Although the image above is not bacon, it is a bacon encrusted brisket. Little brother Phillip threw down in the Bacon Takedown during SXSW this year at Emo’s and did up some “BBQ Brisket Birthday Beans” that he concocted. While he didn’t win the contest, we met many of cool people including the hilarious dudes over at Taco Town who wound up being victorious with their Crack Tacos.

Taco Town and the Beans!

Phil told me a story about one customer who did make multiple trips back to his area requesting cup after cup of the beans. The customer asked which restarunt he represented and when he learned Phil was a home bbq-er , the cusotmer said he should open up shop.

Later the customer was heard hollering “You were robbed bald man! You were robbed!” during the awards ceremony while eating beans he had pilfered straight out of the main serving tray while no one was looking.

You’ll get em next year little bro. Maybe I’ll have to get my competition on… LDT!

Everything tastes better with bacon.

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COUSIN DAVE’S CHOCOLATE CHILI RIBS

This was an easy but super tasty recipe for baby back pork ribs. The “rub” was actually a type of paste that had ingredients such as chipotle peppers, ancho chile powder, cilantro, and an once of semisweet chocolate. That’s right ladies, I said it. Chocolate on your baby back pork ribs. All this was thrown into my little chopper along with onion garlic, lime zest, course salt and brown sugar to make a rub/marinade that I wanted to eat with tortilla chips as soon as I made it. It was like some freaky salsa someone might have entered in the Austin Salsa Festival.

Ribs marinated overnight and then went on to a 350 degree grill. They sat on the indirect side for just over an hour, bone side down. Then, I rotated them around for about 15 minutes. The last 5 minutes I flipped them meat side down to sear the sugar, and make a nice candy coating on the outside of the meat.

This recipe was fun and kind of a novelty with the chocolate in there. I don’t think I would change much about how I did them. The meat had the right consistency and the flavors in the paste really came on when grilled . I did go for high quality rib cuts and I believe it made the difference. I can’t wait to do this one again.

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Check in and set up went fairly smoothly except for being boxed in by a huge bus, forcing me to back the RV up through swarms of bikes and people to get to a clear path to our spot.

Wednesday and Thursday were smooth as silk except for the massive storm that rolled through Central Texas Thursday night. We wound up covering up the bikes and evacuating to the Expo center itself for fear of tornadoes and hail and so on.  I’m not going to compare our situation to any Katrina events but it was a taste of what it could have been like. Plus the real bummer was that the Robert Earl Keen concert got canceled. Next time then.

Friday, I actually rode the motorcycle out to a place called “Cindy’s Gone Hog Wild” out in Bastrop, TX with Abraham. It was biker joint out there but it was surprisingly clean and the folks were friendly. We were served by Cindy herself at the bar for lunch. I was pleasantly surprised that my bike wasn’t kicked over in the parking lot (i kid i kid!) when we headed out.

That night Linda and I met my family downtown for the dinner and biker parade. We were able to get a good table at Hickory Street Bar where we could see the festivities and the parade coming down Congress. After the parade we walked down to Casino El Camino for a damn good burger. I was aware the Robbie Knievel jumped some Budweiser trucks in front of the capitol building earlier that evening but I was eating ma burger! Here it is.

Saturday consisted of trying to stay cool while out at the Expo center and hanging out with Abraham’s riding group. We saw some vendors but no bikes as they had the inside areas closed off for cage fighting. We cooked up some fajitas and drank some new Mesquite Smoke beers from Shiner. I stayed in the RV that night, and offered the RV’s couch to a VMAX rider from Houston that had no place to go. We sat out for a good while that night drinking suds and trying loop bead strings onto various parts of trailers, 4wheelers, and people.

Sunday is pack up day, and we loaded up and headed out. All in all a great time again and can’t wait til next year.

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Smoked Brisket Number one

For Memorial Day I wanted to do something that would make our service men and women proud, so I decided to smoke my first brisket on my new Weber Smokey Mountain Cooker Smoker that Linda gave me for my birthday.

The rub was a simple course salt and cracked pepper rub. I wanted to try and replicate the Kreuz Market rub in Lockhart because it seemed simple enough and was always good. I did not use a mop sauce or anything like that while smoking the meat. The water pan had simple hot water in it, but I can use beer wine, cola, juice etc. to do some fancy flavors later on.

I smoked it unwrapped for 6 hours with the fat side down, making coals twice, and using water soaked hickory wood chips.

Overall I think it came out great for my first true smoked brisket. I had good beef flavor, some smoke flavor but not too much, and a nice smoke ring through out the cut. Lessons for next time include taking its temperature a little earlier for a more rare flavor, and cooking fat side up for a more juicy cut. The meat wasn’t dry but it wasn’t greasy as hell either. A mop sauce may be fun to try as well.

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Edward hanging with Tom Merrit, Natali Del Conte, of - CNET

I am a regular listener of CNET.com’s “podcast of indeterminate length” – Buzz Out Loud   and was excited to get to sit in on a taping of it at sxsw-interactive this year. When I finally found the room in which the podcast was supposed to be taped I walked into the room with only the “cast” of the podcast hanging out. I was a little confused thinking I had missed it or something else weird had happened, and indeed the taping got pushed back an hour or so. So I got to hang out with some my “internet heros” for a good while and talk one-on-one with them which was very cool. I’ve linked the episode that they wound up recording, which I attended, and their personal blogs and other podcasts if you are interested in anything tech.

Buzz Out Loud 930: Live from SXSW–day two

Tom Merrit, Natali Del Conte, Jason Howell - CNET

• Tom Merrit
• Natali Del Conte
• Jason Howell

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L & E Pumpkin Pie

Linda and I don’t go out on “Amateur Night” as my sister calls it. We go out the night before. I got flowers at work, she got flowers delivered to her home. We went to a swank little joint called  “Wink” on Lamar. She baked me this pie. We win.

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Merry Christmas Mother F***er!

Christmas 2008 yall. I know it’s late but its totally worth it.

Me and my brother did the trip across Texas thing in which we visit the folks out in Bourne and then trek our butts down to the valley. Everything was cool at Dads house and we were able see our new little half-nice.
As the travel situation unfolded we decided that we had to take two cars down to the Valley as Phil was staying a little later then I was because he wanted to hang until the new year which was cool. I tossed my walkie talkies in the car and we rolled it like a convoy down to the valley ,passing trucker talk that i hadn’t used since high school off like i was some sort of long hauler. “Hey baby bro we got a black and white taking polarid pictures of working folks in the hammer lane, better back it down 10 and let him get a good shot of these chrome rims spinning legal, cmon….” lol

We made it down to the valley without a hitch and the fun began. My folks had set up the 5th wheel travel trailer for all us kids to stay in during the weekend which was great. We didn’t blow any fuses and we didn’t need any cans of fake snow in case you were wondering. Christmas at our house consists of three things. Food, fireworks, and guns. All of which were used enmasse with pride. I think Jesus would have done the same thing at a birthday party if he was from around here.

Phil and I did another Beef tenderloin on the grill with a custom baste. We got crazy again and put it on early and got the sugar burn, but that’s not to say that there were any leftovers or anything. Everyone always likes the food that we throw down for the holidays and this was no exception. My mom aunts and sister and cousins cooked up everything else and we ate till we got teary eyed. (we like to drink wine and tell stories too ) Uncle Ron had an early flight to D.C. that morning and we toasted him. Aunt Anita busted out an awesome prayer form her convent days which I thought was awesome and it was all good.

My family loves fireworks and lots of them. Cousin Mike had some”special” fireworks from another country that were so loud I thought Poncho Villa was back. We shot fireworks and drank beers until we ran out. Friends came over from across the resaca and we had a good time.

A cooking pot after feeling the wrath of fireworks.

We rounded out the holiday with a trip to Mexico for the afternoon and even got some contraband Rum confiscated at he border! Even though it was made in Mexico it had the words “Cuba” on it so it went bye-bye.

Hope your holiday was as loud, deliciuos, and as fun as mine was.

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I made two full cans of hardwood charcoal and put them on top of charcoal that was in the pit already. I let that sit for a while and turned it over so i had a nice full bed of charcoals to work with. I oiled the grates as much as i could but I still had some sticky parts so I will watch that next time. With the bed of coals ready and the marinade cooking down to a baste the meat went on with my Dad saying “Mmm boy , I love cow tongue!”  (thanks Dad lol)

I knew I had to turn this meat over as if almost on a spit. I didn’t want to burn anything and I didn’t want it over cooked. The meat took about an hour and some too cook, turning and basting the whole time. I did have a little bit of suger-burn also. I also cooked with an open hatch because these coals require allot of 02 too keep going and I didn’t want them to go out. I wasn’t after a smoky flavor with this dish either.

The meat came off the grill and was allowed to stand for about 10 minutes. The strings were snipped off with a pair of scissors and pulled away. The length of the tenderloin was cut into medallions and set out for serving.

In the end, everyone seemed to enjoy it , my Dad got seconds so I guess I succeeded there. I may consider doing this one on a gas grill with a closed cover next time, possibly on a rotisserie. Also, I need to watch my cook time as it could have been pulled off a hair sooner.  I am looking forward to do doing this one again, and it was kind of cool to boast about being able to do a cut of meat like this on a coal pit.

Beef Tenderloin on the Grill

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From Wurstfest 2008

Wursfest is a sausage festival which happens in New Braunfels every fall. It started way back in 1961 when a bunch of crazy Germans got together and put on a demonstration of how they used to make sausage in the old country. The festival just grew from there. What goes along with sausage and other festival food than beer…and lots of it. So sausage, potato pancakes, whatever-you-can-think-of-on-a-stick, funnel cakes, fried everything, and sweets galore can be found in the main food hall and vendors in the park area. The main Dance Hall is a massive cotton gin filled with family crests from Germany. For a full week Landa park is filled with polka bands, lederhosen, and families taking it all in.

Whilst being at Wurstfest is one of my favorite things to do, the drive back to Austin is not. This year my sister and I went down to scope out an RV space that we could park my folks 5th wheel at close to festival and camp out at, rather than run the the IH-35 gauntlet. We found an awesome spot called Camp Huaco Springs where the spaces were large and clean, the scenery was beautiful, and the folks were friendly.

That Friday I drove down to hook up to the RV and pulled it the few miles form storage down River Road to the camp site. Set up was quick and easy, which as I have discovered with RV-ing, takes practice. Linda drove down from Austin later on that night and met me at the spot. I put on some Texas country music and cooked some burgers on an outdoor grill and we enjoyed a quiet night on the river, except for some kids that extended their slide out and broke a water pipe, which was quickly fixed by the on-site maintenance person.

The next morning friends arrived at our camp site to meet up with us before heading down to the festival. We walked along the trail that followed the river and took photos of the scenery before heading down to the park.

Amanda met up with us at the festival a little later on and we commenced to try and do as much damage as we could. We luckily got a table inside the main hall thanks to our friend Mike. Food that was acquired included the famous 5 kinds of sausage on a stick, fried olives, pork ribs on-a-stick (which were absurdly tasty), potato pancakes (which you must wait almost an hour for but totally worth it), and fried pickles; a favorite of Abraham’s. We started off drinking Spaten Pilsner , but just went straight to the Dunkel after that. Next year I’m not pansying around with beer you can see through, the darker the better for this crew.

We ate and drank and danced until we had to call off the dogs. We heard polka music and watched professional cloggers. We danced the chicken dance about 10 times and started to wonder if it was scheduled, as in “Chicken Dance on the eights, every hour”. Amanda learned how to dance a polka and waltz, and we did our best to keep up with Cotton Eyed Joe.

At the end of the night we bid farewell to our friends, and Amanda carted us back to the campsite. Hilariously enough we actually stopped at a river bar on the way back but they were charging a 10 dollar cover like they had Robert Earl in there or something so we took a pass, and opted for our Shiner summer brew we had in the cooler back at the RV.

So if you ever go out drinking with us and we get a little crazy and give out a big German style “Ticky Tacky Ticky Tacky, Oy Oy Oy!” all you have to remember is: “Prost!”

For us that day: In New Braunfels ist das leben schoen! (In New Braunfels, living is good!). See you there next year!

Enjoy the photos!

• My gallery
• Abraham’s gallery (includes photos that Amanda took!)

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Maker Faire is an event in which amateur and professional engineers, hobbyists, artists and so forth get together and a huge “Look what I made” type show and tell festival We attended Maker Faire 2008 out at the Expo center two weeks ago with friends Seth and Amy and saw some really cool things out there. We saw battle bots, a trebuchet competition, electronics and LED lights everywhere.
The car that had 100 singing billy bass fishes wired together was quite a site. There were all sorts of electronics including a pair of glasses that made your brain give you your own personal show. It was like a screensaver right inside your head. Arts and crafts people were everywhere including people that made clothes, welders, and other craftsmen. At one booth Yahoo had their purple bikes out which folks ride around the area. A camera and computer mounted on the bike take random photos and upload them to Flikr on the fly. I don’t know if we are in any of them but you can see some of the craziness that was going on.  If Maker Faire is going to be in your area I highly suggest checking it out one time. Learn more about Maker Fair at makerfaire.com and enjoy the pics!

Pictures I took:
http://picasaweb.google.com/spaceghost65/MakerFaire2008#

Yahoo Flikr Pool:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/makerfaire/

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