Wednesday, February 24, 2016

Grilled Ribeye and Coconut Fried Shrimp with Blood Orange - Habanero Dipping Sauce

I went out and bought a new kamado grill at Christmas.

I know, another kamado is probably the last thing I needed but this was a splurge courtesy of a check that I wasn't expecting.  We bought a Big Green Egg Mini-Max from Mannix Pools in Winter Haven, FL and B.J. Mannix drove it up to Tennessee personally!  


Mannix Pools, kamado grill, kamado smoker, portable kamado

To be fair, B.J. was already coming to visit the Smoky Mountains anyway but it was still great customer service to make room for my Mini-Max during his trip.  Mannix Pools carries Big Green Egg, Napoleon grills, Delta grills, and anything you could ever need for your pool and deliver exceptional service.  If you're in the Orlando/Winter Haven area, check them out. 

The main reason I bought one is portability.  I got to use my sister's Mini-Max last October during a camping trip and knew I had to have one.

Mannix Pools, kamado grill, kamado smoker, portable kamado
Mini-Max next to one of our Large eggs.  It is has the same cooking capacity as a Small BGE cut it's cut down to be the same height as a Mini BGE.  

Mannix Pools, kamado grill, kamado smoker, portable kamado
In order to shorten the base, the firebox has to be more shallow than the proportions on other Eggs.  This cuts back on the amount of coal it an hold and puts the heat very close to the grate.

Mannix Pools, kamado grill, kamado smoker, portable kamado
The carrying nest is unique to the Mini-Max and makes it more readily portable.  It's much lighter than bigger kamados but it is still a bit heavy.  
Mannix Pools, kamado grill, kamado smoker, portable kamado
But you can put a plate setter in and go indirect to roast and smoke on this dynamo.  A pork butt, brisket flat, rack of ribs halved, or a 5-6 pound prime rib would fit on here.

Here's a dinner we made last weekend.  I didn't fry the shrimp on a kamado grill.  You can, Big Green Craig showed that at Eggtoberfest 2015 when they deep fried smoked pork belly and took First Place.  I'm just not a huge fan of having a wok full of hot oil over flame on my wooden deck :)

coconut fried shrimp recipe, ribeye steak compound butter, grilled steak recipe

You can prepare the shrimp up to 4 hours prior to shopping, just keep them as cold as possible the whole time.  The steak was great as always, the shrimp crispilicious, and the sauce was spot on.  I'd use the sauce on other things like grilled chicken, maybe.

Coconut Fried Shrimp with Blood Orange-Habanero Dipping Sauce

Published 02/22/2016

Ingredients

  • 1 pound shrimp, 16-20 count
  • 1 cup flour
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1 teaspoon black pepper
  • 1 teaspoon granulated garlic
  • 2 eggs
  • 2 tablespoons cold water
  • 1 cup panko bread crumbs
  • 1/2 cup sweetened coconut
For the Blood Orange Habanero Dipping Sauce
  • 1 cup blood orange marmalade
  • 3 ounces soy sauce
  • 1/4 cup rice wine vinegar
  • 1 ounce lemon juice
  • 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar
  • 2-4 habanero chile, seeded and finely diced
  • 1 teaspoon fresh grated ginger
  • salt to taste, about 1/4 teaspoon for us

Instructions

  1. Mix the dipping sauce ingredients together in a small sauce pan and simmer for 10 minutes. Blend ingredients with an immersion blender (or allow to cool slightly and do in a regular blender or Magic Bullet type appliance) and strain through a sieve.  You can make this a day ahead of time and refrigerated, but serve slightly warmed.
  2. Peel, and clean the shrimp, except leave the last shell segment and tail on.  
  3. Butterfly the shrimp by cutting almost all of the way through where you would normally de-vein them.  Put this on a flat surface and press slightly down to open them up (see pictures). 
  4. Prepare a standard 3 tray breading station.  Mix together the flour, salt, pepper, and granulated garlic on a plate or tray.  Whisk together the eggs and cold water in a bowl.  Mix together the bread crumbs and coconut on a plate or tray.
  5. Hold a shrimp by the tail and dip into the flour, coating on all sides, including in the butterflied part.  Then dip it into the egg wash and then finally into the coconut mixture.  Place flat side down on a tray and repeat with the remaining shrimp.  Keep refrigerated until ready to cook.
  6. Preheat a deep fryer to 350°f.  Deep fry the shrimp in small batches (so you don't cool the oil by putting too much cold product in at once) until golden brown, about 90 seconds.  As soon as the shrimp comes out of the fryer, sprinkle with a little fine salt.
  7. Serve immediately with the warm dipping sauce.
Yield: 2 dinner servings, 3-4 appetizer or combo servings

