Cheese Scalloped Carrots

12 Carrots (peeled and sliced) 
½ lb sliced sharp cheddar cheese 
1 med. minced onion  
3 c. bread crumbs
2-3 stalks celery, chopped 
4 tablespoons butter 
1 teaspoon garlic salt

Boil carrots until done, but not overdone. While carrots are boiling, sauté celery and onion in 1-2 tablespoon(s) butter or substitute. Drain carrots, add celery and onion, stir until mixed. Sauté bread crumbs in butter w/ garlic salt until slightly browned.

White sauce

¼ cup flour  
¼ cup butter  
1 tsp salt 
1/8 tsp pepper
¼ tsp dry mustard 
¼ tsp celery salt 
¼ tsp herb seasoning

Melt butter, add flour and seasonings, slowly add milk while stirring over low heat. Continue stirring until thickened to gravy like consistency and is smooth.
In a 2 quart casserole dish, layer half of the carrot mixture top with sliced cheese, layer rest of carrots over cheese, then another layer of cheese. Spread white sauce evenly over cheese and carrots, add bread crumbs and cover.
Bake in 350 oven for 35-45 minutes

The first recipe is a great appetizer from Josh who does our web programming.  “We do these every year.  Easy and extremely tasty, perfect snack while dinner is cooking!”

Bacon Wrapped Water Chestnuts 

1/2 pound bacon cut in half
1 (8 ounce) can water chestnuts
3/4 cup ketchup
1/2 cup packed brown sugar

Directions

1.  Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).
2.  Wrap 1/2 strip of bacon around each water chestnut and secure with toothpick. Combine ketchup and sugar in a small bowl and mix together; dip each wrapped water chestnut into this mixture.
3.  Place water chestnuts in a lightly greased 9×13 inch baking dish and bake covered in the preheated oven for 20 minutes, or until bacon is crisp.

My wife suggested we take a picnic and head out of town. That is kind of an odd thought since I live out of town anyway, and my deck is pretty peaceful and secluded. I’d not been up the canyon lately and was curious to see what it looked like in some of the popular camping areas.

People…we need to do a better job cleaning up after ourselves on public lands. There is no excuse for leaving trash in a fire pit or around camp sites. I fear that our big brother foresters would rather we be in a paying camp ground and are headed in that direction if we cannot get involved and take care of ourselves. A paying camp ground isn’t in the city, it doesn’t have much of as appeal to me because it is a bit like a subdivision in the woods. While this particular area is one of the largest dispersed camping areas left on the Cache Forest of Northern Utah and while the popularity of ATV’s has increased the areas use 300 percent in five years. It didn’t look as bad as I expected. But any trash is too much.

I’m ok with a cold sandwich but not if I can easily have it hot. The Teton stove worked like a champ with the old Wagner aluminum griddle I’d rescued from my mom’s garage sale for just such an occasion. I need to replace the handle of the griddle, but then again I may grind the mount off so it will fit in the bag with my stove. The chicken salad grilled sandwiches were great! A hot drink to top it off was even better. The time alone with my wife priceless!

Troy had other ideas and broke out a single burner stove from the tool box. “Do you want Clam Chowder or Beef Stew?” he asks.  We’ll I’m a chowder head and swallowed my pride of eating something not cooked on a Camp Chef even though it was warmed up in a can. 

“Sorry bud for not bringing along the Camp Chef”, he apologized. “You know I love em, all two I own, but sometimes its just too much fire power for the job”. “I thought you Firemen liked fires”, I said through a steaming mouthful of chowder.
To be honest, many days I ate a cold sandwich when I wanted something more or hot, but was too lazy to haul the stove with me. Mostly because of its bulk and the addition of a five pound tank. And how would it look if I was to get caught cooking on some other product than what I sold?

“Why don’t you guy’s build something smaller for times like these”, Troy queried. If I had a dollar for every time I’ve been ask that in the past four years I could retire.  So as you can see we finally did it.  Now there is a stable of cooking heat for every occasion.

I’ve been hauling our Teton around for the past couple weeks to see just how well it applies to what I do. I’ll keep you informed till I run out of applications. Looking forward to hearing and seeing some of your adventures on the blog

I’d become almost stir crazy being within yards of them for over 4 hours with my bow and not getting the shot opportunity I needed.
What I’d learned hunting them with my bow the past week helped me secure my feast for the 26th of November. But it took a shotgun this day to close the deal. Now it was time for ham and eggs and a hot cup while I reflected on the great days afield turkeys had provided for me this past season.

The weekend was a success in more ways than one; fish were caught and brought home only to be thrown into a brine bath. The tasty fate of the Smoke Vault awaited the oversized rainbow trout. The brine was simple; buy it from Hi Mtn Seasonings out of Riverton, WY. They make a few different versions and variations of the brine but I went with the Wild River Trout Brine and was not disappointed. The instructions recommended 24 hours of ice cold soaking but I favored to the longer side and ended up getting them out around 30 hours. Rinse them well in tap water and pat dry, followed by laying them out in the smoker that has been pre-heated to 180 degrees.

Eight and a half hours later the wait and smell paid off, fillets of fresh caught and smoked steelhead! Thanks so much Thane, Judi and crew, you guys are the best!

