Jeep and BBQ Weather

If you follow me on Facebook, you can see that I have been enjoying the weather.   I lose my doors and roof as much as I can.  Unfortunately, as a ginger I burn if I don’t wear sunscreen.  It’s a love hate relationship.  I need sunlight in the winter, and get too much in the summer. There is something about feeling the warmth of the sun and the breeze on my face that just makes me feel amazing no matter how crappy of day I might have had. Top that off with some Zeppelin blasting through the stereo.  It’s like a mini vacation everyday.

Also, I broke my Weber out recently.  My neighbor grills almost everyday, and we will hang out and cook on our respective grills and share a beer and some laughs.  The mosquitoes have not made it out yet, and for that I am thankful.  So far it’s been a pretty good spring.  Below are a couple of the meals I’ve cooked:

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I like to grill sweet peppers and sweet onions a lot. I generally cut the onions and peppers up in small strips, and a little olive oil, add a little pepper medley or just black is fine.  Once they are all seasoned up and ready to go I’ll put them in a vegetable grilling dish, or foil that’s perforated.  Just set them directly over the fire and let them cook until they soften up.  I like to take them the next step and let them caramelize a little bit.

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I used to hate mushrooms until one day a friend showed me how she does hers.  Take your portabella and simmer it in sun-dried tomato dressing prior to grilling.  Cook directly over the fire as well.  I like to just get some good grill marks on it, and get a little smoke flavor in it.

The asparagus, I will season the same way as the onions and peppers. Grill them directly over the fire until they are slightly wilted occasionally turning as grill marks are made. Once the asparagus is finished, add a little lemon juice to them.

I used olive oil and our BBQ rub to season the chicken breasts. Once they were seasoned I threw them over direct coals and let them cook a few minutes per side. I didn’t time it, but it didn’t take long.  Once the outside had nice grill marks, I flipped it and let the other side do the same. I typically cook on a two zone fire, placing my coals to one side of the Weber. In the event that something isn’t done enough I simply place it to the indirect side and let it finish cooking with out burning the mess out of it.

The burger was actually a turkey burger this time. I seasoned it up with our hickory rub and cooked it the same way I did the chicken. It’s nice to have a thermometer with you, but I didn’t at the time I just cooked my burger until it quit gobbling.

 

Keep Cooking My Friends,

Michael Q

 

A Legend is Born

In the 1980’s championship BBQ competitions were a fledgling sport with many amazing and talented competitors fighting for bragging rights. It was a young sport with wild ambitions and huge ideas to unfold over the next 35+ years. Jim and his crew of farmers, lawyers, doctors, cousins, friends, and outlaws began to get known for their crazy antics and amazing food. After a few years they were invited to compete among other world renown chefs from all over the world in the first ever International Cooking Competition held in Lisdoonvarna, Ireland. Jim along with his sister Becky went to Ireland and took home the inaugural trophy signifying the first well known world championship in competition barbecue cooking.

Jim Quessenberry was born on this date (May 3) in 1948 as the second child of three during the baby-boomer era to James and Anne Quessenberry of Birdeye, AR. He grew up between two loving sisters, Becky and Beth, with his work cut out for him and a mischievous grin on his face nearly all the time. He was very much into football and making music with his friends and always sought out life to the fullest. One of Jim’s earliest voyages into cooking food professionally was his stint as the general manager of the famous Britling’s Cafeteria in Memphis, TN. He spent some time in Memphis getting to know new people and began participating in cooking exhibitions and competitions regionally and locally. Jim was one of the pioneers during the infancy of Memphis in May as a competitor with a handful of other aspiring legends under one tent in the Orpheum Theatre parking lot. Since then Memphis in May has grown to become the “Super Bowl” of competition BBQ festivals and has made the careers of Chris Lily, Myron Mixon, and other legendary pitmasters that are seen on TV today.

ThePigtails

After winning a second International Cup in 1987, Jim and his crew had amassed several grand championships, 1st-runner-ups, and auxiliary championship wins from Cleveland to Dallas, Memphis to Ireland, and Kansas City to Nashville. Then the boys (my brother and I) started growing up. Once we were able to light a fire and cook a rack of ribs, Dad turned his attention towards family competitions and began to teach us all of his trade skills. He wasn’t in it for the fame, but for the bragging rights and to make people happy. Memphis in May had been a staple of our summer vacation for 16 years when my Dad finally gave it up to focus on the roots of championship BBQ and his family. He began to tout us as the youngest team on the circuit until we were met by a team in Nashville that undercut our ages by a year respectively at 6 and 4 years old. We even placed 5th in ribs while competing in Nashville, TN although we may have actually just used some of Dad’s ribs on our own Weber kettle to take the win. Honestly at the time, Michael and I were more worried with visiting the theme park at Opryland rather than cooking at the competition, but nevertheless, we started young participating in competitions and learning a trade that would become a passion for us.

So that’s pretty much it in a nutshell and now we’ve been using Dad’s secret recipes as the basis of our products and we are able to share our passion with the world thanks to the skills we learned from Dad. Happy Birthday Daddio!