/2 c steel cut oats (NOT rolled)
2 c. water
1/2 gallon scotch

Mix all ingredients( but scotch), warm gently on low heat only until blended. Remove from heat, let cool and stir in scotch. Allow mixture to soak overnight w/ secure cover. Strain oat mixture from liquid and discard (or use for bread). Place liquid in glass jar and swirl (or roll) daily for 2-4 weeks.Several months if you can stand it ! Try not to open the container as you go to keep contaminants out.
The longer you wait the smoother it gets! Strain one last time and serve to all!

How about some “moose milk”?

Moose Milk
40oz Lambs Dark Rum
40oz Kahlua
40oz Vodka
4L Vanilla Ice Cream (the good creamy expensive kind)
4L eggnog

Mix all together, breaking up the ice cream a bit. Sprinkle nutmeg on top if you so desire. Stir occasionally as the ice cream starts to melt. Enjoy!

Bull’s Milk???

Both the Warrant Officers’ and Sergeants’ Mess and the Officers’ Mess of The Lincoln and Welland Regiment serve versions of “Bull’s Milk” or Moose Milk on New Year’s Day. There are at least two recipes:

Hot version. Heat slowly until warm:
• 80 oz Dark Rum
• 40 oz Brandy
• 40 oz Rye Whisky
• 12 qt Egg Nog

Cold version. May be kept cold by adding a block of ice after mixing:
• 120 oz White Rum
• 26 oz Brandy
• 26 oz Kahlua
• 3 or 4 gal Ice Cream (Chocolate, Vanilla or Neapolitan)
• 2 or 3 gal Milk or Egg Nog
• 1 qt Whipping Cream
• dash Vanilla Extract
• dash Nutmeg

Not so sure about this – not for the faint of heart:
“BOAT GAS”

What you need.

- 1 very big pail, or small garbage can ( clean ), or crock pot – and a ladle
- depending on the size of bucket used, buy about 4-5 frozen fruit punch mix – throw it in
- buy lemons, and limes, and strawberries etc and cut up and put in the bucket
- add about 1 bottle vodka, 1 bottle white rum, 2 bottles tequila ( basically whatever you want ) ( bottle generally 40 pounder)
- Stir up until the boat gas eats away at your ladle
- serve to a friend first and watch for negative effects. Usually let the “lab rat” sit for 5 minutes. If all checks out, go nuts. Enjoy the evening.

The fruit adds flavour, but also when all the booze is gone you can eat the alcoholic fruit, that way when your wife/girlfriend asks you if you actually ate anything healthy at the party ( or does that just happen to me? ) you can say “yes dear, i had fruit”

and finally…. “Windex”
“Windex” (later named “Prop Wash” by a rigged vote in the mess, damn those Air Force rotters … !)
- one part vodka
- one part white rum
- two parts Parfait D‘amour (a blue-coloured licquer by Marie Brizzard)
- dilute with Seven Up to suit your taste … while your taste buds are still functioning … (supposedly, 7Up is better than Sprite)
- makes a delightful, uniquely-coloured drink that will lift floor tiles (yup – I wouldn‘t make that one up) and will leave a mildly radioactive glow on your glassware (which we discovered at our wedding reception … )
- Theyd serve it to unsuspecting guests, and when they‘d ask about the blue colour we‘d explain that we‘d used Melita coffee filters and Windex … whereupon their faces would turn a shade of blue to match the drink!

Enjoy. I’m not responsible for you not drinking responsibly

Read more: http://www.skinnymoose.com/desertrat/2007/12/13/holiday-libations/#ixzz1gkewRfFg

Great video from TastyLicks BBQ Supply Co I have posted reviews on their great rubs in the past.

Anyway – a cool alternative to traditional roasting or deep-frying your turkey. Enjoy!

Spatchcock Turkey Video

I’d really like to thank Agate Publishing for tracking me down and asking me to review Rick Browne’s book on grilling – “1001 Best Grilling Recipes: Delicious, Easy-to-Make Recipes from Around the World”. In the grand scheme of things I’m a pretty small fish in the great big pond that is the World Wide Web and it’s always flattering when someone contacts me and asks me to do a review.

First things first – after looking through this book I have to say that if a person was an experienced griller, smoker or ‘Que guy – and that person could only have one book in their house to feed their passion – this would be the book I would recommend.

