Archive for November, 2012

Bacon Weave Smoked Turkey

Posted: November 12, 2012 in Food, Main course, On the grill
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A couple of years ago, we went to my parents for Thanksgiving. They didn’t have their deep fryer anymore and I was broken-hearted. I refused to go back to regular baked turkey, so I embarked on a grilling method since they still had their grill. My mom didn’t want me experimenting with her baked turkey so she bought me a turkey breast to experiment on. Since they have a normal grill and not a smoker, I used a technique to create a makeshift smoker. I will say this… the bacon weave turkey was the first to be devoured. 😮

  • One turkey breast, cleaned and skinned.
  • Turkey injector marinade (I used Creole Butter)
  • Your favorite rub (I used garlic powder, Jane’s Krazy Salt, and a little bit of oregano)
  • A pack of pork bacon (Turkey bacon simply does NOT have enough fat, it will crisp up and break apart while on the grill)
  • Apple juice (In a spray bottle. Any spray bottle from the walmart travel hair section will do)
  • Olive Oil
  • Wood chips soaked in water overnight

If you have the time to let the turkey sit overnight, definitely do the turkey prep part first and let it sit in the fridge. Following instructions on the injector marinade you are using, inject the breast meat and apply the marinade while withdrawing the needle. The guidelines on the bottle usually say half a bottle per turkey, but I use the whole bottle for this breast. Lightly coat turkey breast in olive oil and apply rub liberally to the meat.

On a large cutting board, prepare to start bacon weaving. line up 7-8 strips (however many strips it takes to equal the length of one strip of bacon laid across lengthwise) of bacon vertically side by side and starting at bottom (or top), lay one strip of bacon horizontally, going over and under. It may help after this first row to put toothpicks on the end to keep the ends in place. Fold each vertical strip that is on the “under” side of the horizontal strip down over that horizontal strip so that only the “over” strips are still lined up. Lay another horizontal strip of bacon above previous horizontal strip and over the vertical strips. Now fold back “up” the vertical strips  you folded down before and then fold down the strips that were previously “up”. Repeat this step until to you get to the end and you should have a nice bacon weave. There are other ways to weave but this worked out easy and efficiently for me. It will definitely help to have extra hands to help you transfer this to the turkey or you can lay the turkey breast-side down on the weave and then pin the edges of the bacon to the turkey with toothpicks. (Let sit overnight in fridge if you have the time available)

Prepare the grill for indirect grilling with a drip pan in the middle. With aluminum foil, put a handful of the soaked woodchips into the middle and loosely roll this up into a tube, leaving the ends open (so that the smoke can escape). Be prepared to either have multiple tubes ready or to refill the ones your using throughout the cooking process. Place one tube on each side of the grill, directly on top of the coals. Place the turkey into the center of the grate and close lid. Spray with apple juice every 10-15 minutes, but very quickly as to not let the heat/smoke escape. (The apple juice add flavor and helps keep the bacon from cooking too crispy or burning. When the bacon looks nice and done, after about 25-30 minutes, remove turkey and wrap with foil and then return to grill and cook for another 20-25 minutes. The time depends on the size of your bird and this was just a breast. For a whole turkey, say 15 pounder, you’re looking at about 3 hours total cook time. And always check the meat to make sure its done deep down inside.

Remove turkey to a dish and unwrap from foil into dish. You will want a dish with high edges because as soon as you cut into the turkey, juices will be flowing. Make sure you get your plate first before serving everyone else, they may not leave any for you.  Enjoy!  (This also works with cornish hens).
The slideshow below shows the detailed steps. I apologize for not having a picture in process of the weaving, I did this 3am while everyone was sleep.

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The Dr. and the Artist

Posted: November 7, 2012 in Family, Fatherhood, Nariah
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I know most parents brag about their kids. Its only natural right? Sometimes the bragging can be an over the top “my kid is better than your kid” type, sometimes it can be the “proud parent” type, and sometimes it can just simply be “sheer amazement”.

Nariah is my first child. Things as simple as when they say “excuse me” or tell their first joke feels like a big deal because it’s your first child. Now there comes a point where you get those “come on now, is this for real?” moments and that’s what this is, at least for me and my wife it is. We’ve just had a parent teacher conference with Nariah’s kindergarten teacher. She’s reading exceptionally well and is pretty good at writing. Although the teacher mentioned Nariah would write the bare minimum when it came to sentences because she wants to be finished quickly and move on. If the exercise was for the students to write what they did this past weekend, Nariah would write something like “I went home. I had fun.” and leave it at that. Nothing along the lines of variance. The teacher was trying to get Nariah to get more creative with her sentences. Now this conference happened 3 days before this “sheer amazement” moment.

We’re visiting my grandparents in NC, and everyone is kind of doing their own thing. Nariah asks her granddad for some paper and something to write with. Over the course of the next few minutes I walk by and see her kneeling on the floor writing and drawing intently. “What are you doing baby?”
“I’m writing a story and illustrating it too! I’m going to read it to you guys”
“Oh ok, cool!”

Now at this point my “Oh ok” was really expecting a simple “See spot… See spot run” type story. Oh, was I ever wrong. With Nariah’s permission she has given me the rights to share her work. This is a book she wrote all by herself with out any help. She did a pretty good job phonetically spelling a lot of words. Aside from her needing to “slow down” a little and finish out the words we know she knows already, this was awesome in my opinion. The concept of this story alone is a far cry from the 3 word sentences we had just heard about. I’ve added captions showing what she says on each page underneath each picture from when she read it to us for the first time. Click on the first picture to open up the gallery.

Nariah says… #93

Posted: November 6, 2012 in Comedy, Nariah
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There isn’t must backdrop or prelude to this one as this was a short and completely random outburst from our daughter Nariah. Hmmm, let me go on a tangent for a second here. As a parent I’ve seen a few posts online on some parenting websites with comments using “DD” and “DS”. I’ve never actually paid it any mind until a co-worker of the brand new parent persuasion asked me about it. So we proceeded to Google this acronym so that we could remain “hip” and “current”. Darling Daughter and Darling Son?!?!?!!? Really? Who says that? I tried vocalizing “Man, I was almost late to pick up my Darling Daughter from school” and it just sounds so much cooler saying “Nariah” or even  just “Daughter”. Sorry, I’m back. I just had a mental relapse when I thought; what if I actually typed “this was a short and completely random outburst from our Darling Daughter Nariah”? LOL

And back to the random outburst. We’re driving home from visiting the grandparents in NC. Completely out of the blue, Nariah says :
“We have a very silly family…. And I think its cool! I love it!”
And immediately she goes back to playing with her leappad explorer.

Huxtables, we’re taking over!