The Screaming Viking

I meant to type something up about this while I was doing it or shortly there after and I completely forgot about it.  I did this about a month ago now…

After the old man died, it dawned on me that if I wanted to continue to enjoy the various delicacies he produced I would need to learn how to do it myself.  It took him several years to hone his talents…and if he wasn’t an expert no one is.  His recipes are written down, but to say he followed them loosely is an understatement.  There was always an adjustment here or there that had to be made…nothing was ever the same twice.  More often than not it was a success, but there were some failures.  I think it was the epic failure that was the “wine summer sausage incident” that resulted in me only now being able to try home made summer sausage.  I figured the best place to start was with a smoked turkey.  I chose a turkey as my first “on my own” attempt for a couple of reasons.  It’s easy to go to the store and pick one up.  There would be no time spent grinding and stuffing anything…I wouldn’t need to let anything hang for too long…and I really like cured/smoked turkey.

The first step in this process was to find myself a turkey.  It was around thanksgiving time so turkeys were on sale.  I grabbed 3 of them in case I screwed up too bad on the first one.  I had thought I would do two at the same time, but being my first solo flight I decided to just do one of them…I didn’t want 2 messed up birds.  Read the rest of this entry »

This past spring I bought myself a smoker off a guy that was advertised on craigslist.  I fired it up a couple of times..once to see that the thermometer in the door wasn’t anywhere near accurate for cooking…and again after I picked up a remote thermometer to see if it was any better.  I determined that charcoal was not the way to go.  I cannibalized an old propane grill and adjusted the firebox to accommodate this.  It seems to work pretty well.  It looks like complete s*, but I wanted to run through at least one full on trial before I decide to spend any more money on this thing.

I’d been planning on doing a turkey for quite some time now, but just never seem to have the time to dedicate to doing one.  The old man had done many of them, and according to his notes it’s about a 5 day process once you figure in all the time to soak, sit then cook the bird(s).  The last time I was at the farm I picked up what stuff from there I needed, a salt tester (dunno what it’s called for sure), seasoning…etc.  I planned to do it this past weekend just to see how it turns out.  The soaking and resting I don’t need to be there for, but watching the temperature of the smoke house is a pretty finicky process.  There’s no real way to prepare or plan for what could possibly happen to affect the temp…you just need to do it and learn.  Read the rest of this entry »