Bucky's Barbecue & Bread Blog

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Bucky's Barbecue and Bread Blog is moving to a new server, on my GoDaddy hosting site.  There's a new look... I hope you like it!

A social experiment

I've already asked some friends, fellow barbecuers and fellow bloggers to help me out with an experiment I have in mind, but I decided to open this up more.

The experiment is simple to do and won't lead to any immoral or illegal acts in and of itself.  The rules are simply to photograph every meal, and, yes, I mean every meal, for one week, starting October 1 and going through October 7, 2007.  That's about it (but not quite).

(photo by Don Andre, used here in accordance with Creative Commons licensing)

I know some people don't have anything more than a cup of coffee or a Mountain Dew for breakfast; if that's the case, take a picture of it.  I'm not going to plan my own meals around this, so you may see me showing a meal of which I'm less than proud to have eaten!

 

Also, I don't care if the photos are great.  Some people are traveling; a phone with a camera will work fine.  I don't care if the meal is an Egg McMuffin or a six-course tasting menu... This is meant for fun, not "I eat better than you"!

After the week is over, my wife will select a day (Oct 1-7) and a meal (breakfast, lunch, dinner).  I'll post on here what the results are, and that's when the fun begins:

• Send in the photo of that meal and only that meal.  I may or may not retouch the photos if I think it will help show the meal better, though if you don't want me to retouch it, just say so.
• If you aren't shy, send in a photo of yourself.  It can be goofy or serious, just not lewd or it will be ignored.
• Give me a description of the meal.  This can be as simple as what you ate or as detailed as the circumstances around the meal.  Whatever you want to share about that meal is just fine.  The idea isn't to show off what you eat, just to show wh

The email to which to send is cmcadams (at) buckymcoinkumsbbq (dot) com (I am being cryptic to avoid the aliens trying to strip out my email address to send me home refinancing offers).

Depending on how many participate, I'll either show everything at once or split it up into several entries. 

Biscuits and gravy

It's here!!!

Autumn officially started today!  After this summer, I'm ready for lower temps and cooler evenings.  Bread baking filling up the kitchen with yeasty smells and apple pies cooling before being ready to eat are anticipated.

Nicole at Pinch My Salt recently posted on both comfort foods and biscuits.  I tried her biscuit recipe, which can be found here.  I have to say that this was not only an easy recipe but really makes some great biscuits!  The effort wasn't much more than popping open one of those cannisters from the grocery, but the taste and texture were much better!

Biscuits and gravy can be found not only at Pinch My Salt in her latest Comfort Foods post, but also at The Pioneer Woman Cooks.  Ree at the Pioneer Woman Cooks does a fantastic job of showing photos of every step of any process during her cooking. 

With my wont to add smoke to whatever I'm cooking, I do my gravy a bit differently...

Jim Dandy's BBQ Competition

Last weekend was the 2nd Annual Jim Dandy's BBQ Competition.  It was the first year that it was KCBS sanctioned.  We were originally slated to compete, but Mark was really under the weather, so we didn't.  The competition got a great write up in the Cincinnati Enquirer (click on the photo below).  Meggan Booker was the photographer there for the paper, and she waited patiently to get several judging shots; she took one of me feeding my face, but, fortunately, didn't use that one!

(photo by Meggan Booker)

The weather was so perfect for a competition - Highs around 70, lows around 45, clear skies.  If I told you what weather I would want for a comp, this would have it.  My wife and I stopped Saturday evening to talk to some of the teams and enjoy being out in the weather.

I called Jim Emig, the organizer, on Sunday morning, and he asked me to go down in case they didn't have all the judges show.  As it was, they did, but they still needed someone to do turn ins.  One of the other judges volunteered, so I got to judge after all.

(continue reading for photos from the competition)

Autumnal food poll

I'm bringing back the poll!!!  I'll do one every once in a while; participation is appreciated!

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Here we are at the September 2007 edition of the Carnival of Food Photography!  The emphasis is on summer oriented foods, to celebrate the passing of the season.  Next month will focus on fall foods, but let's spend a moment looking back at summer.

First off, I want to address some of the entries that I got.  Sorry, but if it wasn't summer foods oriented, it's not included.

My first submission is from Nika.  She has a great entry at Nika's Culinaria on "An improbably meat nirvana in a BBQ wasteland".  Great photos of a northern BBQ joint with southern BBQ, run by a CIA trained chef.  If the food is anywhere as good as the photos, this guy has great food!  (I linked to her Flickr set... a whole series of great photos!)

Next, Jennie of Straight From the Farm submitted photos from her Tomatillo and Squash Blossom Quesadillas.  The photos are really nice, and the recipe looks well worth a try.  The whole entry just says 'summer'!

Next, Shinie from This Is Really Growing Up gives us "Photo Op: Mutant Summer Squash".  What's summer without weird stuff growing in our gardens?

The last entry is from me!  Only during summer will we have bacon/tomato sandwiches.  Nothing says "tomato season" like having fresh tomatoes paired with pepper bacon to us!

That's it for this edition!  Thanks to everyone for your submissions.  If you weren't included it was for one of 3 reasons:
I had problems linking to your photo (I didn't copy any photos here to ensure the owner has control of the photos)
The entry wasn't summer oriented
The entry didn't make sense to have here at all, and the submitter just wanted to see if I'd list them.

Next month will be fall photos of food (good alliteration!).  So get your apple pies, pumpkin recipes, whatever says 'fall' to you all ready!

This week is really hectic for Bucky McOinkum's Barbecue.  We started off the week with a barbecue class at Cooks' Wares in Springboro, OH.  The class was a big success; it was full in less than a week after registration opened up for it.  We had a full house, with some on a waiting list, too.  Props to my peeps (Maria and the staff) at Cooks' Wares for all their help (like my 'urban' talk there... I'm so with it... Not!)  We did a full competition menu of chicken, ribs, pork and brisket, with cole slaw, tomato pie and doughnut bread pudding added.  The sauce for the bread pudding included some Maker's Mark whisky... Man oh man, was it good stuff!

Keep in mind, if you're local, that classes will only be advertised online from now on at Cooks' Wares.

Before I forget about it, I'll be posting a Carnival of Food Photography tomorrow (a day late, but I needed to get word out about the competition (see below)).

The photos today are from prepping for the kick off of the Dayton Vineyard's Wild At Heart men's ministry for autumn. 

Well, here it is again!!!  The recipe is pretty much the same, but there are reasons to bring it back.  First, this way, it keeps coming up.  Secondly, it's just so good, it's tough to post it too often.  Thirdly, Nika's great looking tomatoes made me start jonesing for the last of this year's tomatoes.  You've got to see them; they're gorgeous, as tomatoes go.  In the time since I moved out of town to the country, and we found an old couple that grows great tomatoes, our tomato usage has gone up, but since tomato pie, it's gone up even more!

I have one basic theory about tomatoes...

Local, ripe tomatoes are a gift from God.  He's basically saying, "Night's will get a bit cooler... Grab the salt and enjoy My best for you!"  Ok, He doesn't tell me to grab the salt; I already know to do that.

On the other hand, hot-house tomatoes, grown out of season and sold all year, are of the Devil, and no one can convince me otherwise!  I can almost see Satan personally breathing a bit of evil into each of those plants that look so diabolically similar to the heavenly tomatoes of summer.

This is going to be a bit of an odd post for me.  I'm really blue today, and, since this is my blog, I'm going to type what I want to type... I'll start with ribs, though, for those readers that want a bit of cooking today.

On Labor Day, I tried some babyback ribs.  I have to say that I still prefer spares, but these were worth a try.  They looked good, but one rack was a bit tough...  Sometimes, you just don't have good meat to start with, I think.  The flavor was still there, though.

I did the same basic stuff I usually do for ribs. 

   

I didn't grow up in barbecue country.  My earliest memories of barbecued ribs were from places like the Montgomery Inn, famous in Cincinnati for ribs.  I don't go there at all anymore, as their ribs are steamed and sauce-drowned.  People in Cincy swear by them, but I choose other ribs.  Pulled pork was done in a crock pot, and chicken was grilled at best.

Brisket was unknown to me in any form other than corned beef.  Later, pastrami could be found in the area, but I had no clue what part of what animal this stuff came from.  I take that back... I knew it wasn't pork because the best places to get either were Jewish delis.

Carnival of food photography - September 2007

Here we are at the September 2007 edition of the Carnival of Food Photography!  The emphasis is on summer oriented foods, to celebrate the passing of the season.  Next month will focus on fall foods, but let's spend a moment looking back at summer.

First off, I want to address some of the entries that I got.  Sorry, but if it wasn't summer foods oriented, it's not included.

My first submission is from Nika.  She has a great entry at Nika's Culinaria on "An improbably meat nirvana in a BBQ wasteland".  Great photos of a northern BBQ joint with southern BBQ, run by a CIA trained chef.  If the food is anywhere as good as the photos, this guy has great food!  (I linked to her Flickr set... a whole series of great photos!)

Next, Jennie of Straight From the Farm submitted photos from her Tomatillo and Squash Blossom Quesadillas.  The photos are really nice, and the recipe looks well worth a try.  The whole entry just says 'summer'!

Next, Shinie from This Is Really Growing Up gives us "Photo Op: Mutant Summer Squash".  What's summer without weird stuff growing in our gardens?

The last entry is from me!  Only during summer will we have bacon/tomato sandwiches.  Nothing says "tomato season" like having fresh tomatoes paired with pepper bacon to us!

That's it for this edition!  Thanks to everyone for your submissions.  If you weren't included it was for one of 3 reasons:
I had problems linking to your photo (I didn't copy any photos here to ensure the owner has control of the photos)
The entry wasn't summer oriented
The entry didn't make sense to have here at all, and the submitter just wanted to see if I'd list them.

Next month will be fall photos of food (good alliteration!).  So get your apple pies, pumpkin recipes, whatever says 'fall' to you all ready!

Current events - Mid September 2007

This week is really hectic for Bucky McOinkum's Barbecue.  We started off the week with a barbecue class at Cooks' Wares in Springboro, OH.  The class was a big success; it was full in less than a week after registration opened up for it.  We had a full house, with some on a waiting list, too.  Props to my peeps (Maria and the staff) at Cooks' Wares for all their help (like my 'urban' talk there... I'm so with it... Not!)  We did a full competition menu of chicken, ribs, pork and brisket, with cole slaw, tomato pie and doughnut bread pudding added.  The sauce for the bread pudding included some Maker's Mark whisky... Man oh man, was it good stuff!

Keep in mind, if you're local, that classes will only be advertised online from now on at Cooks' Wares.

Before I forget about it, I'll be posting a Carnival of Food Photography tomorrow (a day late, but I needed to get word out about the competition (see below)).

The photos today are from prepping for the kick off of the Dayton Vineyard's Wild At Heart men's ministry for autumn. 

Tomato Pie

Well, here it is again!!!  The recipe is pretty much the same, but there are reasons to bring it back.  First, this way, it keeps coming up.  Secondly, it's just so good, it's tough to post it too often.  Thirdly, Nika's great looking tomatoes made me start jonesing for the last of this year's tomatoes.  You've got to see them; they're gorgeous, as tomatoes go.  In the time since I moved out of town to the country, and we found an old couple that grows great tomatoes, our tomato usage has gone up, but since tomato pie, it's gone up even more!

I have one basic theory about tomatoes...

Local, ripe tomatoes are a gift from God.  He's basically saying, "Night's will get a bit cooler... Grab the salt and enjoy My best for you!"  Ok, He doesn't tell me to grab the salt; I already know to do that.

On the other hand, hot-house tomatoes, grown out of season and sold all year, are of the Devil, and no one can convince me otherwise!  I can almost see Satan personally breathing a bit of evil into each of those plants that look so diabolically similar to the heavenly tomatoes of summer.

Melancholy ribs

This is going to be a bit of an odd post for me.  I'm really blue today, and, since this is my blog, I'm going to type what I want to type... I'll start with ribs, though, for those readers that want a bit of cooking today.

On Labor Day, I tried some babyback ribs.  I have to say that I still prefer spares, but these were worth a try.  They looked good, but one rack was a bit tough...  Sometimes, you just don't have good meat to start with, I think.  The flavor was still there, though.

I did the same basic stuff I usually do for ribs. 

Making burnt ends

   

I didn't grow up in barbecue country.  My earliest memories of barbecued ribs were from places like the Montgomery Inn, famous in Cincinnati for ribs.  I don't go there at all anymore, as their ribs are steamed and sauce-drowned.  People in Cincy swear by them, but I choose other ribs.  Pulled pork was done in a crock pot, and chicken was grilled at best.

Brisket was unknown to me in any form other than corned beef.  Later, pastrami could be found in the area, but I had no clue what part of what animal this stuff came from.  I take that back... I knew it wasn't pork because the best places to get either were Jewish delis.