A seriously big BBQ (what was I thinking)

[oli collett]

The idea:
Invite 40-50 friends round mine for an all day/night feast of eating and drinking

The problem:
That's gonna be a lot of food to prepare

Meat

• 2 x 6kg beef packer briskets (with extra dry ageing)
• 1 x 2.5kg beef featherblade
• 2 x 2.5kg beef short ribs
• 2 x 4kg pork butt
• 1 x 2.5kg pork belly
• 6 x 600g pork loin ribs

Sides

• Green Slaw
• Red Slaw
• Chipotle Slaw
• Smoked Beans
• Ratatouille (veggie option!)
• Potato bread rolls
• Cornbread
• Pork Scratchings

Desserts

• Lemon Meringue Tart
• Crack Pie
• Chocolate Tart
• Ice Cream (instant - using CO2)
• Cookies, Brownies
• Goodie Bags

Cocktails

• Negroni
• Whisky Sours

All needs to be ready for Saturday 17th

The first thing to tackle will be some of the baking - cookies, brownies and so on can be done during next week and are easy enough to put together in the thermomix and then bake. I can also prepare a large batch of tomato passata for the beans and ratatouille this weekend.

Meat arrives on Thursday, will be rubbed, Vac-Sealed and placed in a large coolbox until Friday evening. I have Thursday and Friday off work, so I can then begin with getting the baking done along with some of the other sweets for the goodie bags. I've also got some friends helping out - one preparing tons of potato rolls, another helping on the sides. Slaw and cornbread will be prepared Saturday morning to prevent it going soft - should be easy enough as I'm reasonably competent at julienning vegetables.

During the afternoon, it should just be a case of whipping up ice cream using the dry ice and serving up some cocktails. Cocktails will be first come first served.

I'll try and use this thread as a diary and keep an account of pictures. Something tells me I'm not going to get much sleep next week!


Wednesday
Well I've already got the following prepared:
One batch of BBQ sauce - it's a bit spicy
Rub for beef
tomato base for smoked beans/ratatouille - this has been smoked and cooked down

Tonight I also made the sauce for the mac & cheese. Bit of an odd thing to do you might think, as it's not going to keep? Not this one. This sauce is milk, water and cheese (mixture of cheddar/stilton/comté/parmesan) emulsified with sodium citrate that prevents the sauce from splitting. It's the same thing they use in cheese slices to keep the texture as it is, but with this method you effectively preserve the cheese flavour in the sauce and it is silky smooth as there's no flour added.

I've created enough sauce for 1.5kg of Macaroni - on Saturday I shall just be able to reheat it, pour it over the cooked macaroni and then finish under the grill

 

[oli collett]

Thursday
Now things get serious. The meat delivery:

Beef - 2 packer brisket, 1 featherblade, 4 short ribs:

Pork - 2 pork butt, 6 racks loin ribs, pork belly (out of shot):

 

[oli collett]

Friday
Everything was going quite well, all i needed to do on friday was finish some desserts and prep some bits for cocktails. Sadly things didn't quite go to plan.

The main issue was pastry. I was planning on using Chez Pim's recipe (http://chezpim.com/bake/how-to-make-the-perfect-pie-dough) for the lemon tart and a chocolate tart as I had used it before and i remembered it being very easy to do. Sadly, the first attempt failed. Then the second attempt did. I figured it was probably to do with the fact that I was using unsalted rather than salted butter, so I took a break and went to get some salted butter.

After getting back I thought it would be a good idea to make the crack pie. This was nice and easy - you blitz some oatmeal cookies (i made these at the weekend) with butter and sugar and simply press this into a pie tin. You then add the filling and bake. This was easy enough, until the mixture started frothing up in the oven - i think i mixed the filling a bit fast in the thermomix which resulted in too much air in the mixture. Fortunately after all that it actually turned out fine:

But there was still the rest to do, and time was ticking on. I had another go at the pastry, using the salted butter, realising I didn't have much time left now and I'd probably have to ditch some of the things I wanted to prepare. At my third attempt - I failed yet again to get the dough right. In the bin it went, and I went for my last attempt. I looked back at the pictures again and I realised I was probably overworking the dough in the initial stages which meant the butter was melting, causing the dough to go sticky when you add the water. This time I worked quickly and it came together nicely without the stickiness I had before. About 6hrs late, I had some pastry to work with!

Next I lined the tart tin and blind baked the pastry for the lemon tart. This was tricky as any holes could mean the whole thing would fail and my mixture would end up in a puddle in the oven. Fortunately it held and after coating with an egg wash before the final baking of the pastry, I filled it and cooked it unitl the filling hit 70C. The result:

I also decided to cook the pork belly in the oven low and slow before moving it into the smoker for a few hours. Whilst this was going on, I got the brisket and pork shoulders out to get them ready for the smoker. My big worry was that I wouldn't be able to fit them all in which would have made things rather tricky.

After the pork belly was done, I went to fit the briskets on. Fortunately they JUST squeezed onto the bottom, which meant that the pork butts could fit on the top rack of my smoker. The briskets went in at around 10pm and I inserted a probe to keep an eye on their temperature. At around midnight, I added the pork butts and set the temperature to 105C - A little lower than normal but I didn't want them ready until mid-day. Last thing before going to bed I filled the pellet hopper to ensure that it wouldn't run out during the middle of the night - the low pellet alarm is very loud and would probably wake up a neighbour!

