HIT BY SPIKES

Just very busy this time of year bro. i tend to resurface around St Paddy’s Day. i don’t tend to eat bars much these days since after Covid it typically leads to disappointment. i don’t own a deep fryer so once in a while I will devour a double order of chicken wings at a weekly chicken wing special. Although the wings here in Hamilton can not match those in Buffalo — Gabriel’s Gate is my favourite — we have a Facebook page called Wings in the Hammer that has grown very quickly where patrons report on bar wings they just tried. They list which bars/restaurants have their specials on a Monday or a Wednesday, etc. If you find yourself in Hamilton on a Wednesday, I recommend the Iron Horse Saloon on Melvin Avenue. $12 CAN for 10 jumbo wings. They have flipped ownership however have the same Short Order Cook and she knows how to cook those big babies right. They have won the best wings in the city award more than once. Taps on Parkdale Avenue is getting a lot of traction here these days. Their deal is on Wednesdays and they sell them by the wing at $1.25 a piece. Reviews have been outstanding over the past year. With the current exchange rate around $1 US = $1.45 CAN, I strongly suggest you take a mid-week trip up to Hamilton and do a little wing crawl where you hit 3-4 places between lunch and dinner. Your dollar will go a long way up here.

Sorry bud — between February travel and March garden/property prep I get very busy this time of year. I was just cleaning and relocating my Italian Wood Burning Pizza Oven today and thinking of cranking it up next week now that the snow has melted away. There is pretty much nothing I have not tried on a pizza before. I don’t believe you can call a pizza a pizza if you put pineapple on it. If you are going to put fruit other than tomato on a pizza then it becomes a flat bread and not a pizza. Same goes if you put fresh pear and balsamic vinegar on it. Flat bread. Always use THE best cheese that you can afford. Whether it be mozzarella, feta, blue cheese or whatever, buy the good stuff since to me other than the crust it is the most important ingredient. i like using whole wheat flour for the crust. I have tried ricing cauliflower for the crust and am not a fan. My pizza oven is next to my veggie garden and often when I am hosting/entertaining guests I will simple let them pick the plum tomatoes, sweet or hot peppers, herbs, etc. themselves fresh from the garden to garden hose and put on their pizzas. Farm to table is a popular concept these days but I just eliminate the middle man and put the table right in the farm.

Can I add beer stocking into the fridge to your job description?

You will eat well. Can you be useful and fetch a beer from the fridge and open it? Then you are welcome.

That is the key -- bone in. Vinnie:"That's the flavour"...

The isolated countryside hills of Jamaica outside of Negrill. NO TV. I choose NOT to go to Seven Mile Beach to watch the game. Just NOT interested. Been cooking though since my arrival with only locally sourced ingredients..... Jamaican Saturday Chicken & Cow Foot Soup Curried Pork Stew Jerk Pork Jerk Chicken Tripe & Beans Rice & Peas I broke down my 3rd and 4th local chicken so it is in the fridge. The flavour of these chickens is awesome!!! Soaked, boiled, soaked, boiled and soaked again Salted Fish that is also in the fridge. Going to make Fritters or Salt Fish & Ackee. The price of goat was twice that which I pay for in Canada so I gave it a pass. Same with the oxtail. Going to the fisherman dock in Negrill tomorrow morning to see if I can score some fresh Red Snapper, Tuna and Conch. Finished two 24 cases of Red Stripe and got three more yesterday. This rum is 55% so laid off of it until yesterday. Ting is really cheap. I am here until the 18th.

