According to Smoky
HAMBURGERS & HOTDOGS
EVERYONE'S FAVORITE
Welcome to According to Smoky. Here you will find the latest and greatest from C. Clark "Smoky" Hale notable 'baster', author, publisher, television star in both the barbecue and 'the real' world. And yes, he is a real person and not the webmaster.
Smoky will be offering his talents, techniques and secrets discovered over the last 150 years, or so. He will be to the point, pull no punches and if you suffer through the process, you will become a much better outdoor cook, turning out masterpiece meals for friends and family alike.
He continues our education with the truly American food - Hambugers & Hotdogs! . . . . . take notes!
So, with no further adieu, we turn the mike to Smoky. You're on Smoky . . . . .
Thanks PC,
THE ARTFUL HAMBURGER
More affronts to good taste have been committed in the name of hamburger than in the name of art. "Hamburger" is as wantonly applied to the rubbery disk of mis-begotten menagerie meat and adulterants served in fast food houses as is to an aptly appointed artwork of a master griller working with premium ingredients. A thick ration of heavy, aged ground beef, masterfully grilled, and sheathed in generous slices of dense, fresh bread is magnificent, unadorned. With a little horseradish, piquant mustard and romaine lettuce, it can traumatize a rabid vegetarian.
When Leonardo set out to paint Mona, he didn't use wax crayons. Ground beef is pigment which can be used to create a Mona Lisa or an obscenity. If you plan to do a Mona, choose your pigment carefully. Select meat specifically for hamburgers. Proper meat for hamburger is freshly ground heavy, aged, lean beef. "Extra lean" lacks enough fat for flavor and texture and falls apart on the grill; "regular grind" fades away to become a mere memory of itself. It also causes flame-ups.
Select a nice chuck roast and, if you do not grind your own, have the butcher trim and grind it for you. Then you know the flavor, freshness and meat/fat ratio to expect. Several other cuts are tasty, but chuck is my favorite for hamburgers. Sirloin, rump and round will also work. If it has a bone, save it for stock. If the butcher is unable or unwilling to custom grind and time is short, choose the freshest (pale red) package of ground lean meat. Find another meat market before you buy again.
A meat grinder or grinding attachment on your mixer or food processor is a worthwhile investment for your kitchen. It puts you in control of quality, and, with ground meat, freshness is essential to quality. It also means that your ground meat is not going through a grinder which has just run a ton of meat of questionable character.
Personally, I never buy ground meat, but grind, at home, the meat I use. You can also trim roasts and grind the small pieces to save and cook later. The ability to grind other foods makes the grinder a handy kitchen implement. Get the sausage stuffer attachment, also. Think of brats, Italian, kielbasa, chorizo and other tasty stuffed items. Among other uses, it stuffs manicotti.
If you don't make your own, find some good bread. The undercooked froth of bleached wheat flour posed as hamburger buns lacks flavor, nutrition and texture - unpalatable even to discerning bread mold. Suitable bread must, first of all, maintain its integrity while supporting a juicy hamburger. Bread should pleasure the eye like a plump Rubens nude and seduce the nose with promises; reveal sensual texture and give earthy sustenance. Choose any proper size, hefty rolls which tempt you or a loaf of hearty bread to be sliced into supporting roles. Later, I'll tell you how to make your own. 
Choose greenery and condiments to complete the scene that your palate has envisioned. Iceberg lettuce has only crunch and pallid color; try a lettuce of substance, fresh spinach, cress or chard. Fresh, curly mustard leaves are a piquante surprise. Grated horseradish, mustard of choice, mayonnaise, sliced tomatoes and sweet onions, with perhaps grated cheese, sliced dill pickles and Greek peppers on the side, ought to do nicely. Remove catsup and "steak sauce" from the premises.
Now another flavoring opportunity presents itself. "To season or not to season?" is the question. Shoot them straight for a few times - no seasoning in the meat before broiling. ( I never salt before broiling.) We will cover some seasoning variations in the future. Shape the meat into firm patties to fit your bread and about 3/4" thick and of even thickness.
Allow to warm to room temperature. Fire up the grill.
When all the trimmings are prepared, the grill should be right, with charcoal glowing red and the heat so intense that you cannot hold your hand within two inches of the grill for more than a couple of seconds. If you are cooking with gas, turn to the highest setting and keep the lid closed until ready.
Gently place the meat on the grill. If the temperature is right, meat will seize to the grill. Do not move or turn the patties until each releases. As soon as they release, turn them. When the second side releases, remove and serve.
There should be no flame-up from the lean meat, but if flames appear, close the lid.
