Well today got off to a bad start, the weather was awful, I got wet walking Lenny (my Springer Nutter), the Sunday drivers were out early and I forgot to bring the Silverside in to work to smoke on our demo Kamado, Perfect! Still son number three to the rescue as he dropped the beef in on the way to his work so I light the kamado and prepped the meat when it arrived.
I'm a big fan of the chimney starters for using charcoal BUT it is not wise to use on your ceramic kamado as the sudden heat from pouring red hot charcoal onto cold ceramic can cause it to crack (I hear a bunch of you going 'oh that's why it happened') so it is best to pour your charcoal (lumpwood NOT briquettes) into the bottom, put two or three Eco Starters into the charcoal and light. This way the ceramic warms up and expands slowly and no damage is done! I also put a chunk of oak onto the coals to give a lovely smoky colour and flavour to the beef, don't forget to do this when you are smoking meat.
So I unwrapped my incredible value beef, removed the net (what's that about?) and used the same rub combo as I used on my brisket last week, Tubby Toms Wake The Dead on the fat side and Cowa Bunga on the meat side as the brisket last week was delicious. The intention was to let it set for 15 minutes or so and put it on the grill around 11:30 to let is smoke at 135 C for two hours or so then wrap it at 52 C and take it home with me to rest and to carry on cooking up to 56 (ish) C to give me a medium rare piece of beef.
That was the plan but fortunately we were very busy in the shop so the meat didn't actually go on until 12:30 so it's now sitting at 190 C in the kamado to speed the cook up as I have plans for this afternoon and can't stay on at the shop. After an hour it was looking good and smelling better and at an internal of 44 C so not long to go and should be ready to wrap by the time I'm shutting up shop.
Not everything has to be cooked low 'n' slow to taste delicious. If you only have a couple of hours then throw it on the barbecue anyway, it only takes that long to get a lovely smoke flavour!
What ever you cook cook it outside and share it with friends and family, that's the key to a happy life!