SM

The dredge and cast iron is the key to this recipe. After that the seasoning is to your flavor. But I was surprised with the luck I had with the Log Cabin Grub seasoning.

After you clean and cut up your pheasant prepare a flour dredge with your seasoning blended in.
Cover the pheasant with the dredge

I like the solid Crisco vegetable oil and use about a cup of it in a 14 inch Dutch oven to brown the pheasant pieces. The 14 inch Dutch oven gives me a bit more surface to do more at one time. In this case I was using three pheasants.

After all the pieces are brown I load the oven back up with the pheasant and then add a cup of diced onions spread on top.

I cover the oven and put it on a very low heat. I used the Dutch Oven Cover and in an hour it was fall from the bone time.
I unloaded the Pheasant and place it on a tray in the home oven to stay warm while I made flour gravy from the drippings in the oven. That also helped with oven clean up.
Mashed potatoes, garden peas, baking powder biscuits topped it all off on the side…and then of course the family.

• Five gallon food grade brine bucket
• 14 pound turkey
• One gallon water
• One gallon Cranberry Juice (or equivalent in concentrate, more if desired)
• One pound brown sugar
• Three Tablespoons cinnamon
• One cup Kosher Salt

Dissolve all ingredients in brine bucket. Add turkey and seal lid. Turkey and brine should be kept at 41 degrees or less. I keep mine on the deck on the North side of my house where I can watch the outside temperature.

November is usually conducive for this. If I do one earlier, I pack it in ice in a cooler and change the ice out as it melts. After removing the turkey rinse it and pat dry. Sprinkle, if desired, a paprika based seasoning on the bird to help color it. Add 1/2 cup of olive oil to the Ultimate Roaster. Spray the sides and cone down with non stick spray.

Place the bird over the cone, cover with lid. I start the bird out on Low over the 30,000 btu Camp Chef burner.  Once I hear it start to sizzle inside (apx. 20 minutes) I will reduce the flame to about half of low using the setting between off and high. If it is colder out or windy I may bring the heat up some. Using a Dutch oven trivet will allow you to turn up your burner in higher winds and not burn the bottom of the bird because you create a cushion away from the direct high flame.

This bird took 90 minutes and went into the pot extremely cold. You can pre-heat the lid to speed cooking time. I used a thermometer until the breast was 165 degrees. Allow to sit 20 minutes before carving.

Tip- Bone the meat off the Breast in two sections then cut the sections cross ways for a more tender cut of meat.

Follow the Turkey Throwdown on the Camp Chef Facebook Page.

Find great prices on products used in the Turkey Throwdown at OutdoorCooking.com.

For my turkey, I decided to go with a quick cooking method that I could do in the oven.  I used our Infusion Roaster in a pan, but you could also do the same thing with the Turkey Cannon and place it in your own roasting pan.

I started with a 14 pound turkey.  For the outside rub I used an olive oil, and then added a generous amount of rosemary garlic seasoning.  I then separated the skin from the breast meat, and slid two slices of bacon up under the skin on both sides of the breast.

After placing the turkey onto the infusion roaster you can fill the tube with your liquid.  For this turkey I used chicken broth, and then added some crushed garlic into the liquid.  After that I plugged up the tube with half an apple to prevent the liquid from evaporating out the end.

After the turkey was on the infusion roaster, I added three cut up onions, chopped celery, and whole garlic cloves to the roasting pan.  I also added more chicken stock to the roasting pan to prevent burning.

I put the turkey in a 400 degree oven and cooked it for 30 minutes.  After the 30 minutes, turn the heat down to 350, and continue cooking for another 30 minutes.  After the first hour, I pulled the turkey out of the oven and added my bacon weave to the top of the turkey breasts, securing it on the ends with toothpicks.

Place back in the oven and cook for another 30-45 minutes, or until a meat thermometer reads 165-170 degrees.  Let sit 20-30 minutes before carving.

Follow the Turkey Throwdown on the Camp Chef Facebook Page.

Find great prices on products used in the Turkey Throwdown at OutdoorCooking.com.

On Sunday morning I mixed up the brine.  I have used the same brine recipe for about 10 turkeys now and have had success every single time.  The turkey always ends up clean right to the bone.  The bird soaked for about 24 hours in the following brine mixture:

This morning I arrived at work and began smoking the 13 pound bird over apple wood chips at about 8:00am.  I tried to maintain a temperature on the smoker of about 275 degrees.  For added flavor and moisture I placed the turkey on a Beer Can Chicken Holder (BCH1) with a can of beer.  Once the temperature heats up, the beer boils and steams the inside of the turkey throughout the cooking.  I added wood chips twice more each 1 1/2 hours to make sure and hit the bird hard with some amazing apple smoke.

At 1:00pm the turkey was reading 160 degrees in the breast portion and it was time to remove it from the heat.  I brought the turkey inside and carved it.  The entire platter was clean within minutes.  The office consensus was that the smoker created the most excellent flavor.  There is just no going wrong when it comes to smoking food.  This method is sure to have everybody’s mouths watering.  Try it out this Thanksgiving.

Follow the Turkey Throwdown on the Camp Chef Facebook Page.

Find great prices on products used in the Turkey Throwdown at OutdoorCooking.com.