The meat will be uncharred on the outside and medium to medium rare on the inside. Juicy and delicious. Cover with condiments and bread and experience a real hamburger.
That's a hamburger! Maybe, not quite a Mona, but even Leonardo did preliminary sketches.
HOT DOGS
"You can't teach an old dog new tricks."
Right after marshmallows, most people learn how to cremate a wiener. The kid who has never burned a hot dog on a little fire outdoors is truly deprived. Hot dogs have the exceptional characteristic that no matter how bad, or how burned or how gritty, one is always good to a kid. God knew what he was doing when he put hunger amongst us.
Hot dogs are reputed the item most often cooked on a grill. Somewhere around four billion pounds are consumed each year raw, boiled or roasted. Those of us in the know, realize that those cooked on a grill aren't actually roasted, they are more likely broiled - and most likely burned.
Because they are so popular, I thought hot dogs deserved a decent dissertation. So I went down to the local commissary and checked out the offerings.
Nothing is as simple as it used to be.
In addition to the traditional weenie of ground up pork and beef parts, there are a lot of strangers. Chicken, turkey and soybeans have joined the crowd, along with the beef people's representatives. In the interests of science, I got one of each. All except the soybean, that is. As far as I know, I eat soy beans in tofu and soy sauce - with emphasis on the soy sauce.
Since my fondest memories of hot dogs are associated with baseball games, where weenies were generally steamed or boiled. Therefore, as a bench mark, I ran the first batch through boiled. My all-time favorite hot dog is a fat weenie, generously slathered with mustard, chopped onions and sauerkraut and bedded down in a bun that stays together long enough to be consumed. This fond flavor was developed in the years when every town with more than two barber shops had a semi-pro baseball team that played on Thursday and Sunday afternoons. That hot dog remains the all-time best fifteen cent bargain. A nickel drink still left enough money from a quarter for a bag of peanuts. (That was after I had walked six miles, each way, to school - through the snow.)
With my benchmark newly polished on the palate, I carefully marked cryptic identification on each variety and invited some friends with sons of immense appetites and indiscriminate palates. I told the parents that I was grilling steaks, waiting until they arrived to clarify that they were "tube steaks".
As a matter of pure research, I also tested a theory that had come to me in the wee hours of the morning - whence come brilliant thoughts that need to be quickly written down and captured before they escape forever. With the weight of weenie wonders weighing heavily, I had for some weeks entertained the idea of simmering weenies in one of my legendary basting sauces, before putting it on the grill, thereby transforming this close cousin to a road kill into an elegant example of gastronomic ecstasy.
Had I not properly fortified myself I would, no doubt, have trembled in anticipation.
But, alas, another bolt of bedtime brilliance bit the boards. Smoky's First Law of Weenies is, "It is easier to grow pearls inside hickory nuts than to change the taste of weenies."
Not one to falter in the face of foul fortune, I prepared a superb assortment of green woods for subtle flavoring on the grill. Presenting statistically valid samples to carefully controlled conditions, I grilled each lot to perfection. True to tradition, I properly burned some. When done, I cut each weenie in half, to allow precise testing on a properly primed palate.
The results of the tests were clear and decisive. Those who like hot dogs, liked them.
Smoky's Second Law of Weenies is, "It is easier to grow pearls inside hickory nuts than to change the taste of weenies."
The all-beef and the all-turkey varieties got highest marks. Price and promotion proved irrelevant. Everybody was surprised by the variety. Proving the theory that most people just take a bite of whatever is in their hand and keep on talking.
In summary, hot dogs are still a viable victual that most kids and many adults enjoy. They are quick, easy and nutritious. Don't try to improve them.
Keep the temperature lower than for normal broiling. If you drop the temperature to around 300 degrees, have patience and a sturdy grill, you can let the kids do their own. Allow a few extra for the dogs, dirt and burnt offerings. Afterwards, stir up the coals, add more charcoal and relax until the grill is ready to cook whatever you intend to eat.
Don't forget to have a good time.
Philosophically, weenies aren't quite as good as I remembered nor nearly as bad as I expected. Gastronomically, they are not likely to change.
Good gobbling to all,
© 1999 by Smoky Hale
8168 Hwy 98 E.
McComb, MS 39648
Smoky's 5th basic position for really great barbecue'n.
'According to Smoky' is (c) by C. Clark Hale
who is solely responsible for its content. Comments
should be addresses to cchale@bellsouth.net
Barbecue'n On The Internet has been serving millions and millions of satisfied readers every
year since February 3, 1996