2023 Thanksgiving Turkey

If you've been following along on my blog, you already knew that ...

1) I was going to smoke a turkey for Thanksgiving. 

2) I was planning on Spatchcocking and halving it on my weber kettle. 

3) I was going to use Crack as my spicing.

This past Thursday was Thanksgiving, and I did indeed smoke a spatchcocked turkey on my Weber kettle and spiced it with Crack.

Since 2018, which was the year I started becoming obsessed with BBQ, I've been in charge of making the Thanksgiving turkey outside on my smoker.

3 Redheads and a Blonde

I feel like I've brewed a lot of Amber / Red beers lately. Currently, I have 4 homebrews on tap, and they are all in that color range.

• Falling Leaves Autumn Saison ... my Autumn "Seasonal Saison". Sort of an Oktoberfest with a French Saison character.
  
  
• Steamacularly Common ... a "California Common" brewed in tribute of Anchor Steam upon closing of the brewery.
  
  
• Buckwheat's Belgium Pale Ale ... SheppyBrew classic BPA. Favorite of the Beer Model. Currently the lightest in color, but still in that amber range. 

• Humdinger of a Hootenanny ... Kentucky Common. currently the darkest of the beers I have on tap. Almost a "brunette", but still in the red range.

 

Chicken Crack

You might remember in Humdinger of a Brisket, that I went down a little rabbit hole that included hitting my 2020 Thanksgiving Turkey post.

I had used Crack Seasoning on that Turkey, and I remember liking it quite a bit.

I decided to track some down and grabbed some for this year's Thanksgiving Turkey.

As I was ordering the spice, I saw they now have "Spicy Crack Seasoning", and I picked some of that up along with the "Original Crack Seasoning".

I had to try it out, and I had planned to cook a chicken, so I used the Spicy Crack Seasoning on my chicken last Sunday.

Humdinger of a Brisket

Soooo ... As I am typing this post, I just went through a weird rabbit trail to realize I had not posted my latest Brisket cook ...

I just picked up "Crack" because I remembered that I really enjoyed it on my 2020 Thanksgiving Turkey.

As I was looking through Turkey posts on this blog, I started looking through Smoked posts.

At some point ... I started looking through Brisket posts, and saw that my last one was my Easter Brisket from earlier this year.

I thought that was weird ... because I knew I had cooked a brisket much more recently than that. 

In fact, I cooked one just on the 29th, which as I type this, was Sunday of last week.

I cooked one on my Humdinger of a Hootenanny (Batch 345) brew day. I'm absolutely sure I intended to blog about it. But, I have not. Yet. Until now.

Smoked Chicken Bombs

I subscribe to and watch various BBQ Youtube channels. One of my favorites is Hey Grill Hey.

Recently, Susie had a video called Amazing Smoked Chicken Bombs with a cheesy jalapeno center! So easy anyone can can do it!.

 

Golly Jeepers Wild Mango Ale (Batch 346)

If you read Roll-a-Style 13 ... Wild Specialty Beer, you know that Saturday was Learn to Homebrew Day, and that I brewed Golly Jeepers Wild Mango Ale.

My friend "Doc" wanted to host another brew day, so I headed over to his "brewery".

Generally, when I "Travel Brew", I like to start my mash at home and let it convert during the drive over. Then, when I arrive I can just transfer to a boil kettle and therefore have a head-start.

I do this in my old-style gott cooler / propane burner system.

But, my friend "Du" also was heading over, and he asked to use a propane burner and boil kettle.

E is for El Rancho Colorado

We're well on our way through round 5 of A to Z Breweries Series of Posts.

A is for AC Golden Tank Room

B is for Black Shirt Brewing Company

C is for Cannonball Creek Brewing Company

D is for Diebolt Brewing Company

So far, so good. No issues at all filling out the alphabet.

As you probably can figure out, it is time to get to something that starts with the letter "E". Unlike the past couple of letters, we only really had one choice ....

E is for El Rancho Colorado

Roll-a-Style 13 ... Wild Specialty Beer

I brewed Humdinger of a Hootenanny (Batch 345) the weekend before Learn to Homebrew Day. I obviously had to have something to brew on the first Saturday of November (today if you're reading this the day it publishes)

About the time I discovered that I Lied about the 2021 BCJP Categories ... I came across some Wildbrew Philly Sour yeast in my favorite local homebrew shop.

That yeast has been sitting in my fridge since then, and I always had expected I'd use it to brew a Category 28. American Wild Ale with it.

I decided that Learn to Homebrew Day would be the day. It was on my Roll-a-Style list ... so ...

I pretended to roll the Online 20 sided die and pretended that I rolled ... 13

13 corresponds to 28C. Wild Specialty Beer, a pretty wide-open style.

An American Wild Ale with fruit, herbs, spices, or other Specialty-Type Ingredients.

I decided to go with a simple base beer with mango fruit. The "Wild" character would come from the Wildbrew Philly Sour yeast.

My recipe is 

Humdinger of a Hootenanny (Batch 345)

I brewed on a snowy Sunday this past weekend.

Due to poor planning, this was probably my worst brew day in awhile, but a bad brew day is better than a good work-day, so it was still pretty good.

I'm sure the beer will still turn out great.

If you read this blog and are able to remember, you may know what I was planning on brewing next as I mentioned it in Roll-a-Style 9 ... Historical Beer: Kentucky Common.

This was my 345th batch ever. My 20th of 2023. My 63rd batch of beer brewed in my Anvil Foundry.

It was a new recipe, my 222nd unique recipe since I started brewing beer (if I am counting correctly).

Humdinger of a Hootenanny