Never heard of Prague powder so I just looked it up. Now I know why. It's for curing meats like sausage, which I've never got into doing myself. If wet brining I would stick with salt, sugar, and a seasoning you are going for. I like to add cinnamon sticks to my chicken brine along with bay leaves

I use Prague powder when I make bacon. But that's curing. And you need to make an effort to wash it off afterwards, as it's toxic.

Yeah, if I'm not curing I don't think I would use that.

You definitely want to dry brine a pork shoulder. 1/2 teaspoon salt per pound. Rub that on a trimmed pork shoulder about 12-24 hours before smoking. Just before placing on smoker apply your rub (sans salt)

As for turkey ive done a wet brine. Although they say a dry brine is just as good and easier.

Definitely spatchcock the bird though. Will cook more evenly and quicker.

Wtf is this? A box around an item so you don't steal it? I've never seen this, you have to be putting us on.

We're not in that big of a town (100k) and our walmart had $5.6 million in inventory shrinkage (aka shoplifting/theft) last year. That's crazy to me.

They are keeping the Spam from being stolen.

At the same time, It's actually great marketing; I had no idea there were different flavors. Made me look.

So….. I’ve seen this sprinkled here and there.. but can people provide input on what spice rub they use the most or uniquely flavorful?

I’m running out of the super cheap Costco Traegar Garilc/Chilu rub I bought long ago and looking to try something new.

I’ve seen some use vinegar based rubs.. sounds like different profile.

Throw me what you got… or if you have a website/brand you suggest to look into that is unique (not major name brand) let me know.

Eventually, I’ll make my own blend, but it’s nice sometimes to just buy some.

I tend to use Meat Church rubs (usually Gospel or Holy Gospel)
I'll make a dalmation rub for smaller cuts (e.g. chuck roast) but kids don't like it as much as the sugary rubs
Speaking of sugar, I've also followed the rub recipe for a Flame Tree (Disney World) copy cat found here: https://insidethemagic.net/2020/05/disney-recipe-flame-tree-barbecue-kc1/

Everybody is out there selling their rubs and every youtube channel is being paid to promote some rub.

"I don't grill anything without xxxxx" and then 6 months latter "Guys, you know everything needs yyyyyy before grillin" depending on who is paying them now.

But, there are no new spices; everything has been around for 1000 years.

Find the closest ethnic store in your area, and stock up on some FRESH spices - then make your own, much better, rubs.

Look at the ingredients you are paying $15 a jar for, and just make it yourself

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Black pepper only keeps it flavor for about 3 days after grinding, so don't grind more (use your coffee grinder if you need a bunch) than you need.

Never use that gray dust in a can!!!

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Monosodium Glutamate, that you see in most rubs is just the MSG chemical that every restaurant claims not to use

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But if you want to make an exact clone of some rub, they sell MSG.

Make sure you inform your guest that you are using it, because a lot of people get headaches or heart palpitations from it

Screenshot 2022-09-16 at 12-13-48 Amazon.com Badia Msg Seasoning 1.75 Pound (Pack of 6) Spices And Seasonings Grocery & Gourmet

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Get some medium and coarse grades of salt, depending on what you are using it on.

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Paprika is that smokey/sweet spice that is the main ingredient in almost every rub. A giant bag of it is ~$7 and since you use it all the time, you will save a fortune buying it in bulk.

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Dextrose is just a fancy name for sugar

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Most chicken rubs are based on dried Rosemary and Basil - totally classic flavors for chicken

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Dried garlic, onion powder, lemon zest, cinnamon sticks, cloves are all staples you should have already. Don't use any spices that you have had for more than 2 years. Write the date on the lid with a sharpie

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Turmeric is smokey peppery and has great color enhancing abilities, the main flavor of Lawrys seasoning salt. Thousands of members of the Herman Cain Club swear it prevents covid

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Cayenne pepper is good to just gently warm up any flavors

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Read your labels, make your own.

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Very informative and true. Those pre made spices cost me too much $$$ per ounce. Sadly, I gotta drive a long distance for a ethnic store with spices like your photo.

I’ll ask my Persian coworker to let me know where he goes. Great idea and should have thought of that!!

The journey will begin soon.

Look at the familiar $15 "Voodoo" BBQ spice rub:

Salt - you got that at home
sugar - got that
brown sugar - nothing exotic there
paprika - every rub uses it
dehydrated garlic - you already have that AKA Garlic Powder
dehydrated jalapeño - common jalapeno powder
monosodium glutamate - the much hated MSG
dehydrated onion - you have that already AKA Onion Powder

Do you really need to buy this?

