How to put some smoke on your prime rib roast before using the 500-degree reverse sear

The Gagne's prime rib roast ready for carving. (Photo ©Texas BBQ Posse)

Warning: This isn't a normal Posse blog post. Just how atypical? I had to look up how to spell sous vide.

But don't worry, that vacuum-sealed cooking method was used only for warming up some wonderful leftovers from the meal that long-time Posse member Mike Gagne cooked on Christmas Day.

Mike is a University of Texas law school grad and serious Longhorns fan, so when we (Mike is married to my daughter, Libby) decided to cook prime rib for the holiday, he went right to the source of all knowledge -- Orangebloods.com.

He quickly found a long thread on the subject that mentioned a Serious Eats article by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt. For the juiciest prime rib, Lopez-Alt argues, start low on temperature and go slow on cooking, then finish very hot with what he calls a reverse sear. Everything is done in an oven.

That's when Mike's Posse background took over.

"It's not us if we don't put some smoke on it," he said.

Mike's cooking variation started the roast, which had just a salt and pepper rub, on a Weber kettle. The Weber was set up offset, with charcoal and pecan wood chips. Mike wanted a light smoke flavor so he let the meat cook for 30 minutes at about 250 degrees.

Then the roast, which weighed about 12 pounds or so, was transferred to an oven, pre-heated to about 230 degrees. The roast stayed there until its internal temp was about 130 degrees, which took about 2 1/2 hours.

Now the hard part. Be patient. Mike took the roast out of the oven and let it rest, covered by foil, for about an hour. He then kicked the oven up to 500 degrees and put the meat back in for another 20 minutes or so.

That final sear produced a beautiful looking, juicy, smoke-flavored rib roast. He served it with a mild horseradish sauce.

The next day, we ate the leftovers re-heated in a warm water bath sous-vide style. The meat was just as tender as Day One. This could become a family Christmas tradition.

Mike Gagne carves up the finished rib roast. (Photo ©Texas BBQ Posse)

Warming leftovers sous-vide style, the meat was just as tender as Day One. (Photo ©Texas BBQ Posse)

Lights, Camera, Eat BBQ! The Posse -- briefly -- goes Hollywood

George Clooney and Leo DiCaprio can relax. It's unlikely anyone from the Texas BBQ Posse will challenge them for leading roles in Tinseltown.

Still, we had our brush, very briefly, with video fame. And while nothing came of it -- yet, anyway -- the experience was great fun so we thought we would share it with you.

About a year ago, the folks at 12 Forward Entertainment in Dallas approached us about making a "pitch" video for a reality TV show based on the Posse. The video would then be used to sell the concept to producers and networks.

We liked the idea and assembled a group for a quick trip to Billy's Oak Acres BBQ in Fort Worth.

Re-watching the video now, it certainly does provide a good summary of the Posse's origins and purpose, all in less than four minutes.

On camera, co-founder Chris Wilkins probably summed us up best. "Barbecue is an emotional subject," he said, "an incredibly personal subject."

There is also a brief discussion about one of barbecue's great philosophical questions: How much smoke is too much?

"I think I'm in the school of liking smoke," Daniel Goncalves said with conviction, while admitting there have been times when the smoke has overpowered the meat.

"I can't get enough of it," Phil Lamb said of smoke.

And there is a brief diversion into why I'm the most likely Posse member to say I don't like something, and, even, "get punched in the face" because of it.

"You have to remember he's a reporter from the old school and he pisses people off for a living," Jim Rossman said of me.

Make that past tense since I'm now retired. But Rossman, as usual, may have a point.

Anyway, we want to thank Melanie and Terry Wester at 12 Forward for making the video and allowing us to run it here. We do like it.

UPDATE: Step-by-step, cooking butcher paper wrapped brisket - See the video

Pitmaster Marshall Cooper and son Mark wrap a brisket with butcher paper. (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse) 

By Marshall Cooper

Six years ago, we wrote about cooking brisket wrapped in butcher paper. It continues to be one of the most read posts on this blog.

As anyone who cooks knows, the more you cook the more you learn. So since that initial post, I've made some refinements to my butcher paper technique that I'd like to share with you in this Posse cooking update and accompanying video.

For me, the major benefit of using butcher paper instead of foil, or leaving meat unwrapped during an entire cook, is that you end up with a better texture of barbecue, very moist and tender and less potential for over steaming. The butcher paper, which is used near the end of the cook, seems to breath, keeping the brisket from drying out while shielding the meat from too much smoke.