To cook this and have everything ready, here is how we  timed everything.

Make ahead

  • blood orange habanero sauce
  • steak seasoning
  • compound butter
Four hours before
  • prep shrimp and put in fridge
Hour before
  • remove steaks and compound butter from fridge and sit at room temp
Cook
  • Preheat grill and deep fryer
  • warm the sauce over low heat
  • Cook the steaks
  • Immediately after the steaks come off, put them on a resting rack, top with the compound butter, and start deep frying the shrimp.  Two batches of shrimp will cook in the 5 minutes.


Prime ribeye, grilled steak, CAB prime steak, Food City
We got a pair of CAB prime ribeyes from a local area grocery store.
coconut fried shrimp recipe, ribeye steak compound butter, grilled steak recipe
I also made a compound butter for the steaks.  It was just a half stick of butter at room temp, a minced garlic clove, some parsley, and a pinch of salt.  You can just roll it into a log and chill but I like using a small scoop to shape them into rounds like this.
how to butterfly shrimp, seafood, shrimp recipe ideas
I think pressing the butterflied shrimp down like this helps them hold their shape better.  I also set them down like this into the flour, it gets that bottom coated easier than just flipping it on two sides.

Standard three station breading set up.  


steak dry rub, shallot dry rub, dried shallot
I used our Shallot Steak Seasoning for the steaks. We have to order the dried shallots (upper left) but they are so much more flavorful than dried onions (upper right) that it is worth it. 

how to season steak, grilled steak recipe, delicious steak recipe, seasoned ribeye, how to grill ribeye, thermoworks timestick
I say this all of the time, but either season your steaks right before they go on OR season them an hour ahead of time.  The hour gives enough time for the salt to draw out the moisture and then have the seasoned moisture drawn back into the steak.

Big Green Egg,
Notice how close the grates are to the coal.  This causes a bit of a learning curve compared to larger kamado grills because the closer you are to your heat source, the less even the heat will be.  That means being sure to give adequate preheating time and lighting the coals in multiple locations (instead of just a starter cube in one spot).  My sister recommended that I buy a Woo rig for it which raises the cooking grate another inch, which would help too.

BGE Mini-max steak, steak recipe for kamado grill, cast iron grate
Steaks were 4 minutes a side at 500°f.  

BGE Mini-max steak, steak recipe for kamado grill, cast iron grate
The small size and proximity to the coals makes the Mini-Max ideal for searing steaks, burgers, and chops.  But you can also smoke or roast on them.


BGE Mini-max steak, steak recipe for kamado grill, cast iron grate
Notice the cast iron grate upgrade.  I like cast iron grates because they give good sear marks and I believe they act as a heat sink, helping to maintain even cooking temps.  Some folks feel like they are unnecessary and are a pain to maintain.  I find that the best maintenance for cast iron grates is frequent use.  I can't remember the last time I had to deal with rust or re-season one. 

coconut fried shrimp recipe, ribeye steak compound butter, grilled steak recipe
We devoured these.  Crispy, crunchy, and delicious!  

I'd describe the sauce as a spicy citrus teriyaki.  Surprisingly, it is just at the mild level with 1-2 habanero chiles and goes up from there.

[FTC Standard Disclosure]  I received no compensation for this post and paid a fair price for my Mini-Max.  By fair, I mean I got a slight discount off of retail but it was the same discount offered to others in a group to which I belong.