SHOVE IT UP MY MR BRIGHT SIDE

I made Kansas City Style BBQ Sauce using this recipe ==> https://www.seriouseats.com/sauced-kansas-city-style-barbecue-sauce-recipe Made enough for these ribs and another 4 cups worth. Recipe called for 20 minute simmer. I wanted it much thicker so I simmered it for 3 hours. I put the ribs on the electric smoke at Noon at 225F and cut up a bunch of the smaller 3 year old pear branches to throw in for the first smoke. I cut up bigger branches -- nothing thicker than 3/4" -- for the next few smokes. I also had a whole Italian Vienna bread loaf and a whole Baston -- Southern Italian thicker bread with hot peppers in the bread dough -- from Friday that NO one here ate. Converted them to two huge bruschettas with some starting to spoil Roma tomatoes I picked up in the produce section of local grocery store this morning, Fresh Garlic, Onion, Parsley, just milled course Green Peppercorns and EVOO. They are going in the oven since my smoker is a little one. So I am kinda exhausted from the shopping, food prep, dog maintenance, etc. and only had one 7% high IBU IPA tall boy so far so I need to concentrate on that part of my day. Going into the hot tub now which is about 12 feet from the smoker to crank up the tunes so I don't disappoint the neighbours. AND finally for what it is worth, even though I like The Killers and saw them in Toronto when they first toured with my teenage daughter, her friend and a woman I was dating, Mr. Brightside is an absolute crap choice of a song to play at a NFL game. There you go. I said. I regret nothing. HIT BY SPIKES out.......

Damn these marinating pork side ribs smell good in the fridge.

Pizza can and should be served for every meal. The winters can be harsh up here so we tarp up our Italian Wood Burning Oven however I can't wait until late March when I pull off all the outdoor tarps and get that baby past 700F just to allow it to cool down slightly to slide in our homemade pizzas. Easter is late this year so I am thinking about some exotic pizzas for Easter rather than the usual Baby Goat or whatever.

You do realize you are merely watching the game and not actually playing in it? I'm Italian -- I EAT!!!

Oh your lucky bastard!!! I looked into getting some shipped up to Canada a year or so ago and the cost was prohibitive so found 3-4 recipes and made my own. I did that for the game this year that we slapped the Chiefs around. I still have molasses left. Oh an Aristocrat eh?

The BBQ Sauce I will make tomorrow morning and it will be quasi KC style. Obviously, smoking typically requires a dry patted down meat however the marinate I used is wet with non-salt spices. The reason I don't use salt even though it is crucial to draw the moisture to the surface is due to my high blood pressure. Sodium is NOT my friend. So I use No Salt which has potassium rather than sodium. In this case, I have various non-salt seasoning mixes I use and the side ribs I have fresh lemon juice and a fake soya sauce with some dry spices and the breast bones have Worcester Sauce and Apple Cider Vinegar and some Cayenne Pepper and another non-salt dry seasoning mix. I have a covered stack a pear tree clippings -- some 4" in diameter -- that a friend gave me in 2022 from trimming his 2 massive pear trees. It is a small vertical electric smoker so it is limited in so many ways however it gets the job done for the infrequent smoking that I do these days. I forgot to quote your post. Please see my response now above this. Gorgeous!!! That makes me as happy as a little girl....

Scored 12 lbs of fresh side ribs early this morning. That is just 2 large side ribs with massive breast bones attached. Cut them down to 4 racks of side ribs and 4 large breasts. Marinated them differently and now in back of the fridge to be flipped every 12 hours. Will throw them in the electric smoker on Sunday. Very promising start.

More of a grasshopper than an ant?

What goes up, must come down. What goes in, must come out.

Show me Wax their poor KC asses

Wing on Wing off Wing on Wing off

Keep two hands on that ball Texas

Geez...I hope this unusual lack of activity on this weekly thread in this highly successful Bills season is NOT a harbinger of the result of Sunday's game. Burnt Ends is what I hope to make again for Sunday's game. The electric smoker is under the roof of the raised veranda off the kitchen however the forecast for Sunday Afternoon is a very windy high of 28F (feels like 14F) which is NOT ideal smoking weather. I can shelter the smoker from the westerly wind and with the blue tooth temperature monitors I don't really need to go outside very often. Screw it -- I am doing it!! I am taking one for the team. Next rib up!!!

ARE WE BILLS FANS JUST NOT HUNGRY ENOUGH FOR THIS GAME?

Do the same as the Nov. 17th game where we beat them?

YES YES I AM