Butcher Paper Wrapped Brisket from Gary Barber on Vimeo.

Cooking butcher paper wrapped brisket is really simple if you stick to basics and don’t try to complicate things by using countless techniques you hear about or see at the barbecue joints. Here's how you just keep it simple:

1. Start by buying a choice or prime grade 12-14 pound brisket. Trim the thick fat off the bottom side down to 1/4” or so. Trim the sides as well to 1/4”. Trim the heal off the top side. If you don’t want to bother with trimming, don’t worry about it.  Then, use whatever rub you like. A simple rub for brisket is 1/2 cup coarse ground (16 mesh or butcher grind) fresh black pepper, 1/4 cup of kosher salt and a 1/4 cup of Lawry’s Seasoned Salt. Or 1/2 cup of black pepper and 1/2 cup of kosher salt & throw in 1-2 tablespoons of granulated garlic. That’s it. Now season the brisket, sprinkling the rub from a red plastic cup, applying a light even coat, not too heavy. You want to be able to still see the meat.

2. Now fire up your smoker so it will burn fairly clean, and bring it to it’s ideal cooking temperature so that it won’t burn up your brisket while it cooks for 10-12 hours, unwrapped. This will probably be 225-250 degrees (F) for most backyard stick burners or charcoal pits. Use whatever wood you like -- hickory, post oak, pecan or a mix of whatever you like. Just get it burning clean and even. Someone once told me if the smoke doesn’t smell good while it’s burning, the meats gonna taste terrible.

3. Place the brisket on the pit cold. On most backyard stick burners, it should probably go fat side up. Fat side down on charcoal pits if the fire is directly below the meat. You decide what works best on your pit.

4. Cook the brisket at a steady temperature. After 4-6 hours you will see water starting to puddle on the top. This is when it’s in the “stall." If you don’t know what the stall is, you can read more about it on Amazing Ribs web site. Basically it’s when the internal water in the brisket begins to evaporate and the meat stops cooking until the water has evaporated. The stall will take around 4-6 hours to complete if you do not wrap. And we are not going to until later. So be prepared to let the brisket cook unwrapped for 9-12 hours. If it looks like the meat is burning, slow the pit down.

5. Once the puddles of water on top of the brisket start to dry up, the brisket is coming out of the stall. The internal meat temperature should be around 175-185 (F).

6. Let the brisket continue to cook until your index finger will sink into the fatty end about an inch. Then wrap the brisket in the pink butcher paper like I show you in the accompanying video. Use this butcher paper available from Amazon, it’s what Aaron Franklin uses in Austin.

Follow the directions in the video by letting the brisket cook 1 to 3 more hours until the butcher paper is saturated. Check for doneness by feeling if it’s floppy. If it is, then check the internal temp if you must.

7. Let the brisket rest for at least 1 to 4 hours! Repeat, because it's so important: Let the brisket rest!

Then enjoy!

Posse member Marshall Cooper is a leading backyard pitmaster with more than 40 years of experience smoking meats. He is a commercial real estate broker at Capstone Commercial Real Estate Group in Dallas.

Inflation watch: Franklin's barbecue and Austin home prices on same track

All sold out at the original Franklin Barbecue trailer in Nov. 2010. (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse)

Posse co-founder Chris Wilkins sent me a photo the other day from a trip we made to the original Franklin Barbecue in November of 2010.

It shows the front of Aaron Franklin's little trailer in Austin and his barbecue prices at the time.

"Sweet memories," Wilkins said in his email subject line.

Indeed.

Franklin then sold his terrific brisket for $13 a pound. Now it's $20 a pound, a nearly 54 percent increase.

Ribs were $11 a pound then; now $17, also a 54 percent increase.

Franklin, of course, has since moved to a permanent building near downtown, which increased operating costs. And there was a huge jump in the price of raw brisket a while back.

Still, that 50 percent barbecue increase occurred over a period when overall consumer prices in the country rose by only about 10 percent.

But compared to another staple of life, shelter, Franklin's prices appear right in line. Since 2010,  the median price of an Austin-area home has jumped more than 50 percent, from about $179,000 to about $275,000.

So, Austin not only has one of the hottest residential real estate markets around but also one of the hottest barbecue markets.

More Franklin price comparisons:

Pulled pork, $11 a pound in 2010, $17 now.