Wednesday, February 17, 2016

How I Smoke Bacon On A Kamado Grill (Big Green Egg, Grill Dome, Kamado Joe, etc)

Bacon.  My neighbor and teammate, John, and I have been curing and smoking a bunch of bacon this winter.  

homemade bacon, cure bacon at home, how to smoke bacon, big green egg bacon, kamado bacon, grill dome bacon, kamado joe bacon


We have done bacon using commercially available seasoning/cure packets, tried and true recipes, and a few adaptations of our own.  We have smoked them on the Big Green Egg, Grill Dome, and even in Char-Broil's Digital Electric Smoker.  The "least-good" (can't say "worst" with home cured bacon) was the pre-made seasoning packet that we bought but it was still better than store bought.  

Why does home cured taste better than commercial bacon?  
To cut costs and maximize profits, most bacon processors shrink the curing process to just a few brief hours and it's packed the same day.  Commercial bacon is often made by injecting brine with a battery of hypodermic needles or sliced and bathed in a quick brine (McGee 175).  Not all processing operations take those shortcuts.  For example, local ham and bacon producer, Allen Benton, cures his bacon for weeks and cold smokes it in a smokehouse for at least 48 hours.  Then again, that's why his bacon is world famous and found in some of the most exclusive restaurants.

So here's how we cure and smoke our bacon on a kamado grill.  Regardless of the exact recipe, our process has been pretty consistent.  

1 - Find or order Prague Powder #1 aka "Pink Salt"
This can be the most difficult part of the process.  First, pink salt is NOT the pink Himalayan salt that has become popular these days.  It is a 6.25% mix of sodium nitrite and often referred to as Prague Powder #1 or Instacure.  You might be able to find it locally at big box sporting good stores but in most cases you are over paying for a small quantity.  Usually you can buy a larger batch online for about the same price.  We paid about $10 for a kit that does 25 lbs of meat at a sporting good store (only place we could find it in town) but got enough to do 100 lbs of meat online for $7.97.

2 - Pick a recipe
You definitely want to follow a road map with curing your own bacon or you could cause food safety issues. Meathead of Amazing Ribs has some excellent bacon recipes and gives you ideas for varying them. His simple bacon is basic but simple is what Allen Benton uses - curing salt, brown sugar and pepper. We also really like Meathead's maple bacon recipe doctored up with bourbon.  One of my personal favorites is Maple and Black Pepper Bacon from Chris Lilly's 2014 book, Fire and Smoke - A Pitmaster's Secrets.  

3 - Find a pork belly
You want a pork belly with the skin off, usually about 7-9 pounds for a whole side. You won't find these at the grocery store, typically.  Start by asking a local butcher.  We've been lucky lately as Costco has been carrying them here in Knoxville.  If you can only get skin on, you could always carefully remove the skin yourself and save that for making cracklin's.  

If you get a whole side of belly, I'd recommend cutting it in half across the middle which will make it easier to store while curing and it lets you try out two different recipes at the same time.  John cuts his in thirds to fit into gallon zip bags for the cure and to fit his slicer.



As noted, John did three recipe variations with one pork belly cut into thirds.


4 - Cure the pork belly
First, we do wet cures, which makes it easier to get good coverage all over the pork belly.  If you are doing a dry cure, even distribution is more paramount.  John says the wet cures are better for us because they are more idiot proof (wait....what are you saying about us, John?).

Mix the curing salt and other dry ingredients thoroughly, the pink salt needs to be well distributed. Be sure to follow the curing salt's guidelines for amount per pound of food, the ratios are critical for food safety of bacon.  Then drizzle any wet ingredients to coat the belly.

Obviously, the pork belly must be kept refrigerated for the curing time so you need to clear room in your fridge. The cure time is affected by thickness.  For most bellies, a little over 1" in thickness,  7 days is usually enough.  But if the belly is extra thick, you should go longer, about 10 days. You also need to use non-reactive containers, so we used glass 9 x 13" baking dishes and covered them with plastic wrap.  John uses large zip top bags which makes the flipping easier and keeps the brine in contact with the whole slab.

