Here are some photos from our 4th of July.
I spent a good piece of the day looking out from the front porch.....
It was beastly hot but a clear sunny day with a slight breeze. As long as you were in the shade you could deal with the day.
We didn't have anyone over, nor did anyone invite us to their cook out. We had a quite(except for the pyromaniacs in the neighborhood) day, just the two of us and the dogs.
And here is why I spent so much time on the front porch....
Just me and my little smoker.
This is the first time I've used it this Summer.
The problem is, in order to make it worth the effort/time, you need to load it up with meats.
And that's great if you have a lot of people around to eat what you smoke.
But this Summer, it is basically just Hubs and I here. The sons are off working at summer camp and while the daughter is home, she is either working when I serve meals or off with her friends on her day off. And she doesn't seem interested in eating leftovers, even awesome leftovers.lol
And here is what I cooked in the smoker......
About 8 lbs. of pork ribs. What do you think of that bark? This is apres sauce.
On the rack underneath is a whole large roasting chicken. I figured I would cook it all up and we could eat on this goodness for most of the rest of the week. No running the oven this week, just reheating in the microwave or on the grill outside. Cook once and eat 5 times? I'll take it!
And here is another thing I made from scratch in the crockpot.....
Boston Baked Beans made with Yellow Eye Beans from my last trip to Maine.
I made these on Tuesday and we just reheated them on Wednesday.
While the ribs and chicken smoked I made a big batch of macaroni salad.
I put the sauce on the ribs and then it all came together.....
A truly home cooked and awesome meal for the 4th.
After licking my plate clean(ok, maybe not "clean"), it was a long swim in the pool and then a nap next to the a/c window unit.
After cleaning the smoker out that evening, my day ended as it began, sitting on the front porch, watching the town's fireworks over the tree tops from my hillside home.
No pics of the pyrotechnics though, due to my camera's delay feature and my lack of timing.lol I do have about 8 totally black/dark photos I could share.....
The good thing about smoking a lot of meat at once and only 2 people eating?
We are still working on that chicken and those ribs from Wednesday and there is plenty left to go!
Sluggy
It was beastly hot but a clear sunny day with a slight breeze. As long as you were in the shade you could deal with the day.
We didn't have anyone over, nor did anyone invite us to their cook out. We had a quite(except for the pyromaniacs in the neighborhood) day, just the two of us and the dogs.
And here is why I spent so much time on the front porch....
This is the first time I've used it this Summer.
The problem is, in order to make it worth the effort/time, you need to load it up with meats.
And that's great if you have a lot of people around to eat what you smoke.
But this Summer, it is basically just Hubs and I here. The sons are off working at summer camp and while the daughter is home, she is either working when I serve meals or off with her friends on her day off. And she doesn't seem interested in eating leftovers, even awesome leftovers.lol
And here is what I cooked in the smoker......
On the rack underneath is a whole large roasting chicken. I figured I would cook it all up and we could eat on this goodness for most of the rest of the week. No running the oven this week, just reheating in the microwave or on the grill outside. Cook once and eat 5 times? I'll take it!
And here is another thing I made from scratch in the crockpot.....
Boston Baked Beans made with Yellow Eye Beans from my last trip to Maine.
I made these on Tuesday and we just reheated them on Wednesday.
While the ribs and chicken smoked I made a big batch of macaroni salad.
I put the sauce on the ribs and then it all came together.....
After licking my plate clean(ok, maybe not "clean"), it was a long swim in the pool and then a nap next to the a/c window unit.
After cleaning the smoker out that evening, my day ended as it began, sitting on the front porch, watching the town's fireworks over the tree tops from my hillside home.
No pics of the pyrotechnics though, due to my camera's delay feature and my lack of timing.lol I do have about 8 totally black/dark photos I could share.....
The good thing about smoking a lot of meat at once and only 2 people eating?
We are still working on that chicken and those ribs from Wednesday and there is plenty left to go!
Sluggy
Okay, those ribs looked incredible! YUM!
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for your input on the pool...but I forgot to ask you a question...If you had a choice, would you have a pool, even with the expense?
We went the above ground route. It was only $5 to install/buy, including the digging and leveling of the yard.
DeleteI figure it cost us about $1.5K a yr. in maintenance(water, chemicals, added electric, more insurance). We do the work ourselves and haven't had any big repair bills yet.
That being said, things are cheaper here than around DC so your similar costs would be more.
For this price point I feel the benefit is worth the expense.
If I had to go the inground route, I wouldn't. Hope this helps.
Those ribs look delicious. That is my stule of cooking--cook onece, eat five days. I just got to hear firework on the fourth because I was not leaving the house for anything.
ReplyDeleteMy stomach instantly began growling...
ReplyDeleteThose ribs look yummy. Have you ever frozen some after smoking them? When my neighbor moved, she cleaned out her refrigerator and pantry and gave me all of her food. (What a haul! :-) ) There were some smoked pork ribs in the freezer. They re-heated very nicely.
ReplyDeleteWhoa... That looks awesome! My hubs will smoke a bunch of stuff and we'll freeze it.
ReplyDelete