Sausage, $9  vs. $12.

Tipsy Texan sandwich, $4.95 vs. $8.

Single serving sides (potato salad, slaw or beans),  $1.35 vs. $2.50.

Quart-size sides, $8  vs $9.

I'm certainly not an economic expert. But I would think that there is still some upside to both Franklin's prices and Austin homes.

Gary Jacobson carries the Posse's first-ever Franklin brisket to the table in 2010. (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse)

Going whole hog at CattleAck BBQ on Saturday

Tray of whole hog, brisket & pork ribs with sides at CattleAck BBQ in north Dallas (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse)

The Posse first caught wind of CattleAck BBQ in May 2013, when Jim Rossman picked up some Twitter buzz on a new joint in north Dallas near the Galleria. Jim headed up on the tollway to investigate, finding a promising new player on the DFW barbecue scene.

After success in the catering business, owners Todd and Misty David decided to open on Fridays from 11am until the meat ran out. A full Posse contingent made a followup visit  to CattleAck a few weeks later for a rare Saturday opening and was blown away. Gary Jacobson wrote, "After eating at Cattleack Barbecue last Saturday, the Posse declared the Dallas joint the equal of any in town."

Over three years later, the Davids are still catering but are now open Thursdays and Fridays at 10:30am, and starting last month are open the first Saturday of each month. They also recently expanded their restaurant by adding a large dining room in the space next door. As the lines will attest, CattleAck is far from a secret for hard core BBQ aficionados.

We met pitmaster Marshall Cooper out front on Saturday at 9:30am, where we were first in line. Our timing as good, the line started building almost immediately behind us. There was a lot of anticipation in the crowd for Todd's whole hog offering, not a regular menu item and something you don't see a lot in Texas BBQ.

Along with the whole hog, we ordered brisket, pork ribs, turkey, sausage, beef brisket pastrami and sides. Every meat was cooked to perfection, moist and full of smokey flavor. By 11am I counted 80 people in line, which ran from the back of their new dining room, snaking into a queue for the serving line in an adjacent room. The line seemed to move pretty quickly though.

If you haven't been to CattleAck BBQ yet, check your calendar for the first Saturday of the month and plan a journey to have some of the best BBQ in the state.  And if you're lucky, Todd might just be smoking another whole hog, you can check "What's Cooking" on their website for any special offerings that day.

Cattleack BBQ, 13628 Gamma Road, Dallas, 972-805-0999. Open: Thurs & Fri 10:30am-2pm & the first Sat. of the month 10:30am-3pm. Website: www.cattleackbbq.com

The line of customers winds through CattleAck BBQ's new dining room. (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse)

The day the Posse flew Chile's national flag (oops) and other tales from Blues, Bandits & BBQ

The Posse cook team celebrates after the first Blues, Bandits & BBQ festival in 2010. (Photo@R.J. Hinkle)

The Posse has always loved Blues, Bandits & BBQ, the food and music festival held in Oak Cliff.

Loyalty is a factor. Some of us lived in the O.C. and the festival does a good job of showcasing a great part of Dallas.

We also liked the fellowship of close friends cooking together around the clock and competing against other barbecue teams. Occasionally, winning was a side benefit.

So with the seventh annual BB&BBQ coming soon (Nov. 11 and 12 at Kidd Springs Park), allow us to reminisce, beginning with a lesson learned.

One year we cooked near Rob Shearer,  a creator of Blues, Bandits and the unofficial honorary consul of Oak Cliff. While we hunkered near our offset smoker, ready to feed it wood all night long because that's the way real barbecue is made, Rob tinkered a bit with the vent settings on his Big Green Egg and headed home to catch a few hours of sleep.

We poked some fun at him as he left. He just smiled.

The next morning, the Posse was tired and Rob was well rested. His brisket looked wonderful. The Egg, indeed, can be an excellent barbecue machine.

The Posse crew unloads smokers at the first Blues, Bandits & BBQ festival in 2010. (Photo@Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse)

For many in the Posse, our favorite Blues, Bandits was the first, held in 2010. It was our initial barbecue competition and there was a special energy as the festival blended itself into the everyday life of the O.C.  Jason Roberts even grafted one of his Better Block projects onto the festival.

We cooked on the street near The Kessler and napped on cots on the ground between the buildings. Posse co-founder Chris Wilkins blogged live and we proudly flew the "Texas" state flag at our site. One problem. Fellow BBQ blogger Don O. informed us that it was Chile's national flag, close but definitely not Texas. (How the mix-up occurred is a long story.)

