Grills and Barbeque: The Good One Open Range Smoker (Model 30-P)

Grills and Barbeque: The Good One Open Range Smoker (Model 30-P): "Chris Marks and his Three Little Pigs barbecue team are one of the top teams in competition barbecue (8 time grand champion of the America..."

Anytime is Barbecue Time in Canada

Canadian chef and author Ted Reader, who owns more than 100 barbecues, says about half of Canadians grill 12 months a year. He says when it's cold outside, the barbecue should be preheated five to 10 minutes longer than in the summer. Barbecue manufacturer Traeger Canada suggests adding 20 minutes of cooking time per pound for every five degrees below 45 F. If you're using a charcoal grill, you may need to add charcoal more often to keep the temperature constant. .Read more: http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/112665/20110215/anytime-is-barbecue-time-in-canada.htm#ixzz1EF9Iz8q4

Three Little Pig's All Natural Gluten Free BBQ Sauces and Seasonings - products and services from Three Little Pig's BBQ Sauces and Seasonings

Three Little Pig's All Natural Gluten Free BBQ Sauces and Seasonings - products and services from Three Little Pig's BBQ Sauces and Seasonings

Barbecue & Grilling 2011 Readers' Choice Awards

Earlier this year, About.com invited readers to nominate the best Barbecue & Grilling products. They have tallied up those nominations and found the top five nominees from the hundreds received in each category.

Ace of Hearts BBQ Specialties is proud to announce that The Good-One Smoker/Grill and the Three Little Pig’s BBQ Sauce and Three Little Pig’s BBQ Rubs have made the finals for the Best of the Best in the Country.  We have named the finalist in 5 out of the 6 Categories.  

Nominated Categories:

  Charcoal Grill: The Open Range Smoker/Grill

  Backyard Smoker: The Open Range Smoker/Grill

  Competition Smoker: The Chuck Wagon Smoker/Grill

  Barbecue Sauce: Three Little Pigs Competition

  Barbecue Rub: Three Little Pigs Championship rub/seasoning

  Please help up get the “Best” of the Best by voting for the above.

Click here to vote.

http://bbq.about.com/od/organization/ss/Barbecue-And-Grilling-2011-Readers-Choice-Awards.htm

4 Ways to Make Money with Your BBQ Trailer

If you own a BBQ trailer, you know the financial investment required for the privilege of owning such a delicious piece of equipment. It seems like a shame to fire up trailer only on special occasions. Instead of letting the dust settle on your BBQ trailer, why not put it to work! These four moneymaking ideas for BBQ trailer owners can help get you started.

Catering: Good Profit, Good Food
Catering special events with your BBQ trailer can become a full-time business. Wedding receptions, anniversary parties, birthday parties, graduation parties, weekend bashes, school dances, and even corporate events and company picnics all require food, so why not BBQ!
Catering some of these special events may mean you need a support staff and additional food items other than BBQ, although we think you can live on BBQ meat alone! If you can manage those additional tasks, then great! Otherwise, you can outsource those extra items with a full service catering company in your area. Be sure to find a reliable company with a food selection that complements your fine BBQ skills.

Renting your BBQ Trailer:
You can rent your BBQ trailer smoker. BBQ rental is an economical way to have the proper cooking equipment when you have to cook for a large crowd on a limited budget. BBQ trailer rental would be available to all churches, municipalities, and business, caters and home owners. These are large mobile trailer smoker Grills that can be towed behind your vehicle.

Capitalizing on Community Events
A BBQ trailer is a salivation genie on wheels! The smell of cooking BBQ announces itself without any further advertising. This makes setting up a food stand with your BBQ trailer an easy income source. BBQ food stands are perfect for any community get-together like block parties, fundraisers, carnivals, craft fairs, car shows, yard sales, and county fairs. Wherever people gather, food and drink is necessary.
Of course, you will need to obtain the obligatory permits and permission to feed the public, but once the paperwork is finished, the fun begins! In addition to your sumptuous BBQ wares, you can also offer beverages, French fries, salads, fresh fruit, and ice cream if you can manage to acquire the freezer space. It is always a good idea to keep the little ones in mind when planning your menu, so bring along a few hot dogs, plenty of ketchup, and something fun for dessert like cupcakes or popsicles. Throw in a few helium balloons and you’ll have customers lining up at your trailer!

Fundraisers: Unlimited BBQ potential
Another great way to bring in extra income with your BBQ trailer is to haul your gear to fundraisers. Granted, this money may not go into your pocket, but it does help out whatever good cause you choose to support. You can combine your BBQ trailer with a carnival on wheels for a complete fundraiser to go. Carnival games can include beanbag toss, a dunk tank, bounce houses, balloon animals, clowns on parade, ball bounces, and a portable obstacle course complete with oversized tricycles.
Making money with your BBQ trailer is a great way to get more use out of your trailer and get out in the community. Who knows, you may happen upon a few other BBQ enthusiasts and spend your time trading recipes and criticizing each other’s BBQ! Everyone loves BBQ, so get out that trailer and make it pay for itself!