Flip the belly every two days, scooping up any liquid and drizzling it back over both sides before recovering the dish.

You notice even though it's bagged, John keeps his in a container. Zip tops do fail occasionally and if it happens in your fridge, it makes a real mess to clean up.  Better safe than sorry.


5 - Rinse the pork belly
Most recipes call for rinsing off the cure with cold running water. I was surprised at how little of the pepper came off when rinsing but I sprinkled some fresh pepper on just in case. 

If you prefer less salty foods, you can consider soaking the belly in a cold ice water bath for an hour or so to remove more of the salt/nitrite.  I just rinsed all of mine, John soaked one of his.  Both ways turned out fantastic.  

6 - Air dry the cured pork belly under refrigeration....or not
Most recipes call for air drying the pork belly in a refrigerator for a while after rinsing.  This supposedly builds up a coating on the belly.  But as McGee points out, smoke vapors are deposited more efficiently on moist surfaces (176), my buddy Meathead endorses this technique, and it is a bit quicker, so I skip the air drying and head straight to the smoker.

If you do air dry, make sure that all surfaces of the meat is exposed by putting it on a raised rack like this.

home cured bacon, homemade bacon, thermoworks chefalarm
You want your pork belly cold when it goes on the smoker if you want to create more of a smoky flavor.

pork belly, cured bacon
The section on the left was John's molasses bourbon and the two on the right, maple bourbon.  We were slightly worried that the molasses one would come out super dark.

smoke bacon kamado, big green egg bacon, Flame Boss 200
Here are a half pork belly of maple pepper and a half of bourbon maple.


7 - Puttin' on the spritz
Heck if a moist surface attracts more smoke [actually helps the nitrogen compounds in smoke convert from nitrogen dioxide to nitrous acid to nitric oxide which gives smoke flavor and a smoke ring to meats (McGee 149)], let's take the opportunity to add flavor too!  John and I have started spritzing with bacon with an apple juice and bourbon mixture (2:1 ratio).

John spritzing his belly sections with an apple juice/bourbon mix (2:1).

8 - Smoke That Bacon!
The short story is smoke the bacon at 200°f until it hits an internal temp of 155°f.  Here's the long version.  Smoking at 200°f can be a little tricky if you're used to cooking at dome temps of 250°f but a few tips make it easier.

As always, cleaning out your fire bowl will make your fire come up to temp quicker and easier to control at steady temps.  You are eliminating potential air flow issues.  In his A Meat Smoking Manifesto, Aaron Franklin talks frequently about how air flow and currents are the key to good smokes.  This is as true for kamado grills as it is the large metal pits he is using.

For the same reason, John and I find using a Kick Ash Basket helps too.  We have 4 of these and use them on all of our kamados at BBQ competitions.

big green egg controller, kamado controller
For the ultimate in temperature control, you can use a PID controller/blower like our Flame Boss 200.  You can keep a 200°f fire using just the vents but the Flame Boss makes it soooo much easier.  You can even check on your cooker and pork belly temps via wi-fi while doing your chores watching the game and enjoying a cold one.

You'll want to fill your fire bowl up with lump and about 4 - 6 chunks of smoking wood.

For the fuel, John and I both have been using Parker's lump because it's a good hardwood coal, sold at the same store where we get our ribs, and it's a Tennessee company.  It starts quick and burns clean.

For wood, we both favor cherry.  John got a bunch from one of his clients at the gym.  John likes using pecan and cherry.  I like hickory and cherry.  (No, the USDA does not grade smoking wood but Ron's note cracks me up.)

You need to set your kamado up for indirect heat.  This can be using a spider/indirect rack, pizza stone, and drip pan like this.

Grill Dome, indirect kamado set up
Set up for doing a 4.5 pound belly section on my Grill Dome, with the indirect rack, stone, and drip pan.

Or using a plate setter like below.  John prefers the plate setter because it protects more area from the direct heat below.  

bacon, Ceramic Grill Store rigs,
John using a Woo 2 with his plate setter and a raised grid on his Grill Dome so it can hold an entire pork belly.  The rig is from Ceramic Grill Store but now I think they sell the Woo 3.

