Brine, baby, Brine

Smoked Ribs make my top five list of favorite things.  This isn’t the first time I’ve done them on my smoker either.  The butcher I go to always has really meaty loin back ribs.  They are essentially the same cut as baby back ribs just all grown up (literally).  More meat, not quite as tender.  The ones I get typically weight about 2-2.5 pounds per rack. 

I’m a big fan of Memphis style BBQ so the first couple of times I used a dry rub.  What I have discovered though is that my smoker won’t do Memphis style right.  I can’t keep opening the smoker to baste and do a wet style, and it’s a wet smoker, so I can’t do a straight dry rub because the humidity is too high.

Besides I like the taste of the pork and all that spice rub and sauce tend to overpower the yummy “porkness” of the ribs.  Maybe if you’re a pro you can balance all three, but I’m not a pro, oh and I like the way the pork tastes on its own.

So instead of a dry rub I though I’d try a seasoning method that works with my cooker.

Brining.

I soaked the ribs in a mixture of salt, brown sugar, and sliced apples for about 6 hours.  I then rinsed them off, patted them dry and smoked them with apple wood chucks for just under 3 hours at 225.

I almost got too much salt in the brine, but they were still the best ribs I’ve ever had.  Next time I’ll use less salt and maybe even apple juice instead of water…

Total Chaos

Matthew is a first year boy scout this year.  Most of the boys in his Cub Scout den cross over into the associated Boy Scout troupe.  Matthew asked me to be an assistant scout master; he never asks for things, well ok, he never asks for reasonable things.  How could I say no?  So after two consecutive weekends of training and several online courses later, I am now a BSA trained assistant scout master.

I managed to survive my first campout with the Boy Scout Troupe, specifically with Matthew’s patrol: The Spitting Alpacas.

First there was a stop for dinner on the way.  One of the cars shot an alternator, so we had an extended stop.  One of the boys in my car managed drank 2+ 44oz sodas while we waited, and when asked if he need to pee before we left said:  Nah.

Yeah right.  OK, I say, but I’m not stopping.  You’ll just have to put it back into the cup…

He would have made it, but the other boys were making running water sounds the last 10 minutes or so.  I had to pull over literally 40 feet short of the parking lot…

We stayed at the glorious tree houses at S-F Scout Reservation.

They have a grand view of the lake

On Saturday…

There was much fishing, thankfully no one got hooked.

There was much rock throwing, thankfully no one got hit.

There was much running through the woods, thankfully everyone got ticks.

There was also a five-mile hike, its one of the requirements for the scouts to achieve second class. Well it was suppose to be a five mile hike, but one of the boys was SURE he read the map right, until he hadn’t.  So, you know, seven miles isn’t too bad, what’s an extra 10,000+ feet between friends?

We got to stop at Castle Rock along the way.

What a wonderful igneous rock outcrop!

Everyone made it though the hike, even though a couple of the boys, and my feet, wanted to lie down and die in the middle of the road on the way back.

Then there was:

Much fishing, thankfully no one got hooked.

Much rock throwing, thankfully no one got hit.

Much running through the woods, thankfully everyone got ticks.

Followed by dinner of beef stew, a camp fire, and dump cake.  Why beef stew?  Cause I like watching kids dice vegetables with pocket knives!

Needless to say the boys fall asleep much faster the second night.  Sunday came too quickly and after breakfast we were completely out of food.  We packed up and left around 10am.  The boys in my car all passed out within minutes of hitting the highway, and didn’t wake up until we were almost home…

COMRADES!

Permit me to propose one more, last toast.

I should like to propose a toast to the health of our Soviet people, and in the first place, the Russian people.

I drink in the first place to the health of the Russian people because it is the most outstanding nation of all the nations forming the Soviet Union.

I propose a toast to the health of the Russian people because it has won in this war universal recognition as the leading force of the Soviet Union among all the peoples of our country.

Excerpt from:

Toast to the Russian People at a Reception in Honour of Red Army Commanders Given by the Soviet Government in the Kremlin on Thursday, May 24, 1945 by J.V. Stalin

OK so I’m not Stalin, however I’m declaring the Great Patriotic Mouse War over.  It’s been a week since I’ve caught one.  I’ve changed locations and bait several times, and still nothing.  Until I start seeing “evidence” again it’s time to resume the pre-war routine.

Scooter

April showers bring May – long, uncut grass?

To the untrained eye that is just a mess.  To me however that’s the 2011 rabbit’s nest.  Our first nest was in 2008.  It was right below the window in the living room and we were lucky enough to be looking out the evenings that the baby rabbits started exploring.  They explore for two nights at sunset then move out. 

We usually get one nest with 3 or 4 babies each year.  In 2008 the last one out and the first one back from exploring didn’t hop.  It pushed its front legs our and scooted along.  Jacob quickly named it “scooter”.  Each year since then all of our rabbits are scooter.

The 2009 bunnies the day before they left.

The 2010 bunnies the day before they left.

Scorched Earth

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.

AAAAA.

AAAAA.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa…

Found the advanced mouse base in the kitchen.  It was under the cover of the mixer.  They crapped all over, and in, the Kitchen Aid.