BBQ Smoking Troubleshooting

Bitter Taste - Can occur in some foods when smoke concentration is too heavy. The Oily residue that accumulates in the smokers is very bitter. If it comes in contact with food it will transfer the unpleasant taste. Remember that charcoal and foreign lump charcoals not processed correctly will also cause bitter flavors due to their high oil content.

Bitter, Pitch taste- Smoking with soft woods. Pitch and resins will accumulate on meats smoked with soft woods, such as evergreens, pine trees. Buy your wood from a good source beware of Big Box smoking wood in the plastic bags.

Hard, dry meat – Excessive smoking time or temperature can dry meat and make it hard.
Chris

Natural Hardwood Lump Charcoal

Natural Hardwood Lump Charcoal

Good-One Natural Hardwood Lump Charcoal contains chunks of kiln-fired Pecan, Hickory and Oak trees harvested from Central Missouri hardwood forests.
 
Why cook with Good-One Natural Hardwood Lump Charcoal?
 It's fast.

Good-One Natural Hardwood Lump Charcoal lights in half the time of ordinary briquettes. It's only 10 minutes from lighting to 900-degree cooking.

 It tastes great.

Good-One Natural Hardwood Lump Charcoal burns hotter and drier, caramelizing the natural sugars in food and sealing in flavor and moisture.

 It's healthful for you and the environment.

Compare the difference:
Good-One Natural Hardwood Lump Charcoal Composition: 100% natural Pecan Hickory and Oak charcoal for pure wood-grilled flavor.
Briquettes Composition: semi-anthracite coal with sulfur, lignite, sodium nitrate, limestone, borax, charred sawdust, petroleum binder/starch binder.
Other brands - hardwood lump charcoal   Composition: pallets, slabwood, flooring, furniture remnants, softwoods, or construction material ... easily identified by flat or squared wood.

Good-One Natural Hardwood Lump Charcoal burns cleaner with 250 times less sulphur dioxide and 3 times less nitrogen oxide than composition briquettes.

Natural Hardwood Lump Charcoal

Frequently Asked Questions

1.  What is charcoal? -- In general, wood charcoal is a substance obtained by partial burning or destructive distillation of wood. It is largely pure carbon. Wood charcoal is prepared by heating wood in the absence of oxygen. In this process volatile compounds in the wood (e.g., water, hydrogen, methane and tars) pass off as vapors into the air, and the carbon is converted into charcoal. (Tar is a generic name for big, smoky, sticky molecules that form liquids when they're cool. The tars, in particular, can contain carcinogenic compounds, like benzo-A-pyrene.) With the volatile component driven off, you are left with wood charcoal that is about 20 to 25-percent of the original volume of the wood. It's chiefly carbon, with traces of volatile chemicals and ash. When it burns, it won't produce as much smoke as burning wood, and it will burn long, hot and steady. Charcoal, being almost pure carbon, yields a larger amount of heat in proportion to its volume than is obtained from a corresponding quantity of wood.
2. What forms does charcoal come in? -- As far as cooking is concerned, there are two main forms, lump charcoal and briquettes. Lump charcoal is charcoal which has not been formed into briquettes. Briquettes are the pillow shaped little pieces of compressed ground charcoal.
3. Which is better, lump or briquettes? -- Well, this FAQ is about lump charcoal, so we aren't going to wax eloquent about briquettes. But admit it. You really want to know what is in Kingsford briquettes, don't you? Well, according to Kingsford, here is what is in their briquettes and what each ingredient is used for: wood char (heat source), mineral char (heat source), mineral carbon (heat source), limestone (uniform visual ashing), starch (binder), borax (press release), sodium nitrate (ignition aid), sawdust (ignition aid). If you hang out on any of the barbecue forums on the internet, you will find lots of folks complaining about the borax and coal and limestone. You don't often hear of people complaining about the mineral char. What is mineral char? "A soft, brownish-black coal in which the alteration of vegetable matter has proceeded further than in peat but not as far as in bituminous coal.

Lump charcoal burns hotter and faster than briquettes, if given an unlimited air supply. If you can control the air flow through your cooker, lump will burn at whatever rate and temperature that you allow it to. If you can't control the air flow in your cooker, then you may need to use the slower-burning briquettes in order to keep temperature under control.