Couldn't get any decent pics of when the meat went in as it was so dark, but I do have some of the following morning which will follow

 

[oli collett]

Saturday

OK, whilst I'm sorting out the rest of the pictures, this is what I saw first thing Saturday morning:

I actually got up at 4.45am to check - I woke up and got paranoid that the low pellet alarm might go off so I did a quick refill (not that I really needed to). Went back to bed and got up at 7.30 to check again. I was quite worried as the briskets cooked much quicker than expected - they were already pushing up past 80C. I ended up leaving each until it was right up to 95C - a temperature I would never have considered previously but glad I did as the results were superb

(more to come)

 

[Judgeneo]

<reserved>



edit: That looks like a lot of work, I don't think I would manage to pull it off. I had 16 people around for a BBQ a couple of weeks ago, and that was hard enough! Do keep us updated

 

[randomshenans]

Nice! This will be sweet as. You will totally be running around like mad though, as you know lol juts make sure you get some of the munch!! I hate not getting to eat when I'm bbqing

 

[tomparker95]

The lack of beer with this BBQ is concerning.....Sounds epic though!

 

[oli collett]

<reserved>



edit: That looks like a lot of work, I don't think I would manage to pull it off. I had 16 people around for a BBQ a couple of weeks ago, and that was hard enough! Do keep us updated

I had 7 people round the other week. Went through so much food, i've ended up ordering tons more!

Nice! This will be sweet as. You will totally be running around like mad though, as you know lol juts make sure you get some of the munch!! I hate not getting to eat when I'm bbqing

Yeah I imagine I'll miss out on some bits On the plus side, I've got tons of space for putting cooked food, plus i'm borrowing a cambro which will be able to store all the meat after cooking so i can go in/out of that

 

[Gambisk]

Sweet meats! that's a lot of food, sounds epicly good though. I like that your not going down the boring British burger and sausage route. BBQing done right by the sounds of it.

 

[oli collett]

The lack of beer with this BBQ is concerning.....Sounds epic though!

Oh that's covered, ordered 2 x 5L kegs, 24 cans and 12 bottles from adnams, ordering 24 bottles of cider and a crate of american craft beer today as well. I've told everyone to bring booze as well, so we should be covered. There's also 12 bottles of champagne to go around.

Sweet meats! that's a lot of food, sounds epicly good though. I like that your not going down the boring British burger and sausage route. BBQing done right by the sounds of it.

Catering for those numbers with sausages/burgers etc. is a lot more stressful. My mate used to do at least one such BBQ a summer and spent the entire day grilling. After getting a smoker it's become much easier!

 

[DirtyJester]

I can understand you not posting address details in the thread....

...but I've still not received anything by trust

 

[tomparker95]

Oh that's covered, ordered 2 x 5L kegs, 24 cans and 12 bottles from adnams, ordering 24 bottles of cider and a crate of american craft beer today as well. I've told everyone to bring booze as well, so we should be covered. There's also 12 bottles of champagne to go around.


Thats good to hear, sounds soooo good though BBQ and big booze up, perfect! Have a good one

 

[Chicken #16]

I watched the Osborne Family Farm bbq on Man vs Food. I hope this will be similar

 

[Scougar]

The secret is this...

Say that you are doing the BBQ, and others also bring some side dishes... and when they arrive you initially do the cooking. A little later, rope one of the guys to tend the BBQ for you, normally you will find a willing victim/volunteer as guys love fire. If it's more of a kitchen affair and the lady of the house is running it... let her mates do the work.

You basically can get away with doing very little, and everyone will still say it's a great party.

Also.. organise the BBQ so it is the focal area for talking etc.

 

[pitchfork]

Most I've done is 25, and that wasn't easy, it was trying to manage all the temps and stuff.

Probably be a piece of **** on a gas grill but charcoal/ wood, nightmare.

 

[Maccapacca]

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18515981

Been there done it

Think you'll be surprised how little people will eat, guage 1lb of meat per person and use the bbq to finish meat off not cook it through otherwise you'll be there for hours, make as much as you can the day before like your bbq beans and coleslaw as these keep nicely.

If you have kids coming then they'll only want sausages and rolls, where's your porkers????

 

[pitchfork]

Think you'll be surprised how little people will eat, guage 1lb of meat per person

Yeah, I always find it amazing, I usually go for 4lb food minimum for me and my male friends. And enough beer, wine and spirits to kill an army.

But girlfriends, and occasionally kids, anyone older? Probably eat a quarter of what I would, I love food far too much. But leftovers? Always good.

 

[oli collett]

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18515981

Been there done it

Think you'll be surprised how little people will eat, guage 1lb of meat per person and use the bbq to finish meat off not cook it through otherwise you'll be there for hours, make as much as you can the day before like your bbq beans and coleslaw as these keep nicely.

Why would I be there for hours on the BBQ? Brisket and pulled pork will be put in Friday night and left, there's nothing else to do - I have an automatic pellet smoker. The rest of the meat will go in mid-day on the day for an evening feast.

1/2kg PP is roughly what i've gone for but added a bit more as they're going to be there all day

If you have kids coming then they'll only want sausages and rolls, where's your porkers????

I'm not sure they are coming, but if anyone is expecting sausages they can go home crying

 

[FrenchTart]

Why would I be there for hours on the BBQ? Brisket and pulled pork will be put in Friday night and left, there's nothing else to do - I have an automatic pellet smoker. The rest of the meat will go in mid-day on the day for an evening feast.

1/2kg PP is roughly what i've gone for but added a bit more as they're going to be there all day



I'm not sure they are coming, but if anyone is expecting sausages they can go home crying

Macca's approach to BBQ is quite different to ours. I'm sure it works for him but personally I'm in your camp on this one

I also agree with the whole "massively over-provision the amount of food per person" idea

 

[Maccapacca]

I'm up for good BBQing but not for 40 people and if you have an automatic pellet smoker you flash git that sounds great.

Thanks for the invite btw consider this my rsvp and I won't tell anyone else.


And sausages......... great sausages belong on the BBQ, slowly done yum yum yum