The official Traeger thread

[PaloAltoCougar]

Last night we hosted two couples from our former neighborhood with whom we've been close friends since the '80s. Typically, we dine out with them every month or two, but I wanted to try my hand at cooking/hosting. I decided to do both ribs AND tri-tip. The ribs were very good, but a little dry (I explain in the 3-2-1 ribs thread) but the tri-tip was perfect. I followed DDD's and others' recommendations, cooking over hickory at 225 until the internal temp hit 135 (this took about 75-80 minutes), followed by searing each side 90-120 seconds on our grill at its highest temp. I cooked up three racks of Costco ribs and two 'Co tri-tips (total of 5 lbs.), knowing we'd have a lot of leftovers, although not as much as I had expected. We gave each couple doggie bags of some ribs and tips for which they were almost embarrassingly thankful.

It was a very primal experience as the other men and I stood by the Traeg, smoke swirling around us during the final moments of the cook, and as I raised the lid, both of them grunting ecstatically liked starving cavemen at the sight of superbly cooked meats. They were absolutely dazzled and couldn't stop talking about how good everything was. One, and perhaps both, will be going shopping today for smokers.

It was funny how they regarded me as a cooking god with my seemingly vast knowledge, courtesy of this board, despite the fact that I've been doing this now for three weeks or so, and I'm probably the least knowledgeable of all those who participate in this forum. But in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. They want me to do this again next month. I shall comply.

[TripletDaddy]

That's awesome.

there is a well-known bumper sticking extolling the virtues of time spent on the links, something to the effect of "a bad day on the golf course is still better than a good day at work." You are going to find that even when you are dissatisfied with your cooks, you think the meat isn't right, etc...the food is still better than pretty much anything your guests are going to ever make on their gas grill. Sounds like you are getting the hang of things and branching out to new meats. Keep going and you will be pleasantly surprised by your continued strong results.

smoking meats is probably one of the best hobbies I've ever adopted. I can't get enough of it, the scent of wood is intoxicating, the meat is always juicy, and everyone seems to enjoy it. Outside of group sex, few hobbies can make a similar claim.

[HuskyFreeNorthwest]

PAC, try to encourage your friends to not go shopping today for A Traeger. As great as they are, I don't think one should shop on The Lord's day for them.

[cowboy]

PAC, try to encourage your friends to not go shopping today for A Traeger. As great as they are, I don't think one should shop on The Lord's day for them.

Unless, of course, the ox is in the oven.

[YOhio]

PAC, try to encourage your friends to not go shopping today for A Traeger. As great as they are, I don't think one should shop on The Lord's day for them.

Plus one.

[PaloAltoCougar]

PAC, try to encourage your friends to not go shopping today for A Traeger. As great as they are, I don't think one should shop on The Lord's day for them.

This is good counsel. Fortunately, one couple is Jewish, so they were in the clear today. And the other couple had previously been agnostics, but it seems grilling/smoking has become their new religion so they were attending their house of worship.

[TripletDaddy]

lol. PAC serving pork to his Jewish guests. What a clodhopper!

[PaloAltoCougar]

lol. PAC serving pork to his Jewish guests. What a clodhopper!

Hence the tri-tip. The wife's Jewish, the husband's a gentile, but after seeing the ribs, any thought of keeping kosher vanished. I was told that a common Yiddish phrase is "Ez men est khazer zol rinen ariber der bord", which translates loosely into "if you're going to eat pork, at least eat lots of the good stuff."

[PaloAltoCougar]

I'm batching it for a week, so rather than cook up vast quantities of meat that even I couldn't consume, I've tried a couple of other things. The other night I made bread from scratch using the Traeger. I used the Sullivan Street No-Knead Bread recipe from the Traeger website. It turned out okay, but it's a fairly bland kind of bread so no cartwheels. In the future, I think I'll opt for something fresh from the bakery and save the hassle. Still, it was fun to do.



Yesterday I made my first batch of beef jerky, since I can consume the entire batch over the next several days (or hours). I used a combination of various recipes, and marinated 2.25 lbs. of round top roast, thinly sliced, for 12 hours (I think 8 would be plenty) in a brew of Worcestershire and soy sauces, red and black pepper, kosher salt, dark brown sugar, honey and onion powder. Four hours of smoke (Mesquite), and voila! I took three small bags to church to get opinions, and passed them out before the final hour. Stupidly, I thought they'd wait until after HP group, but halfway through, the heady scent of jerky started wafting through the chapel where we meet. I got great reviews from the three and considerable grief from the others.

[myboynoah]

I don't get it. Looks . . . . hideous.

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