Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Man Camp Cookin'




Just got home from 5 days of eating meat and drinking whiskey in the mountains. This year we went to Abrams' Creek in West Virginia, way up in the Alleghenies and frequented by people named "Lightning Wolf" and "Rainbow Spider". There's a geodesic dome and bonfires complete with wild drumming and fire dancing.

Also some of the most amazing mountain country where the closest town with more than two buildings is 20 miles down crazy winding roads. Super awesome but you'd better be prepared because it really sucks if you forget supplies and have to go back and hour and half for ice or paper towels or something.



We built a 3-tiered cooking pit with some grill grates from Home Depot jerry-rigged with some stuff from a metal shop. Didn't think it was going to work at all but it did the trick. The first night I put a rub on some ribs and cooked them on the top tier for 2 and a half hours, totally expecting them to be either raw or overcooked and dry but they were right on. The 10 LB pork shoulder was a bit trickier, that thing was cooking for like 6 hours and still raw in the middle, can't win them all I guess.


We also brought a rotisserie and some whole chickens from a farmer's market in the middle of Pennsylvania, poured beer and whiskey all over them, bacon under the skin, stuffed the cavity with onions and celery (and a can of beer towards the end) . Dunked into the vanilla-bourbon barbecue sauce and that was probably the best thing I've eaten in 5 years.



Later that night we were feeling extra awesome and decided to stuff a banana with marshmallows, dump whiskey on it and throw it in the fire wrapped in foil. The marshmallows foamed up and melted into the whiskey and banana like a pudding. Unbelievable.


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