This is the current house bread here. It’s a half-recipe of Carey Nershi’s No-Knead Sandwich Bread with a couple minor tweaks. The whole wheat and rye flours make for a fairly dense loaf that works well for sandwiches and toasts. There’s usually a sliced loaf in the freezer. When there are only a couple slices left, it’s time to make another loaf.

Given the rise times, it won’t be ready quickly. However, after the experience of a couple loafs, the active time is quite minimal and can be worked in somewhere during the week. I usually mix it on a weekend morning while making coffee.

• 216g Bread flour
• 109g Whole wheat flour
• 108g Dark rye flour
• 3g Active dry yeast
• 7g Salt
• 8g Caraway seeds
• 354g Water

1. Mix dry ingredients in a large bowl.
2. Add water and mix with hand into a shaggy dough ball.
3. Cover and let rise for 5-6 hours at room temperature¹.
4. Butter a loaf pan.
5. Turn dough out onto a floured work surface, it will be very wet.
6. Add some flour to the top and pat down with hands.
7. Using a dough scraper, fold the dough over onto itself a couple times.
8. Roll into log shape that will fit into the loaf pan.
9. Place in pan seam side down. Sprinkle top with a bit of flour.
10. Cover and let rise for about an hour or so, until it has doubled in size.
11. Preheat oven to 450º F.
12. Slash top with a sharp knife and cook for 25-30 minutes (watch that the top doesn’t burn).
13. Carefully turn out of pan immediately and let cook completely on wire rack before slicing.

¹ After the initial rise, dough can be kept in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks until ready to bake. If using refrigerated dough, expect the second rise to take a bit longer.

To celebrate Independence Day, we served pulled pork–as tacos.

Here are the recipes, and some notes…

Meat

Pork Shoulder

This was a much smaller piece of meat than I’ve cooked in the past–about 4.5 pounds and boneless. I followed the same instructions from past cooks, for the most part. I didn’t inject, and I forgot to add more rub before cooking. It was tasty, but I think the larger, bone-in ones were slightly moister and more flavorful. Not sure if this is because they are larger, or they have the bone, or both. The cooking temperature was very steady around 250º for the entire time, and it took about 9 hours to get to 195º internal temperature. I’m going to up my timing calculation to 2 hours per pound next time, to be safe.

Sides etc.

Roberto Santibañez’s Truly Mexican is the go-to book for Mexican cooking around here, and provided these delicous recipes

• Fresh Corn Tortillas
• Pico de Gallo go easy on the salt next time
• Classic Guacamole the chili/onion paste method here is great, could up the spice level next time
• Chipotle and Roasted Garlic Salsa

The Smashed Potato Salad with Chorizo, Aioli, and Scallions was a winner.

I also over grilled some zucchini, not a winner.

Dessert

Nectarine and Blackberry Cobbler

Reverse searing steaks produces great results. I think they are superior to sous vide when it comes to flavor, especially when cooking indirectly with charcoal.

With Kenji’s reverse sear method as a (very detailed) guideline, here is what I do on the Green Egg:

• Get the butcher to cut a steak at about 1 1/2 – 1 3/4 inches (most of the precut ones seem to be an inch or less, these tend to overcook before developing a good char)
• Set up for an indirect cook and preheat to a relatively stable temperature between 200 – 250º
• Put a thermometer in the center of the steak and place on the grate
• Cook to 115º internal temperature (for medium rare, see Kenji’s guide for other temperatures), keep the dome temperature under 250º. This will take around 20 to 30 minutes.
• When steak reaches desired temperature, remove steak and the plate setter. Put the grate back in the egg and get the dome temperature up to about 600º. Getting the egg to temperature might take 10 minutes or so.
• Once the fire is blazing, cook the steak for 45 seconds on each side to develop a nice crust. Check the internal temperature, I’m looking for 125 – 130º (for medium rare)
• Cut, if needed, and serve

This process take a bit more time than just grilling the steak, but it’s worth it.

This weekend is Eggiversary here–one year since the Green Egg arrived! To celebrate, we are cooking delicious foods. Last night was Thai-Style Grilled Chicken.

We used Milk Street’s Chiang Mai Chicken recipe for the marinade together with Serious Eats Thai-Style Sweet Chili Dipping Sauce. There were a couple minor modifications to the dipping sauce. We substituted serrano peppers as there were no red Thai bird chilies available, and we reduced the sugar to 1/4 cup. Do not over marinate this one, 1 1/2 hours was great, more than 2 hours would be overpowering.

The last time we cooked this, it was directly over the coals. The skin side was cooked for about 15 minutes, then the bird was flipped and cooked until done. This time, we decided to cook it the more (traditional?) way with indirect heat. It was skin side up, indirect at a temperature of between 425º and 450º. Initially the legs were closer to the hot spot, but I turned it around towards the end since the breasts needed a bit more cooking.

The verdict? Delicious.

Notes for next time: Use the same indirect cooking method, but keep the temperature closer to 400º, especially if it’s a larger bird. This should give it some more time to cook through without over-browning the skin.

Photo by Angela Lin