I'm going to have to take a little break from the blog...  my sister came to visit us for 12 days.  Yee haw!  I love my family!

And I'm happy to announce that we recently had a VERY welcome addition to the Fly family.  No - Mrs Fly is NOT pregnant!

That's right!  It's a gas smoker.  I think I went a little too hard-core last time when I got the wood/charcoal smoker.  That's like starting to play poker at NL10K.  As my friend Lawrence Jamieson used to say, "Know your limitations.  You're a moron."  So the next level down is the gas smoker.  I almost don't even feel like I'm smoking, since I just set the temperature and let the wood and water work its magic.  I might as well make sure I get all the other BBQ concepts down, without the complication of maintaining low temperature with fast-burning wood and charcoal over 6-12+ hours.

We had no immediate plans to get a smoker, but the Food Gods seem to be pointing us in that direction.  Lately Mrs. Fly has really been into marinade and rub recipes (not the good kind of "rub").  Last week, we ordered in from Dickey's (a large regional BBQ chain).  We ate the brisket and we were shockingly unimpressed - no smoke flavor, but it was moist.  A few days later, we were at the supermarket and a 14 pound slab of beef brisket was only $20 (LOL), we decided it was time to get the smoker. 

Since we can't eat 14 pounds of brisket by ourselves, we decided to invite some of the neighbors and have a little initiation party of sorts.  We had never made brisket before, but we figured it's dead animal - how bad could it be?

Well, we sorta found out.  The thin part of the brisket was meh and chewy, but I think it's mostly because the thermostat was off.  But the center of the thick part (that we left 4 hours longer in the smoker) was really outstanding.  Mrs. Fly wasn't too happy with the rub, and I think it would have been better if we trimmed all but 1/4" of the fat.  But we love eating and trying new recipes.  So we're looking forward to it.  I'm hoping we'll get it pretty close in out next few tries. 

We're now that much closer to officially Texans!