Then, just let it smoke until it hits an internal temperature of 155°f.  The amount of time is going to depend on how thick your pork belly is, not how much it weighs.  For example, a 4 lb 2" thick piece of pork belly will take longer to cook than a 7 lb 1 1/2" thick piece.  Typically it will take anywhere from 2 1/2 to 3 hours. But as with all cooks, times are just a guide, always go by the actual internal temperature.  One of John's took 4 hours.

Actually not smoking yet here, John is just getting his Grill Dome warmed up.  Notice the temperature is about 100°f and the smoke isn't close to ready yet, it's too thick and heavy.

smoker, bacon, char-broil
I smoked a maple - bourbon pork belly in my Char-Broil Deluxe Digital Electric Smoker. I've abused this thing, even using it as a makeshift holding cabinet when we vended at the Christmas parade, but it has held up.   If you're the type of person who wants "set it/forget it" type smokers, electric might be the way to go.  I'm a pyro so I like playing with fire.

8 - Cool it
Once the bacon is done, I like to cool it down.  You'll be tempted to slice it but that will be a hot mess.  It will slice much easier and more cleanly once the fats harden, which takes 6-8 hours in the fridge.  If I can withstand temptation, I actually like to vacuum seal it and let it mellow out in there for a few days.  I do the same thing for smoked cheeses, it seams like it balances the smoke out evenly.

homemade bacon, smoking bacon, bacon recipe, bacon instructions
The color of your finished bacon will be determined by the recipe you use.  This maple bacon recipe was pretty light.

Primo bacon, kamado grill bacon
The Maple Pepper Bacon was much darker.  
As you can see, the two maple bourbon ones (left) darkened up but the molasses one (right) actually lightened up a little bit so it didn't come out too dark.


9 - Slicing It Up
Once it has chilled, it's ready to slice.  You can do it by hand or with an electric slicer.

I like doing it by hand so I can do whole slices the whole width of the belly and I can feel what's going on with the meat as I slice it.  I like the slightly thicker slices. I use a Victorinox 10" slicer knife, the same one I use for slicing briskets.  I keep it razor sharp and use a steel before using it each time.  

sliced bacon, kamado grill bacon, primo bacon,
Notice that regardless of how dark the outside gets, the inside stays about the same with a dark rind around the edges of each slice.  

John uses an electric slicer because he likes the thinner slices.  Like most consumer grade electric slicers, his slicer doesn't accommodate the full width of a pork belly so he cuts his pork bellies to fit. After an overnight rest in the fridge, John also likes to stick the bellies in the freezer for 2 hours just before slicing to make it easier.

bacon,
John's bourbon maple bacon on the left, molasses bacon on the right. Both were excellent tasting.
Another good argument for using an electric slicer is that this is a lot to slice by hand and carpal tunnel surgery is expensive.

The sliced molasses bacon.


10 - Eat It Up
Homemade bacon wasn't treated like commercial bacon and it doesn't cook up the same way either. First time I ever got some superior quality bacon (Benton's actually), I burned the hell out of it cooked it extra crispy because I tried to cook it like regular bacon.  You need to cook it at lower temps.  Same goes with homemade bacon.

flat top bacon, homemade bacon
As with all bacon, starting with cold bacon on a cold cooking surface will render the fat better.

Another noticeable difference is that the bacon grease from home cured bacon is extremely clear.  It would be an absolute crime not to save this bacon fat for cooking later.

So what to do with all of that delicious bacon?  Both of our families have been eating the heck out of it.  A few weekends ago, we made these.

Deep fried a nest of shoestring potatoes and seasoned it with some Meat Church Bacon BBQ Rub...  

Topped that with bacon, of course....

Sunny side up fried egg.... 

Then it all mixes together....oh yeah! Sorry if you're one of those people who can't have their foods touch each other.

So that's where we are with makin' bacon.  If you haven't tried it, I highly recommend giving it a shot. If you have, what are your experiences?  