4. What types of lump charcoal are there? -- Basically, you will find three types of wood used to make lump charcoal: kiln dried lumber scraps, saw mill scraps, and pieces of wood not sawn or processed, such as limbs. I'll call this "natural" wood, for lack of a better term.
5. Which type of lump charcoal is best? -- I would place limbs/natural wood and saw mill scraps in the same category. They are both unprocessed wood. Flooring/molding scraps, of course, have the risk of having varnished scraps, but I've not found this. However, flooring scraps are made from kiln dried wood and seems to have less smokiness which some folks consider to be a plus. The flooring scrap tends to be less dense and thus doesn't last as long. Some have reported that it also tends to break up more easily and thus you end up with more chips/dust than with natural wood lumps. The decision to use flooring scrap or natural wood is probably one you have to make for yourself.
6. How do they make lump charcoal? -- Lump charcoal is made by taking wood, usually limbs, branches, slabs from lumber mills, scraps from milling operations, etc. and heating this wood in a closed container in the absence of oxygen.
7. What about funny stuff being found in lump charcoal? -- Since making lump charcoal is often done under somewhat crude conditions, it is normal to find a few rocks or pebbles in lump charcoal. However, a few other oddball items have been found like a mouse, human hair, a tootsie roll wrapper, varnished wood, and black shiny objects commonly referred to as moon rocks. Personally, in over two years and hundreds of pounds of lump charcoal, I've found 3 rocks and a tootsie roll wrapper. It shouldn't be a great concern.
8. How should I start lump charcoal? -- Don't use starter fluid. Why? It isn't cool. It pollutes the air and is banned in some localities. If you don't allow it all to burn off, it will flavor your food. And, because you don't have to. There are many other ways to start lump charcoal. You can use Chimney starters,  fireplace starter blocks. Weber starter cubes. The green gel  (an alcohol gel made from starch). Electric starters. Propane sticks. Weed burners. 
9. What is the shelf life of lump charcoal? -- If you keep it stored in a dry location, the shelf life of charcoal should be indefinite.
10. Why are some bags full of chips and dust? -- There are several theories regarding why some brands or even individual bags of lump charcoal contain a lot of chips and dust, while others do not. The most prevalent theory you will hear is the gorilla theory. Supposedly overly-muscled and underly-brained gorilla types  are the only persons allowed to handle charcoal  and they purposely toss the charcoal around at specified intervals, stomp on it with large hob-nailed boots at specified intervals, and just in general abuse the bags of charcoal. So, what left the manufacturer as pristine 100% whole pieces of lovely charcoal is pulverized into chips and dust by these goons. Well, ok, I sort of exaggerated the theory. But you get the idea, right?
11. Can I use lump charcoal that has gotten wet? -- We have never gotten any lump charcoal wet, so we don't speak from first hand experience, but we have read several sources that say if you lay it out in the sun in a thin layer, it will dry out and can be used.

the manufacturer bagged a lousy bag of charcoal. Either they fail to

What are the major styles of BBQ and their differences?

What are the major styles of BBQ and their differences?

There are so many types of barbecue out there to choose from, how can you possibly know where to start - or what you might prefer?  Today, I'm going to help you solve that problem."

Every state in the country has its own version of barbecue, and regional differences exist even within many of the states. I have found that you can buy the ingredients and equipment you need for any style at a good BBQ store.

Here are some of the most popular BBQ styles:

Alabama barbecue uses a mayonnaise-based sauce with chicken. You just brush the Alabama white BBQ sauce on the meat in the last few minutes of grilling.

Kentucky BBQ is unique, with barbecued mutton a favorite in the western part of the state. A special sauce called black dip includes Kentucky Bourbon, and is a perfect match for the strong taste of mutton.

Missouri barbecue usually means Kansas City BBQ. With over 100 barbecue restaurants, Kansas City is world famous for barbecue and hosts the American Royal BBQ, the Worlds largest BBQ contest.   Kansas City barbecue uses beef, pork, poultry, and sometimes fish.  We especially like burnt ends, the tasty cuts from the ends of a smoked beef or pork brisket. You can choose between sweet, tangy, or spicy tomato-based sauces.

North Carolina is famous for pulled pork sandwiches. In the eastern part of the state chefs cover chopped meat from a whole pig with an apple cider vinegar sauce and a touch of red pepper flakes.  A few hundred miles to the west the pork comes from just the shoulder of the pig, BBserved with a tomato-based sauce.

South Carolina, like its neighbor to the north, favors pulled pork, slow cooked and shredded. But sauces vary throughout the state. In the southern part of the state, and into Georgia, BBQ chefs use a spicy vinegar sauce sweetened with brown sugar and ketchup.  We once enjoyed a mustard-based sauce in the north of South Carolina.

Tennessee favors pork BBQ, especially pork ribs. In Memphis, home to over 100 barbecue restaurants, pork ribs may be cooked in the “dry rub” style or the “wet rib” style.  Dry rubbed ribs are rubbed with a spice mix, smoked, and then served with BBQ sauce on the side.  To make wet ribs you douse the meat with barbecue sauce after cooking.

Texas favors beef brisket for barbecue, followed closely by chopped beef and beef ribs.  Pork has its place in Texas BBQ, also, like spicy pork sausages and pork ribs. Whether it’s beef or pork, most Texas BBQ is rubbed with a special dry BBQ rub and then smoked. Sometimes Texas BBQ comes with sauce on the side.

It’s fun to experiment with different styles. And easy to find the smoker, grill, rub, sauce, and other supplies you need—no matter where you live.

About the author:  Chris Marks (Competition BBQ Team the Three Little Pigs) has won the American Royal BBQ contest 8 times, the prestigious Jack Daniels World Sauce Championship, and 43 national BBQ championships.  He has over 600 individual BBQ titles.

He is also the current owner of the Three Little Pigs restaurant in Kansas City, Missouri and leads the Ace of Hearts BBQ Specialty Company.