Won't your friends be more impressed when they ask what you use and you say 'I just mix up my own rub.' ?

How about the $16 "holy" rub:

Sugar - yep
salt - got that
paprika - it's in every rub
dextrose - corn sugar
dehydrated garlic - Garlic Powder
celery - Celery Powder
silicon dioxide - sand

I mean, really guys; if you cant mix this up yourself, it's time to turn in your pitmaster card

I cannot speak for everyone, but in my case seems I have to drive close to 2-3 hours to the nearest ethnic spice center.

But I was just lazy to do so as well. Yes, once I get the chance to buy bull, it makes since to make it myself.

Buying spices is not that cheap at big chain stores.

Or the beloved $13 "bone sucker" rub:

Brown Sugar
Salt
Chili Pepper- you already have Chili Powder
Sugar
Paprika - always
Dehydrated Onion - onion powder
Garlic - garlic powder
Bell Pepper - red bell pepper powder, they have it at wallmart
Mustard Seed - you got this
Celery Seed

Other than the red bell pepper powder, you have every single ingredient already in your kitchen
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Look for "Asian grocery", "Indian grocery", "Pakistani grocery"

Wherever a city is with lots of engineers, that is your ground zero

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Looks like walmart has some almost one pound bags of Paprika in bulk for $9.99

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Rani-Paprika-Deggi-Mirch-Spice-Powder-Ground-14oz-400g-Gluten-Friendly/972256371

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One pound Turmeric $13

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Rani-Turmeric-Haldi-Root-Powder-Spice-High-Curcumin-Content-16oz-454g-1lb-All-Natural-100-Pure-Salt-Free-Vegan-Gluten-Friendly-Ingredients-NON-GMO-In/687072090

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and 5lb of pepper corns for $18

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Whole-Black-Peppercorns-by-It-s-Delish-5-lbs/196934647

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That's your holy trinity right there, no need to drive anywhere

Best Buy has the Bella stainless steel meat slicer on clearance for $25 (reg $100)

Good for slicing your own pit beef and fresh pepperoni

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/bella-pro-series-meat-slicer-stainless-steel/6464750.p?skuId=6464750

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sand ?

Reviews are less than stellar, but $25 ain't too bad!

Yep, keeps the spice powders from caking together at the bottom.

I would not bother to add it to my homemade version

Here’s my go to rub for pork
Memphis dust
Amazingribs.com

Ingredients
▢ ¾ cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
▢ ¾ cup white sugar
▢ ½ cup American paprika
▢ ¼ cup garlic powder
▢ 2 tablespoons ground black pepper
▢ 2 tablespoons ground ginger powder
▢ 2 tablespoons onion powder
▢ 2 teaspoons rosemary powder

Use Smoked Paprika rather than reg paprika if you can. I've won chili contests with it!

Time for some Dirty Bird Bites
This pan will be in the fridge for an hour. Will post assembly photos

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No salt? I guess you use this on brined pork ?

Assemble with a half of strip of bacon on each piece of chicken cut in 1 inch squares. Add a pickle slice on each side chicken and wrap with bacon. I add Honey Hog rub to the outside of the bacon.

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Next you will need some dipping sauce for your Dirty Bird Bites...

1/4 cup of Soy Sauce
1/4 cup of Honey
3 heaping tablespoons brown sugar
2 tablespoons Sriracha Sauce
1 Tablespoon of Pineapple Juice

Place the ingredients in a Pyrex mixing bowl and combine and stir. Heat in microwave at 100% power for 2 to 3 minutes or until the sugar dissolves. Stir and allow mixture to cool before serving.

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I salt my meat separately, generally overnight. Then apply the rub right before putting on the smoker.

The salt is really the only that penetrates the meat. So better to get that on early.

Thanks…I made a version of these with what I had on hand to watch my NFL team lose today, but they were great and a win

Tried out the new cheap Pitboss smoker. Seems this one so far under reports the temp time to time. The thermometer reader screwed on the front lid sucks a**. Way off, or rather it’s reporting the accurate value at that location which is much different than reported on the grill.

Anyhow… my Dry rub Salmon took longer than expected to smoke about 3 hours. But boy Oh boy was it tasty.

Crisp too with moist meat inside. Perfectly cooked. Nice when execution was done right.

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The lid thermometers on grills are just a joke for your guests to look at .

