Comments on: Thanksgiving throwdown: smoke vs. grill

By: Holiday round-up: Happy Cranksgiving! : Historiann : History and sexual politics, 1492 to the present

Wed, 23 Nov 2011 13:52:40 +0000

[...] November 26, 2010: Thanksgiving throwdown: smoke vs. grill [...]

By: Indyanna

Indyanna — Sat, 27 Nov 2010 02:06:02 +0000

Historiann, this is reminding me that in 1999 I finally got to Detroit, and Tiger Stadium, the year they were tearing it down. And it was the only baseball venue I ever heard of where you could enjoy a game while ripping away at a *hot* turkey drumstick, foil-wrapped, and bought at the concession stand! The only thing was, you couldn’t wash it down with a cold Vernors Ale, not for anything, not even if you threw a fit at the concession stand–which I did. The owner was a Pepsi guy and he had an exclusive “pouring” deal with Pepsi and as far as he was concerned, Vernors was sooooo Toledo, they said. Ty Cobb (who made most of his money investing in Coke in his native Atlanta) was probably spinning in his grave. Anyway, for whatever any of that is worth. And to all a good night!

By: Historiann

Historiann — Sat, 27 Nov 2010 00:37:53 +0000

Heh. Good point, Dr. V.

(I don’t think I’d want to eat a cold smoked turkey.)

By: Dr. Virago

Dr. Virago — Sat, 27 Nov 2010 00:10:06 +0000

And there’s a reason smoked fish comes from northern lands – it’s *cold* smoked.

By: Historiann

Historiann — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 19:48:30 +0000

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Unfortunately, I wasn’t up for pie with my black coffee this morning, and appear to be suffering acutely from a food hangover. (It didn’t feel like I was eating too much at the time!) It’s nearly 1 p.m., and I still haven’t taken any solid food yet.

I guess I’ve developed an Old Lady metabolism already.

By: Notorious Ph.D.

Notorious Ph.D. — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 19:36:02 +0000

I woke up still full. But not too full for leftover pumpkin pie and black coffee for breakfast.

By: koshem Bos

koshem Bos — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 19:17:33 +0000

Did some cooking but had to stay home due my nasty old chronic enemy.

My innovations this year are: shredded butternut squash/carrot balls in fire roasted tomato sauce and peas/edamame pancakes.

My youngest son smoked the turkey. Past experience was great.

By: Comrade PhysioProf

Comrade PhysioProf — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 17:54:34 +0000

But Fratguy and Geoff were undeterred–they(respectively) smoked and grilled two 12 or 13-pound turkeys yesterday, and both were delicious. On my morning run, I saw another family deep-frying a turkey in their driveway. Parts of our town smelled smoky, although I don’t know if that was due to other grilling or smoking turkeys, or just fireplaces.

It’s the smell of testosterone.

By: Indyanna

Indyanna — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 17:44:10 +0000

Several years back, while house-sitting and emptying a house whose oven had become essentially disfunctional, I smoked a turkey outdoors by literally and heavily encasing it in foil, with some other ingredients, and putting it on top of a fire-pile down the woods that had been used for nearly fifty years to burn and dispose of all manner of (hopefully) non-toxic refuse. (Archaeologists someday will call it a “midden”). The project took forever; began in mid-afternoon and went on well past dark. It was cold out there too, although probably not 27-degrees. I remember digging into it and pronouncing what a good fella am I, although perhaps more for the creativity than for the cuisinarity part.

My Thanksgiving this year was displaced two days forward, to tomorrow, by an ice storm in the back country, when I decided that I really didn’t want to try for an Ang Lee reenactment at this point in time.

Out West-back-here-in-the-East, alas, “fracking” doesn’t do service anymore as a polite substitute for its root word, not since the Marcellus Shale trilobites have been muscling in on the deer hunt. Anything left in that keg, and how did that part go?