Oops.

While we loved being on the street, the police thought competitors blended a little too intimately into everyday life, i.e., we obstructed roadways. So, after some intense negotiations, everyone had to move their pits, with fires blazing, a few feet onto the sidewalks. We had two pits, with a couple hundred pounds of meat already on the grates. Moving was a job.

It was also the year -- the only year, thankfully -- of what I'll call the organic experiment. Contest rules required us to cook grass fed and organic meats supplied by Urban Acres. The racks of ribs -- and I'm exaggerating only a little -- looked like strips of bacon connected by bones. Cat ribs, we joked. How do you produce great-tasting barbecue with skinny meat that has no fat?

Ricky Lawson's infamous Big Red chicken in 2010.
(Photo@R.J. Hinkle)

Competitors tried different techniques. Ricky Lawson brined his chicken in Big Red. The photo of him holding his scarlet bird remains a classic.

Justin and Diane Fourton of Pecan Lodge competed that first year. Their joint was still at Dallas Farmers Market; they hadn't yet moved to Deep Ellum. They won for best ribs. The next year, with the reputation of Pecan Lodge booming, I asked Justin if he was going to compete again and he said no. He couldn't afford not to win. Success has a price.

All in all, the Posse did well that first year. Marshall Cooper's brisket placed second. And Bryan Gooding won best chicken. We still call Bryan the Chicken King of Oak Cliff.

In 2012, we invited Clyde Biggins, who long ago owned "Clyde's Old Fashion Hickory Smoked Barbecue" on Westmoreland Road, to compete with us. After nearly 17 years in prison for drug conspiracy, Clyde had gotten out a couple years earlier and was dispensing barbecue again from what he called "Clyde's Rolling Barbecue," essentially his pit on wheels. We had eaten his food a couple of times and it was good.

With Clyde, who once worked for West Dallas barbecue legend Chester Hardeman, tending to most of the meats, the Posse won People's Choice. It was fun to see Clyde holding the trophy.

Gooding made his own sausage that year but couldn't attend the festival so I cooked for him. I managed to burn every link but one, which we carefully turned in to the judges. It won, but all these years later, my Posse mates still kid me mercilessly. How can you burn sausage? (It's a long story.)

In 2013, Martha Gooding, Bryan's wife, devised some special culinary treats as we went all out to defend the People's Choice title. During the public tasting period, teams serve regular barbecue and other items to festival goers. The people then "vote" for their favorite with tokens.

One of our appetizers was a homemade crostini topped with a smear of brie, peach preserves, and a slice of smoked pork belly.  "Bribery on a crostini," one Posse member said.

It was, admittedly, a little high brow for normal Posse tastes, but the bribery worked as we won People's Choice again.

Sheriff Lupe Valdez poses with her Posse at the 2011 Blues, Bandits & BBQ festival. (Photo by Daniel Vaughn)

The event in 2014 is still a blur of cold and wind. Shivering for much of two days is not fun. It's much better to cook barbecue and listen to music when the weather is nice.

Last year, we retired and moved to Austin. My wife, Sherry, and I did return to Dallas in November for one more Blues, Bandits with Bryan and Martha. We competed as the O.C. Sausage Co., not the Posse (another long story).

Bryan made his sausage again and had high hopes. It was good and had a nice, subtle aftertaste. But subtle doesn't work in contests, where it's all about the judges' first impressions. While his sausage didn't even place, Bryan did win again for chicken, using his terrific vinegar brine. The Chicken King of Oak Cliff still reigns.

This year, the Goodings moved from the O.C. to Lopez Island, Washington State, where they already are building a food reputation for themselves. Before next year's big island cook off, Bryan promises to perfect rabbit sausage. Lopez has thousands of the critters running wild.

So the Posse (and O.C. Sausage Co.) won't be at Blues, Bandits this year. But we will be thinking about all of our friends there and remembering many good times. Have fun!

Bryan Gooding, aka: The Chicken King of Oak Cliff, at the 2010 festival.  (Photo@R.J. Hinkle)

The Posse cook team works the crowd in 2013 serving homemade crostini with brie & pork belly, winning the People's Choice Award.

Chile's national flag flies over the Posse cook camp at the first Blues, Bandits & BBQ festival in 2010, oops! (Photo@Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse)