A couple of you asked if it was possible to roast a fattie in the oven if you didn’t have a smoker. Mr. B says you sure can. It’s basically a bacon wrapped meatloaf. A relatively cool oven (300 – 325 degrees – so you don’t immolate the bacon), cook it on a rack (that bacon fat needs to drain), and I’d also suggest a meat thermometer. Just so you know when its internal temperature is safe.
It won’t be quite the same as smoked, but still pretty darn tasty.
I’m thinking I want to do a beef one stuffed with cheese and wrapped in bacon. Basically a bacon double cheese burger fattie. Hello!
Mr. B is really getting into this whole smoking meat thing. Today’s project was something called ‘smoking a fattie.” Smoking a fattie means something very different from smoked meat in our neighbourhood, but I was willing to follow along. What you do is take some sausage meat, flatten it out into a square about 1/2 inch thick.
Cover it in whatever sorts of yummies you like. This is two kinds of cheese, red & green pepper sticks, and finely chopped jalapeño peppers. You then take a pound of bacon and create a bacon weave. Yes really, a bacon weave.
Now, roll up your sausage meat into a tube and place on the bacon weave. Roll the sausage tube up in the bacon and you’ll have something that looks like this:
Coke can for scale. So, you have a pound of bacon, a pound of sausage, close to a pound of cheese & such for filling. Burp.
Now, into the smoker. 1.5 hours with hickory smoke, .75 hours with apple smoke. Then you get this:
Then this:
Pretty darn tasty, I tell you what. In addition to crazy experiments in meat, I also finished a nice new scarf.
I love autumn more than any other season. All those reds and golds and purples just make my little head swoon. This gorgeous piece of fall art is happening right outside my window at work.
I like to stare at it while I’m taking calls from people who are much more affected by the full moon than most. If you know what I mean, and I think you do.
Even riding home on the bus affords me the opportunity to see lovely visions of the season.
Then the inevitable happened and all those falling leaves made me think of this.
Then I giggle & snort and people move away and let me have two seats all by myself! Win/win.
A few other things I saw recently that I haven’t shared with you. I saw an actual protest. What? I’ve led a very sheltered life out here in the suburbs. The only thing that I ever remember being protested in Surrey is when they brought in Sunday shopping back in the early 80′s. Boy, those were some turbulent times!
Lastly, I’d like to talk about fashion choices. No, no, not the whole tights =/= pants issue. This is about boys who think they are all gangsta tough and erm… somewhat fashion forward? Okay, I’m not being clear. I’m talking about little dork thug life guys and their bejewelled/bedazzled/laméd outfits. You know what I’m talking about. You’ve seen them in the mall, shuffling along the street to some internal beat, (actually, not so internal as their iPods are usually cranked & deafening all those around them), quite often with a girl of questionable repute and at least one baby in a stroller. Should we be blaming Ed Hardy? Perhaps, perhaps.
‘Cause I gotta tell you, when I see someone dressed in these clothes, which no doubt are not cheap, hitting up people at the bus loop for cash, I’m a tidge annoyed.
Those pockets on his jeans? Yeah, huge flaps with rhinestones and silver stitching. When he walked, they sort of waved and shimmered at everyone behind him. For the love of all that’s holy, have some self-respect man! It’s not that you’re asking strangers for money, it’s that you look like some sort of Jersey Shore reject while you’re doing it.
Phew, apparently I needed to get that off my chest! Snort.
Yeah, that sounded ridiculous even as I was typing it. But Monday is not all powerful. There are forces at work that are fighting the evil that is Monday. Some of those are:
In three weeks I’ll be on vacation. A real vacation, in a cabin at the beach and everything! I’ve never been on vacation before. Squee!
I’m reading a VERY funny book right now, Skippy Dies by Paul Murray. The benefits of a funny book? Being on the bus at 6:00 am and laughing so hard you snort. I like to think it boosts the morale of the other riders
Having the momma and the poppa over for Thanksgiving dinner and having WAY too much food. A turkey and a ham? Really? For four people? Burp. But wow, can my pop ever pack away the ham. He’ll be so happy I let you all know that.
Waking up on a weekend morning an there is a lone shoe in front of your house. Actually, turns out, there was a pair of them. Spaced perfectly apart like someone was running flat out and was just sucked up by aliens and left their shoes behind. Thoughts like these amuse me to no end.
Knowing that all you very cool and lovely people are out there just exuding your coolness into the world. Y’all rock!
Yesterday Beentsy the wonder cat died. She was 17+ years and had been with us for all but the first 1 or 2 days of those years. I bottle fed her and her 5 littermates when husband brought them home from his work one day back in 1993. Momma cat had been run over and the 6 little ones needed some serious loving. Being raised by humans made them a little different from other cats I’ve known. Beentsy like to play fetch, particularly with hair elastics. We’d lay in bed in our little house and ping them down the hallway and she’d go pelting off to get them and bring them back. Awesome fun. She also came when you whistled and would do just about anything for popcorn. We are so going to miss her.
The one missing her the most though seems to be Mo Cuirdh (front).
She’s 18, stone deaf, and seems very confused not to have her bunk mate around. Just keep walking up to us and meowing VERY loudly. Poor little thing.
So, everyone, go hug & cuddle your babies, furred & otherwise.
The house smells pretty good. Next weekend some of this roasted pumpkin will become pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving dinner. Yummo.
Last weekend we had a tonne of green tomatoes so Mr. B thought we should try to make some fried green tomatoes.
We had some oxheart tomatoes that just weren’t ripening. Bit of a cool down in the weather and they just seemed to stall on the vine.
1/2 inch slices of tomato, salt & let sit on a rack for 15 minutes to draw out some of the liquid. Finally, pat dry with paper towels and dredge in a flour/spice mixture. You can also do a flour/spice/corn meal mixture for a more textured crunch.
Then of course we had to try numerous things to dip those hot crispy tomato slices into. I liked plain old sour cream the best.
These were awesome. What a terrific way to use up those tomatoes that just aren’t going to ripen up. Mmmmmmmmm.
But Monday is not all powerful. There are forces at work that are fighting the evil that is Monday. Some of those are:
