Ballad of the $3.67 top sirloin steak or Holy Molé!

[addicted-to-smoke]

EVENTS OCCUR IN MORE OR LESS REAL TIME. _{As far as you know.}

This here all started last night when the grocery store had the audacity to display small cuts of lean looking beef, as yet uncooked, near the entrance. Did they know I'm mainly cooking for one this week, and that I haven't tackled steak on the grill in a very, very long time?




I'm not good with recipes. I can follow them but it just often doesn't work out like it should. A good cook can adjust, adapt, zig and zag. Where an idiot savant's (at best!) course aligns with a professional's is in the gut reaction, that zone where experience and luck become the same thing.

So most of what I can do occurs when I have nothing else to lose, but this isn't really desperation, just the knowledge that my car key will take me to McDonalds if it all goes Horribly Wrong.

My philosophical camp lies with leftovers and reuse and with "Hey! Watch This" combinations. I won't claim it frequently works out. My wife, who doesn't enjoy cooking and rarely does it, inherited the gene from her mom that allows her to peer into the abyss of our pantry, filled with stuff that appears useful for nothing (I never seem to have what The Recipe calls for) and in 30 minutes to an hour tasty food appears.

I've watched her but I don't think her hands actually move. I get a little spooked.

Lately my method is to do a 3 minute Internet search related to what I want to cook and then I take the gist of that, forget 40% of what I didn't read and light the motherfuckin' coals. My wife as observed this behavior over the winter when cooking stuff indoors and knows I don't cook the same dish twice because I don't know how to do so.

Bewilders the kids, who invariably ask, "Is this the [chicken] [chili] [fish] [etc.] we had last time?"

OK here we go. "Make sure you pay attention carefully because you wouldn't want to screw this up." << I crack myself up.

Beef trimmed of fat and cut into small chunks. Leftover rub from pork butt applied.



Some small, leftover peppers:



Cut, placed into bowl, slathered in olive oil and seasoned:



Despite possibly having just ruined the peppers with an Untested Procedure, I'm not getting a good vibe from the beef. It must be Fundamentally Changed. I felt that rub, my first ever made, was a bit strong at times on the pork and pork has a natural ability to sweeten, that beef doesn't. What to do?

Oh, NO, I have seen in the pantry That Which Cannot Be Unseen. This 'lil project began sanely but just became Something Weird and it's time for Wonka's train to leave the tracks.

addicted-to-smoke's Fake Molé Sauce, or ATSFMS for short _*cough*, invented on the fly. That's 3 "knifefulls" of peanut butter but I wound up using 3 times as much ketchup as you see here, about 3-4 tablespoons at least. I could have researched how to make, where and when to apply molé sauce but would have only harshed by buzz. So to speak.



Representative color comparison of peanut butter to ATSFMS:



Still worried about beef, I very lightly rinsed it. Plenty of spice still on.



And with the ATSFMS appliqué:



We now pause for station identification and bring you today's lunch, leftover boston butt tacos:


Late start to everything today, beginning with waking up. Even the tacos were at 3:30. I'm determined to get a few lawn bags filled with old brush so I'm off to do that. It'll be a late but pretty quick cook on the kettle tonight.

[1buckie]

   Nice !!!!!!!

Goin' off the high dive, eh?

I think mole' has chocolate in it.....maybe squish up a Herhey bar or something?

[Chasing_smoke]

Looks interesting! Can't wait for finished picks!


"my kettle is more powerful it will do almost anything."

[addicted-to-smoke]

... I think mole' has chocolate in it.....maybe squish up a Herhey bar or something?

Why yes, it does! But peanut butter was all I could remember, and the ketchup was a part of the marinade I didn't use for the forgotten 40% of what I didn't read during my 3 minute research.

"I could have researched how to make, where and when to apply molé sauce but would have only harshed by buzz."

[1buckie]

... I think mole' has chocolate in it.....maybe squish up a Herhey bar or something?

Why yes, it does! But peanut butter was all I could remember, and the ketchup was a part of the marinade I didn't use for the forgotten 40% of what I didn't read during my 3 minute research.

"I could have researched how to make, where and when to apply molé sauce but would have only harshed by buzz."

That's all well & wonderful, but what's really got me......

...is I'm severely impressed with the fact your computer can get the accent grave' in the correct position over the letter............

Example:  "Fake Molé Sauce"'


Do I need to do something to then step into the 21st century?


Later, after this is done, I'll tell you a tale of Caramel Apple Dip......

[addicted-to-smoke]

handful of leftover briquets
handful of lump
barely covering the cone in the large chimney



While waiting, I had a few tiny pieces of seasoned beef too small to cook on the grill. Let's dry them out by making Emergency Fake Jerky.

I dumped the beef into the remaining olive oil seasoning sitting in the cereal bowl from earlier and subjected it to 2 minutes in the microwave. Beef had interesting flavor, very dry and like jerky chinks that weren't as salty. (no pic taken)

Ready to cook. What they don't tell you when they suggest to soak wooden skewers (to prevent them from burning) is that they become almost like wet noodles. Bastages! Turned out I had just the right ratio of peppers to beef.




Lid on Smokey Joe, vents open, cooked for almost 8 minutes and then turned. Despite the direct heat the temp was low; coals barely -- if that -- covered the bottom of the 'Joe. Never anything more than faint wisps of smoke:




After turning, lid back on for another .. eh let's say it was 5 minutes. And done!



This was the most amazingly tender beef I can recall eating. It was just as juicy and succulent as it appears here. I threw some leftover rice on the dish with broccoli but who cares about that.

FYI in case the initial beef pic isn't clear, this was sold as .92lb of meat. After fat trimmed off maybe more like .7lb of meat for 3 skewers.

[addicted-to-smoke]

... I'm severely impressed with the fact your computer can get the accent grave' in the correct position over the letter............

Example:  "Fake Molé Sauce"'

Do I need to do something to then step into the 21st century? ...

For MacOS hold down the Option key and hit the "e" key. Let go of Option and hit "e" a second time.
For Windows, [I don't know how.]

[MacEggs]

Wow, everything looks delicious!! Nicely done! 

... I'm severely impressed with the fact your computer can get the accent grave' in the correct position over the letter............

Example:  "Fake Molé Sauce"'

Do I need to do something to then step into the 21st century? ...

For MacOS hold down the Option key and hit the "e" key. Let go of Option and hit "e" a second time.
For Windows, [I don't know how.]

Seven years of French ... that's an accent aigu ..... just sayin'. 

[1buckie]

  "on the dish with broccoli but who cares about that."

.......be careful...there's some real live broccoli fans around here.....could be right on the edge of kickin' shins & peein' in the Cheerios......


Great skewered cookup....might be the vinegar in the mustard & ketchup that tenderizes the meat so well, or........."that zone where experience and luck become the same thing."

I occupy that space quite often......


"Seven years of French ... that's an accent aigu ..... just sayin'"
                                                   ~~~> MacEggs

I got my nomenclature from the back of Little Feat albums....the vynil ones......sorry....

[Chasing_smoke]

Nice work ATS! Looks awesome!


"my kettle is more powerful it will do almost anything."

[Tim in PA]

Haha, enjoyed your story!

[mike.stavlund]

¡Olé!  (thanks for the MacOS tip)