Mary Cressler

This Western Burger is packed with beef, bacon, barbecue sauce, and beer battered onion rings. When onion rings are done, grill the burgers and finish prepping remainder of ingredients. The secret to good onion rings is making sure the batter is the consistency of a thick pancake batter, using some type of carbonated beverage (we are using beer). We add a touch of corn starch to the batter for a light flaky texture, and we keep a separate bowl of just flour to dip the onion rings in.

Making Homemade Breakfast Sausages is as simple as combing ground pork with some herbs and spices, and a touch of good maple syrup for sweetness. For our preference we like classic sausage flavor, aromatics, a touch of sweet, a touch of heat, which reminds us of what you’d get from your typical breakfast restaurant. While you can use brown or cane sugar, we love the natural sweet and flavor with good quality maple syrup (not syrup with cane sugar, but real Grade A maple syrup). When considering how much breakfast sausage seasoning total to use for 1 pound of ground pork we use roughly 2 1/2 tablespoons of dried ingredients and 2 tablespoons of the maple syrup.

Making your own corning spices is pretty easy, it just takes time, some special curing salt, and an understanding of how the curing salt process works. In the example we have below, we started with a large full Brisket, also called a packer trim Brisket, (because that was what was available to us) and trimmed it down to the 5-pound Flat-Half, which we are using for our Corned Beef. After 7 days for a Brisket Flat Half, and up to 10 days for a thicker cut, like a cut from the round or sirloin, remove from the brine. You will smoke the Brisket Flat Half until the internal temperature of the beef is 200 degrees F, or when the meat thermometer easily inserts into the Brisket Flat Half with little resistance.

Shrimp is dipped in a quick marinade of citrus, cilantro, lime, and jalapeños while the grill is heating up, and then grilled hot and fast in just a few minutes. While the grill is warming up, marinate the shrimp for 15 minutes in the cilantro lime marinade and then skewer the shrimp. Place the cilantro lime shrimp skewers over direct heat, close lid, and grill for 4 – 5 minutes or until you see sear marks. We use similar flavors to the marinade (cilantro, lime, garlic) then add in some avocado and Greek Yogurt (or sour cream) for a nice creamy dipping sauce.