This book is a 2″ thick, no fluffy pictures, encyclopedia of all things grilling. Seriously. Browne leads off with a short chapter on grilling guidelines, and then jumps right in. My favorite chapters? There is a chapter on rubs. Another chapter on sauces. A sweet chapter full of wild game recipes. This is a recipe book, plain and simple. 700-plus pages of mouth-watering, lip-smacking roasted flesh goodness. Then a big chapter featuring desserts that might just cause you to weep. Caramel Strawberry Tortillas, Grilled Ice Cream Oranges, Rainbow Fudge Pudding Pie. Desserts I can guarantee that you have never heard of.

Meat galore. How about Red Dragon Ribs? Corned Beef with Apricots and Mustard Sauce. Barbecue Grilled Quail with Jalapeno Cherry Sauce.Grilled Vanilla Shrimp Toast. There’s not a corner of the globe you won’t visit, no type of meat goes unmentioned. OK – I never saw a yak recipe in there….

Oh, and if you insist on having sides in addition to meat and dessert, there’s a chapter for those as well. How does Citrus and Buttermilk Hushpuppies sound? Or what about Craisin-Apricot-Cheddar Rice? You get the picture.

Every single recipe in this book can be done on your grill. Honestly – can it get any better than that? I’ll say it again – this is the most comprehensive grilling cookbook I have ever seen. Rick Browne hits a home run with this effort. I’ll never need another grilling cookbook.

Sorry it has been awhile since I have posted. Have been waiting to try something different and finally, I have something to report. A week or two before Thanksgiving I had read in a newsletter (courtesy of Jeff from the SmokingMeatForums) about brining bone-in turkey breast and then smoking it. I must say that Jeff’s newsletters are awesome and I recommend subscribing! Here is the online version of the newsletter I mentioned: Newsletter – Smoked Turkey Breast.

So, following Jeff’s directions I brined the breast for approximately 24 hours in a solution based on 1 cup Kosher salt per gallon of water. I added some brown sugar and some Sagebrush Blend from the WildCheff.

After brining for a day I rubbed down with some canola oil and shook in a bag with some rub I had made up. Then it went into the smoker for about 4 hours at 225ish.

Almost done!

This turkey turned out awesome! Very juicy and great flavor. A couple of points – once the breast reached tem (165) I took off, foiled and wrapped it in towels for well over an hour. Also, I used no wood other than the briquettes and some hardwood lump I had here. I didn’t have any orange wood or apple or pecan, and I wanted the flavor to be delicate and I was worried mesquite or hickory might be too much.

One of my most biggest hits at work so far have been ABT’s. ABT stands for “Atomic Buffalo Turds” and no, I didn’t invent the name, nor can I take credit for inventing this awesome creation. ABT’s are essentially stuffed jalapenos, wrapped in bacon and smoked. I have seen different variations of stuffing, but the one I will describe here is most standard. Here’s what you’ll need – make in the quantities you want. You’ll want 10-12 good sized jalapenos, a package of cream cheese, the rub of your choice, a package of “Little Smokies” smoked sausages and a package of bacon. Oh, and some skewers or good wooden toothpicks.

I strongly recommend rubber gloves when handling the jalapenos, and maybe some safety glasses too. The first one I went to scoop squirted me right in the eye. Ouch! I keep my gloves on until the ABTs are assembled and ready to go. Wash the jalapenos, split lengthways and keep the halves together.

Take a spoon and scoop out the seeds and pulp from the middle of the jalapenos.

Sprinkle fairly liberally with your favorite rub. I like a sweet rub which offsets all of the other flavors nicely. For this batch I used BBQ Bomber generously sent to me to try by my good friend Obie over at ObieCue. I strongly recommend any of Obie’s products – any I have tried have been awesome!

Next I fill one half of each jalapeno with softened cream cheese, and the other half not-quite-full of cream cheese. In the less-full side, stick one of the Lil Smokie sausages. I went with the cheddar version, just to add another flavor into the mix.

Then you assemble the two halves and wrap with a piece of bacon. Skewer with a toothpick to hold it all together. Depending on they are holding, I may add anoth toothpick, perpendicular to the first one. I dust them once more with the rub, and they are ready to go on the smoker!

