Don't Mess With My Cheese

It's all about the cheese

Something happens to milk when introduced to a little bacteria in a tank that turns it from not so pleasant liquid to an incredible semi-solid. Right back to Miss Muffet's curds and whey, little lumps of deliciousness floating in a sea of cow by-product slowly morphing into cheese. The curds are just fine by me, they squeak on my teeth as I bite into the soft malleable lump followed by a burst of cheese flavor – tough to beat. Here in Arizona one can purchase Wisconsin cheese curds, but sadly they don't travel well, coming off as a pale version of their former selves, no squeak, muted flavor and just not the gems they once were. Fortunately Sprouts carries AZ dairy curds (yes, AZ has a dairy industry). I feel as though I am betraying my old home when eating the AZ curds, but all's fair in love and cheese and if curds aren't addictive, I don't know what is.

The curds that aren't eaten will be pressed and sent into an aging room, where the bacteria, molds, and other nasties will do their work imparting a particular flavor and consistency. Each cheese is aged for a prescribed period of time, though there can be (as far as I am concerned) a point of no return where a perfectly good brick suddenly develops a smell that could knock a buzzard off a gut wagon. Some cheeses are allowed to become runny nasty sweaty gym sock flavored puddles of disgust. This mostly happens in France and there are those who relish the drippy BO flavored delicacy, and they are more than welcome to my share. I gave them a fair shake right from the source, trying several varieties in France and Belgium. Being closer to where they are made does nothing to make them more palatable to me. The only blessing is that there was Gruyere on the plate.

What's this Crap in my Cheese?

Beyond the noisome runny cheeses there is a disturbing trend – someone has been putting crap in my cheese. I first discovered this while trying to purchase cheese form a Beechwood, Wisconsin cheese factory. They had no brick, in fact they had no curds, but they did have a cooler full of cheese with crap in it. There was a brick, with caraway seeds in it – now who decided I wanted seeds in my cheese? There was even a “Chicken Soup” cheese – honestly what does chicken soup have to do with cheese? There were more types of cheese with more types of crap in them as well, a sad day in Wisconsin history as far as I am concerned. The bottom line is that if I want extra stuff in any of my food, I will put it there and certainly won't ruin a good brick with some filthy hippy “artisan” ploy.

Cheese-head to the End

Though residing in Arizona I still firmly believe Cheese is the major food group. Yes, it will bump up one's cholesterol to insane levels, and will never get any respect from the vegetable food group – there are even those who claim cheese exploits cows, but to hell with them all, because I will give up my cheese when they pry it from my cold dead fat induced heart-attack fingers.

Disappointment

There are times when the only thing that will satisfy is barbecue and nothing more disappointing than being all stoked and finding the meal kind of substandard.  Down in Tucson I visited the Brush Fire Barbecue. Now I have been there before and found the food passable, though I couldn't recommend the salmon. The joint is nice, the folks friendly and helpful, and the sauce is good.  Brush Fire is a Tucson based company that slow smokes their meat and has their own rubs and sauces.  Their web site doesn't really give much on history or philopsiphy, though there is an interesting section on their offerings.

On this visit I chose the brisket sandwich.  I view brisket as the Everest of barbecue because it is
tough to get just right and use it as a benchmark for the bbq joints I try.  I always ask for the sauce on the side -- I want to taste the meat and don't want flavors, texture, and tenderness hidden under the sauce.  I found the meat very flavorful, good rub, and good smoke. They serve it chopped in little bits rather than sliced, which is fine, but the small fragments of brisket couldn't conceal the fact the meat was dry and was a chore to chew.

All that being said, I will probably go back as my grandkids love the place and I do want to try their ribs. I'll try to remember to update this post if and when I try the ribs.  Brush Fire is all right, not qa favorite, but then one man's dry and chewy is another man's best ever.

Skirting the Issue

The Rio Mirage is one of my favorite Mexican joints in the Far West Valley, serving up delicious dishes since the early 70's.  I usually opt for the “Ocho” when ordering to get my tamale on, however, during the last visit to the Surprise, AZ location I decided to try the Carne Asada to change things up a bit. The Chef at the Rio uses top sirloin and what could be better than that, right?  The dish arrived and was flavorful, hot, as well as dry and tough.  The Top Sirloin makes the Carne Asada sound pretty upscale but is not the best choice for this particular situation.  It dawned on me that skirt steak would be the way to go, providing both tenderness (if sliced properly) as well as flavor and a chat with my server for the evening confirmed that – he uses skirt steak seasoned with a little garlic salt, allowing the taste of the meat to be the star vice the seasonings.

Skirt Steak

Enter Alton Brown – you remember him from “Good Eats” and now starring on YouTube, brimming with good advice and humor as is to be expected.  What does this have to do with skirt  steak one might ask?  One of his YouTube offerings is video on...wait for it...skirt steak!  Seems our video chef takes the same minimalist approach to skirt steak as does my server – salt and extreme heat.  Season the meat with kosher salt and allow it sit for about an hour at room temp (yep room temp, it won't be a problem as you'll see in a second).  Make a fire in the grill with with natural lump charcoal and after the coals get going, spread them to form a bed roughly the size of the piece of meat.  Drop aforementioned skirt steak on directly on the coals  (goodbye bacteria) and leave it for about two minutes (always pay close attention) then flip it and do the other side. Pull the steak, knock any bits of charcoal trying to hitch a ride and then wrap it in foil leaving the meat to sit for 15 minutes.

Now, I did take my servers advice and sprinkle on a little  granulated garlic before casting my steak into the fire, which accentuated the beefy goodness that is the skirt steak.  Be sure to slice the steak across the grain or you'll need an ax to cut it, however, sliced properly it is tender and mouth watering – you'll be lucky if it even makes it to the table.

Best reason to have a cast-iron grill pan.

About 6 million years ago, or on the first Saturday afternoon at 1:00PM if you are a creationist, man appeared on earth. At 1:35 Prometheus stole fire from the gods and gave it to man if the early Greeks are to be believed. At 1:36 Oog the caveman dropped a huge hunk of the catch of the day in the fire by accident and humankind never looked back. In fact the smell of slowly smoking meat triggers something in our deepest darkest mind, where the spirit of Oog still resides – we can't resist.

Despite the mixed chronology and homage to the 7 day bunch, today we all enjoy time spent by the grill soaking up the delicious smoke and most likely large quantities of beer (preferably of the local handcrafted variety). To me barbecuing the meat is as much fun as eating the finished product. Will my barbecue win any prizes in competition? Probably not, but I've never had any complaints or leftovers so I must be doing something right. Either way there is some satisfaction in having a pork shoulder fall off the bone and fill the air with smoky goodness.

The nice thing about barbecuing is that while a cool high tech smoker would be nice, a grill, if set up properly can be used to slowly smoke meat. Indirect fire, a pan of liquid under the chunk of meat and some wood (no pine, please). Chunks of hickory can be purchased at the local big box store; sometimes you can even find some fruit wood chips if you’re lucky. Even luckier is having a son-in-law with a mesquite tree in his front yard that seems to need to be cut back every week or so.

All I can say is let your Oog-self out and give it a shot. The first tries might produce some pieces that appear to have suffered re-entry into the earth's atmosphere, but in time I suspect most anyone can get the hang of it. The reward is a tender, smokey, mouthwatering rack of ribs, or the best pulled pork sandwich you have ever had. Hit the library, magazine rack, or the Inter webs to learn all you can and then amaze family and friends – but do take a moment to thank Oog the caveman for being a clumsy eater.