Low-and-Slow-Secrets-of-Great-Tasting-Barbeque
October 6, 2011
•Le Cordon Bleu
•Atlanta
• 0 Comments
Low and Slow: Secrets of Great Tasting Barbeque
If there is a national American food outside of burgers and pizza, it must be barbeque. We Americans really love our barbeque even if we’ve grown up outside of the traditional barbeque areas of the South and Southwest. From North to South and coast to coast Americans are cooking and eating more barbeque than ever before. Graduates from culinary school in Atlanta to stay at home dads in California are all spending their weekends outdoors perfecting their barbeque craft.
Sadly, not all of it is good. But that’s not because the barbeque is bad. It’s because many people don’t know the inside secrets of the great barbeque pitmasters to make their barbeque taste authentic and delicious. And fortunately, you don’t have to cook like you’ve graduated from a culinary school in Atlanta. Just follow our secrets for great tasting barbeque.
4 Secrets of Barbeque
Good barbeque comes down to four secrets that will have you entering, and maybe winning, that local barbeque cook off. Here they are:
Each one is important, and each will greatly affect your final product. Let’s take a look at each one in a little more detail.
Meat
Your first choice is the type: pork, beef, chicken. Your second choice is cut: ribs, shoulder, whole hog, etc. Any choice is as good as another, although our friends in Texas don’t call it barbeque unless it’s beef ribs and steaks. One thing that isn’t up for debate, however, is quality. You want high-quality USDA prime cuts for anything you choose. And don’t go lean either. Barbeque depends on higher fat content to add flavor and retain moisture for long cooking times.
Heat
The first and most unbreakable law of barbeque is low and slow, that is low temperatures for long (slow) periods of time. A large pork shoulder may cook for 10-12 hours at 250°F.
The second law of heat is to cook with indirect heat. Whether you have a dedicated smoker with an offset firebox or are using your Weber kettle grill, the meat must not be placed directly over your heat source. You’ll only get burnt, dry results from that.
The third law relates to your fuel source. Natural hardwood charcoal or wood is best, but smokers and grills that run on anything from gas to electric to sawdust produce great barbeque. Always use hardwoods like oak, hickory, alder, apple, and pecan. Avoid soft and sappy wood like pine. The resins burn and impart a bitter flavor.
Rub
Rubs and/or brines are a great way of loading up your meats with flavor and moisture prior to cooking. Rubs, either wet or dry, are rubbed onto the meats and refrigerated to marinate for at least three hours prior to cooking. A tasty basic rub recipe is 8 parts brown sugar to 3 parts kosher salt to 1 part chili powder.
Brines are water, salt, and spice mixtures that meats are placed in for at least 24 hours prior to cooking. Some barbeque champs inject marinating liquids into their meats prior to cooking. They work best on leaner meats like pork, chicken, and turkey.
Sauce
Here’s where things get sticky, literally. No one can agree on what sauce is best with barbecued meats, with many regions of the country having their own distinctly different versions of barbeque sauce. Heck, they can’t agree on whether to use sauce or not. Some places like Memphis, TN and many places in Texas prefer their meats to be seasoned and served as is without any sauces.
Elsewhere there are three main types of barbeque sauces:
- Vinegar-based – a tangy and strong vinegar flavor is accompanied with heat from hot sauce or pepper flakes
- Mustard-based – with yellow mustard as its base, this sauce has some sweet like brown sugar and some heat like hot sauce
- Tomato-based – a ketchup or tomato sauce base is complimented with anything from honey to habanero and brown sugar to scotch bonnet peppers
So you see, you don’t have to apply to culinary school to learn how to make great tasting barbeque. With these barbeque secrets and the help of a good book of barbeque recipes, you’ll be making better barbeque than you ever thought you could. Keep at it and maybe we’ll see you at Memphis in May.
This article is presented by Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Atlanta. Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Atlanta offers culinary arts and pâtisserie and baking training programs in the Atlanta, Georgia area. To learn more about the class offerings, please visit Chefs.edu/Atlanta for more information.
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