I've got 4 grills and all of them are 100 degrees off, one way or another

The only one that's correct, had filled with water. So when I uncrimped it to let the water out, I spun the dial to the correct temp before recrimping

The cuisinart does not even show degrees...just Smoke, Grill and Sear - very helpful

Messing around on the Weber- Smoked a rack of spare ribs 3+ hours on the smoke, maybe an hour or so wrapped and another hour/maybe less with the sauce on residual heat. Came out great on the simple Weber…
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At least they embrace the idea they can't give an accurate temp. On the BGE if you calibrate the thermeter the dome temp will be higher than grate and at some point they cross paths.

I've ditched using a secondary thermoter on the grate so long ago. The people that talk about recipes on the BGE forum are giving dome temps anyway. If you BBQ enough you get a feel for how things are going when you lift the lid to spritz. You can see if things are cooking too fast or not. Same for when to pull and wrap and then pull for rest.

Here's one seasoning you can't make @ home fresh.

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5 different sugars

Ingredients
Sugar, Brown Sugar, Enriched Flour (Wheat Flour, Niacin, Reduced Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Cocoa (Processed With Alkali), Nonfat Dry Milk, Silicon Dioxide (To Prevent Caking), Natural Flavors, Whey Powder, Salt, Malt Syrup, Molasses, Honey.

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Tons of people on this and other bbq forums are saying that they cooked these $9.99 briskets and they were tough.

The manager of our local store had 3 of these that someone abandoned in their cart. They can't put them back on the shelves, so she gave them to me to experiment with.

The first problem is obviously that if you follow the directions, these **briskets** will be horribly undercooked. 160*f makes it safe to eat, but way far from done. It's like the designer of the packaging looked on the back of their meat thermometer and said "Hmmm Beef...160*F...got it"

The second problem is that they have no fat cap. I could not tell if they were the Point or the Flat of the brisket (or if they were even a brisket at all)

They come pre seasoned with salt and pepper, but only about 20 flakes of pepper on each side.

Looks like Morton's doesn't know how to properly smoke a brisket.

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I rinsed off all the **pre seasoning** in the sink, patted it dry, and properly re-seasoned them.

I did a light mustard rub, then a ton of Paprika, freshly ground black pepper, garlic powder, and a little kosher salt (I did not want to over do the salt since it was pre seasoned)

I covered them with plastic wrap and put in the fridge overnight.

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Fired up the smoker with 100% Hickory pellets and a temp of 225*F

Each brisket got a little pan of pickle juice to hydrate (these were so tiny, I really worried they would dry out), and catch any drippings (again, with no fat cap, I had no idea if drippings would be a thing)

I pulled them for wrapping when the internal temp hit 155*F (normally I'd wait until 165*F, but again, worried about drying out. Took a couple of hours to hit temp.

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When they hit 155*F, I wrapped them in butcher paper brushed with bacon drippings.

They did not have enough fat to turn jet black, but they did not look too bad.

Now they were cooked in a pan @ 250*F

It took 5 hours to hit an internal temp of 205*F

I wrapped them in foil, then wrapped in a beach towel and put them in a cooler to rest for ~4 hours

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Murder Hornet supervised the resting process

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So when I sliced them up, I discovered that these were the Point of the brisket! The tiniest Points I'd ever seen. Must have been from baby cows or something.

For some reason, the smoke ring only formed on one side of each. Not necessarily the top or bottom while smoking. Can't think of any reason this would be; any ideas?

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The slices had good sag and were reasonably juicy.

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Certainly not as good as a real packers brisket, but everybody love it. There were no leftovers at all .

Smoked a pan of a baked beans alongside the briskets.

Two cans of beans and 1 lb of partially fried bacon, generous sprinkling of freshly cracked pepper

After a couple hours it has cooked down and thickens nicely

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Didn't get done until 5am so I didnt get a pic but smoked some pork butt yesterday. Haven't done a lot of smoking so it was the first time trying that specifically. Turned out great!

My parents neighbour just dropped these off, smoked "european whitefish" and salmon. Very tasty!

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Did a classic pork butt today on the medium BGE. Turned out very tender and juicy.

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I am looking for a good probe thermometer can someone point me to a decent one? Any good wireless ones?

ThermoWorks.

https://www.thermoworks.com/

Thanks, I cannot get the actual product you might have suggested to load and they look to have a few different models.

Was just supposed to be a link to there website.
Yeah they have a bunch of options.
There stuff is great.
I tried updating the link. I think a pop up coupon was the problem in the first one.

Thermapen is the way to go!

https://www.thermoworks.com/shop/products/thermapens/