[FTC Standard Disclaimer]  I received no compensation for this post.  We did receive the Grill Domes and Char-Broil Digital Electric Smoker as part of our 2015 sponsorships. We have great personal relationships with Flame Boss, Thermoworks, and Kick Ash Basket but we also buy products from them.  I paid full price for the books and knife that I mentioned.

Thursday, February 11, 2016

How I Grill Veal Chops on the Kamado Grill

I was picking up some things at the store the other day and couldn't pass by some pretty veal loin chops.  I don't do veal chops a lot because they aren't generally available all of the time.  Plus it is pretty pricey when it is available, so it doesn't always fit my budget.

Veal is different in beef in that it is lighter in color because they are fed a low iron diet and no grass, which prevents it from developing myoglobin (McGee 138).  Myoglobin is the red protein that you see as "blood" in packages of meat and forms the smoke ring in BBQ when it binds with nitrogen compounds.  The special diet also prevents their fat from hardening, which makes veal succulent and tender.  Finally, the flavor is also milder than full grown beef steers. 

Types of Veal
There are several types of veal.

Field Guide To Meat

According to Green, what you see in grocery stores and most restaurants is typically grain fed while upper tier restaurants often carry the specially fed veal.  Just like beef, all veal is inspected by a USDA inspector but grading is optional.  Green says that 93% of all graded veal is either Prime or Choice (77).

Ethics of Veal
When I first fell in love with the tender, delicious taste of veal in the mid-1980's, I was told that I shouldn't eat veal because "they" treated the calves terribly.  Sadly this was true of a lot of commercially farmed animals as production attempted to keep up with demand.    

But as with a lot of commercial farming operations, the negative attention has brought about significant changes.  Green writes, "improved animal care and feed practices have evolved; today, calves are raised in well-lit, climate controlled, ventilated barns (76)".  McGee confirms that more humane alternatives are increasingly common (138).  From personal experience, Alexis and I stumbled across a veal program while driving though the back roads of East Tennessee about 3 years ago and the calves were even allowed outside.  They were in small pens that allowed them to move and turn, although not roam.  

So like everything, know your sources and ask questions before buying.  

Types of Veal Chops
The most common veal chops that I see are the rib chop, which is from the same cut that would go on to be a ribeye or prime rib if the steer grew to full maturity.  

You can find rib chops as Kansas City style veal rib chop (left) or a Frenched veal rib chop (right).  These examples are from Catelli Brothers.  [photo credit:  Catelli Brothers]

The chops that I bought are the loin chops, aka T-bone and porterhouse.


Loin chops come from the loin between rib and sirloin primals and are one of the most expensive cuts of veal.  Veal is very lean so that means that dry, high heat cooking methods work best, so grilling is ideal.  Just remember because it is lean, that it will be very easy to over cook.  Check your temps early and often with a quality instant read thermometer (I like Thermapen and Thermopop).

Generally, I cook veal chops just like I would beef steaks of the same thickness except I limit it to direct grilling - about 4-5 minutes per side at 400-450f.  I don't do a sear/roast or reverse sear because the meat is so lean.

Because the meat is milder than steak, veal needs a little help in the flavor department.  Salt and pepper is fine for beef but I like a more robust rub for veal. Things like dried onion or shallots, garlic, oregano, basil, thyme, rosemary, and citrus zest are great to add into your rub.  A bold sauce helps out too but not your typical steak sauces.  I like highly seasoned cream sauces.  Today I used a base of brown butter and brightened it up with juice from a grilled lemon, toasted pine nuts, capers, and garlic.


I served mine with fire roasted garlic potatoes and asparagus, all cooked on my Grill Dome kamado grill.  The chops only take about 10 minutes to cook but the whole meal takes about 1 hour.