Eating my food is one thing, leaving turds on the mixer is call for total war.  In our self styled “French Farmhouse” kitchen everything in our open. Really it’s because we don’t have enough storage space, but the “French Farmhouse” is my story and I’m sticking to it.  So.  I had to unload everything and clean it all.

Removal of the food source, along with foam insulation round two seems to have worked.  Went a night without killing anything.  Haven’t found any more calling cards, but I think they are still wandering the house looking for food.  Going to have to change the bait on the traps; been using almonds that are tied to the trap triggers with wire and I think the almonds have gone stale.

Looking for good spots in the basement so I can finally take the war to them…

The Great Patriotic Mouse War

Back from the front lines.  The first phase of my counter attacked was directed at their supply lines.  I have discovered that my castle is apparently made out of Swiss cheese.  I’ve found and patched two holes that combined required a whole quart of Quikcrete

The second phase was to counter their devious psychological warfare tactic of making little noises to keep me awake over night, this was making me sleepy and slow.  The exhaust fan over the stove has provided an excellent source of white noise, capable of drowning out everything except the snapping of the traps themselves.

On the third night I had a trap go off literally no more than two minutes, TWO, after I had gotten in bed.  This required a physical inspection of the kitchen, and creative use of duct tape (Yeah Duct Tape!) to try and limit their ability to get out of the cabinets and into the open.  This resulted in a stand off for the night, and no further casualties. 

The next day I started pushing back the front lines with the use of expanding spray foam insulation to keep them in the wall itself, and out of the cabinets.  The application of foam was not a complete success.  I’m going to have to get up under the sink to install a couple of dry wall patches.

At this point the only thing getting through is field mice.

The traps are designed for the larger tougher house mouse.  What the trap does to the field mice is, well, gruesome.

Last night I took some R&R and didn’t set the traps.  This morning I looked, and yes, we did indeed have visitor(s) in the kitchen.

I’ve read that field mice can get through a hole the size of a dime.  This could possibly turn into a Von Clausewitz style war of attrition without end. 

Mus musculus

They got a bag of almond flour, a bag of dried split peas, a small bag of corn meal, and a small bag of pecans.  I had heard them, but hadn’t seen them.  Finally I pulled apart the shelves and found their calling cards. 

I got a trap, and loaded it with some peanut butter.  Got one.  The first casualty in the “War on Mice”.

Last night they attacked in waves.  The first raided the kitchen shortly after I fell asleep.  I think I reacted too quickly in cleaning up the battlefield.  The rest of the patrol must have retreated. 

Then the psychological warfare began.  Every noise I heard was them.  The thump, the scratch, the rustle on the edge of my hearing.  Then at 230am came the second wave.  The first one out was a clean kill.  Less than three hours to the wake up alarm, I’ll leave this one as a deterrent to the others.

Then the leader comes to see what happened.  He must have stopped to check his dead scout and continued.  But this one is different.  Instead of sticking his head over the trap for the almond (that I tied to the trap with wire), he reaches out and grabs it. SNAP!!  I had just dosed off again. I sighed.  Now I have two to clean up when the alarm goes off.

But wait!!  It’s only got his arm, and though wounded he starts draging himself back under cover.

I leap from bed, but I’m too late.  I get some dirty kitchen tongs from the dish washer and grab the trap, but he’s too strong to cleanly pull him out from under the fridge.  I curse.  I think. I go downstairs. I get “THE BUCKET”.  The bucket is what goes next to the kids bed when they think they’re gonna puke.  I put it in the sink and fill it with water.

Back to the fridge.  The trap is still there.  Gloves on.  Tongs wielded.  With the tongs I grabbed the trap, and then I muscled the fridge away from the wall.  GOT HIM!  To the sink.  No water boarding for this guy, he’s getting the real thing.  CRAP, even with one arm pinned the trap he still has his head above water.  To the faucet!

A noble enemy dispatched in honest (enough) combat.  He and his squad mate get to share a quart sized Ziploc bag – forever. 

Put some duct tape across the gap beneath the basement door and reset the traps.  Hope that there isn’t a third wave. 

Oh wait its 4am and the alarm goes off in 60 minutes…

Osama Bin Laden and the War on Terror

Terror is a concept; you can’t make war against an idea.  We can’t win a war on Terror any more than we can win the War on Drugs, or the War on Poverty.

Bin Laden was a man; you can’t make war against an individual, can you?

When I want to look at related concepts to a word I head over to “The Visual Thesaurus” (http://www.visualthesaurus.com/).  It’s a fabulous way to visualize words.

Using “War” as the starting point the Visual Thesaurus gave me three branches.

1)      A legal state created by a declaration of war

2)      Active struggle between competing entities/waging of armed conflict

3)      A series of actions advancing a principle or tending toward a particular ending via a concerted campaign to end something injurious.

So, does this mean that the War of Terror is Number 3? 

If so how is the War on Terror any different than al-Qaeda’s actions in trying to bring about the collapse of Arab regimes supported by America?

Bin Laden was nothing more than a mass murderer.  By killing him all we did we deny legal due process.

Killing in the name of expedience is wrong.