I usually do ABT’s when I am already smoking something else on the other rack. The latest batch smoked at 225ish for about 3 hours. I used hardwood lump, with some briquettes added, and a couple of packages of mesquite wood chips thrown on the coals. I have a ProQ “bullet type” smoker. Top damper is always wide open to let the smoke out, temperature is controlled via the bottom dampers. 225 seems to be my smoker’s “sweet spot” anyway, and that temperature, more or less, is where I do all of my smoking.

Take them off, let them cool a bit, and enjoy. These don’t microwave great (as leftovers at work) but they did OK.

A couple of weeks ago, I was rooting around in the freezer, trying to figure out what to experiment with next. Lo and behold, I found 2 small roasts of beef, nearly identical in size – maybe 2 or 3 pounds each. I didn’t know if they were chuck roasts, rump roasts, or whatever. I cruised the message boards (see list at right of page) trying to figure out how to do roast beef. Curiously, I found two schools of thought – take it to an internal temp of 150, and take it to a temp of 195. Since my journey so far has been all about tinkering and seeing what works – this would be great!

Each roast went into a baggie overnight, generously hit with Black Bart’s Brisket Rub, from Tastylick’s BBQ. Man, this was gonna be good!

I then put them into the smoker, along with a pastrami I was working on.

When the roasts got to an internal temp of 150, I took one off to let it rest, the other I wrapped in foil and put back on. After an hour or two, unwrapped Roast #1 and sliced it as thin as I could, with a knife.

The meat had an awesome flavor. Wasn’t falling-apart-tender, but was sliced thin enough to make a sandwich that went down real nice. Meanwhile, I had laid down for a nap and fallen asleep. I jumped up and ran to check the smoker. The other roast had hit a temp of 205! Uh oh! I took it off and let it rest, all wrapped up. That one turned out great as well. Not quite falling apart, but just barely able to slice because it was so tender. It was great as well. I don’t think the flavor was as good, but the meat was wicked tender. The flavor on the other roast was a bit better, but it wasn’t as tender. Regardless, I would call them both a success, but not sure what I will do next time!

The 205 roast all sliced up.

Well, you may recall that one of my first smoking projects was to try a pastrami. It came out pretty good, but I needed to improve. Utilizing my lessons learned, I set out to try it again.

Like before, I took a corned beef and soaked it over night in plain fresh water. As I the smoker was warming up for the project of the day (dueling roasts) I hit the corned beef, soon-to-be pastrami really heavy with coarse ground pepper and coriander. A lot of folks’ constructive criticism last time was to use more pepper, so I did.

In the smoker it went. I took it up to an internal temperature of 160 and then foiled it, with my goal to hit an internal temperature of 190-195. I laid down for a little nap, slept for an hour or so and hurried out to check the smoker. I was at an internal temp of 205! Eeeek.

I took the pastrami out, and left it wrapped for about 2 hours. I unwrapped it an “Voila”! It was darned near perfect!

It was awesome, and I made some sandwiches with Uncle Dougie’s Jalapeno Mustard, which is going to get it’s own post one of these days! Fantastic! I had some leftovers and the people at work loved the pastrami also.

I’ve been eying this. I think I’m gonna give it a whirl this weekend. Dang it looks good! A big thanks to Mark Whisante over at SmokinRub.com for letting me re-post his recipe. I’ll be sure and let you know how it turns out! ~DRR

“Living here in North Alabama (Huntsville) surrounded by great BBQ joints (Lawler’s, Whitt’s, Greenbrier, and Gibson’s) I know what it takes to make a great white BBQ sauce.

In some parts of the country people do not know what white BBQ sauce is. If you dont, PLEASE grill you some chicken and use this sauce to pour over it. It will make the chicken the best you have ever eaten.

Well here ya go:

3/4 cup Mayo
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/8 cup vinegar
1/4 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp of Wizzy’s Smokin BBQ rub
1/2 tsp black pepper

Wisk everything together and let sit in the fridge for 12-24 hours before using/tasting. You will need to allow all ingredients to mingle for the set hours above this will allow everything to mix. And if you dont, the sauce will taste awful. Recipe makes 1 cup of sauce, just enough for 1 dinner

Great on BBQ chicken, pork, and even hush puppies

If you are looking for this recipe, you are probably about to cook some chicken or pork either on the grill or smoker. PLEASE check out my BBQ rub its the BEST!!

Thanks
Mike Whisante
Owner – http://www.smokinrub.com “