Veal Loin Chops with Brown Butter Sauce

Published 02/10/2016

Ingredients

  • 4 veal loin chops
  • lemon cut in half
  • zest from one lemon for garnish
For the rub
  • 2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon pepper
  • 1/2 teaspoon rubbed sage
  • 1/2 teaspoon thyme
For the brown butter sauce
  • 1 tablespoon butter
  • 2 tablespoon pine nuts
  • 2 cloves garlic
  • 3 teaspoon capers
  • juice from 1/2 grilled lemon
  • 1/2 cup browned butter
  • salt & pepper to taste

Instructions

  1. Preheat your grill to 400-450°f.  If using GrillGrates, put them in after your grill has stabilized temperature and then wait 10 more minutes.
  2. Meanwhile make the sauce.  Preheat a medium skillet and then toast the pine nuts in 1 tablespoon of butter.  When toasted and golden, add in the garlic and cook for another minute.  Stir in the capers, browned butter, and remove from heat.
  3. Mix the rub ingredients together and season the chops on both sides with the rub.
  4. Grill the chops over direct heat until they reach an internal temperature of 125-130°f (for medium rare), about 5 minutes per side.  Remove from heat and let rest for 3-5 minutes.
  5. At the same time, grill the lemon halves cut sides down.  Squeeze the juice of one half lemon into the brown butter sauce and stir.  NOTE:  Lemon seeds look awfully similar to pine nuts - be extra careful to keep any from getting into the sauce.
  6. Top the chops with some lemon zest, spoon some of the brown butter sauce over the chop, and serve.
Yield: 4 chops

red bliss potatoes, asparagus, garlic, lemon
I like whole meals cooked on the Grill Dome.

It has been very cold in Knoxville but kamado grills like the Grill Dome are resilient to icy weather.

I did the fire roasted potatoes on the Grill Dome too.  This was indirect heat (roasting) but the usual indirect set ups would require taking out the cooking grate, moving a plate setter or stone/spider combo, and putting the grates back on in order to switch to direct grilling for the veal.

Instead, I use GrillGrates or Grill Dome Sear Grates sitting on the main grate as my indirect piece as shown below. I cooked the potatoes above that on a raised grid and pizza stone.  This does two things.  First, it preheats my GrillGrates so they will be ready to sear.  Second, when it's time to switch to direct grilling, all I have to do is take out the raised grid - minimal handling of hot greasy equipment.

red bliss potatoes, Big Green Egg potatoes, Grill Dome potatoes, Kamado Joe potatoes
I parboil a pound of b-sized new red bliss potatoes for 5 minutes.  Then halve them and toss in a mix of 2 tbsp oil, 3-4 cloves of garlic chopped, 1/2 tsp of dried rosemary, and 1/2 tsp of kosher salt.  Then roast at 400°f until tender and golden, about 40 minutes.

BGE side dish ideas, grill side dish ideas, Grill Dome vegetables
You can use any pan that fits, but I like using a thick pizza stone with parchment paper.  The paper minimizes sticking and makes clean up easy.  It won't burn at these temps as long as the edges aren't exposed to direct flame.

BGE veal, Grill Dome veal, kamado joe veal, primo veal, vision veal
Salt will draw out moisture from the veal so either put it on at the last second like I did or let it sit on for at least an hour so the meat will start to draw the moisture back in.

The Sear Grates not only create defined cross hatch marks, they also help you get more infrared heat from your fire, keeping your meat juicy.

Because veal is paler, don't go by visual cues for doneness - they won't get as dark as steaks.  They will be more like the color of grilled pork chops.

I used the other lemon half to squeeze over the grilled asparagus as soon as the asparagus came off of the grill.  

Grill Dome veal, Big Green Egg veal, Primo veal, kamado joe veal,
The sauce isn't thick, it's more of a vibrant juice.  The brown butter adds lusciousness and the acid brightens the flavor.  

Reader Tip
Jay T. had a great idea for cooking meatloaf on the kamado grill.  Too keep it from getting greasy, I usually form mine in a loaf pan and then invert it on a screen for cooking.  Here is Jay's idea.

"But as you discussed cooking it on mesh, it put mine in a large spring form pan with the bottom removed on top of a grill basket (with holes). It worked like a champ and the wedge shaped slices made it look special."

I love this idea, especially the presentation of a wedge.  Thanks Jay!