Recent content by thirdeye

130° is probably my low end, and some people I smoke fish for like it closer to 150°. My sweet spot is between 135° and 140° and I keep an eye on the albumen as that is sort of a signal.

I smoke 3" strips of belly, scoring the fat cap and stuffing herbs in the slits.

Well, the trimming time gets shorter the more you do it. One time I weighted the scraps just to see... I can share one tip when bacon wrapping about anything... buy the thick cut, then cover with some clear wrap and pound them. This makes the slices sort of sticky and it wraps easier around...

That must have been a typo, oven temp when wrapping should have been 275°

I tend to use leftover pulled pork in tacos, burritos, enchiladas and the like. Mr's ~t~'s green chili uses coarse ground pork butt and often we'll add some small cubes of pork butt as well. The recipe is below, and the roasting of the meat with the seasonings on top really adds to the...

The "Chief's" were originally made by Luhr Jensen, the fishing lure company. And Outers had all kinds of gun supplies. One great feature with the Chief's is the heating element has exposed male prongs on the back of the unit... meaning the cord is not hard-wired, but it's replaceable. And so...

Oops, maybe not 😄.... I didn't consider USDA inspected, verses USDA graded. I jumped ahead to individual or custom exemptions. This brochure mentions a retail kitchen exemption too. https://www.fsis.usda.gov/sites/default/files/media_file/2021-02/Fed-Food-Inspect-Requirements.pdf That...

I didn't realize that ungraded beef (regardless of the source) could be sold in retail markets. In the States, meat processors can process non-graded beef but it's treated as an individual order for specific customers who usually buy a steer from a rancher and have it processed. A few years...

Welcome Aboard ! I've been smoking fish on Little and Big Chiefs since the mid-70's. Back in the day all box smokers burned chips, but when pellets became common I switched to them. The ones that are 100% flavor wood (no filler wood) are best and I use a handfull at a time and don't ever dump...

I usually buy the full slab and trim them down to a 9 or 10 bone St Louis rack. All of the trimmings get a salt, pepper, garlic and roasted in the oven, then into a stock pot. The end result is pork broth, and a pile of scraps with uber tender meat for snacking.

5 or 6 years ago during a remodel, I got in the habit of checking availability for items on the website for my Home Depot and Ace Hardware stores, then paying for them online. Sometimes, in less than 30 minutes I'll get a text message saying my order is at the service desk ready for pick-up.

My town has a new and large Ace, and in the last few years I've been to similar stores in Montana and northern Wyoming. They all have the BBQ department right up front and have a nice selection of cookers, charcoal, wood chunks, pellets, rubs and sauces.

Even their 80/20 ground pork is an excellent deal.

It's kind of long winded... but here is an excellent article about how beef pricing actually works, and a breakdown of where the money goes. https://cowboystatedaily.com/2026/10/03/how-much-beef-do-you-get-from-a-wyoming-cow-the-answer-is-in-the-cattle-math/

Several of my markets carry Prairie Fresh brand pork, and here is another example of what a good meat cutter can turn out when starting with a good product. Full cut pork steaks from the horn muscles (adjacent to the blade bone) all the way up to the money muscle (under the price tag). This had...