Getting Ready For Some Football Canadian Style

[oakville smoker]

Hi all

This Sunday is the end of the football season here in Canada.  Its called the CFL, the Canadian Football League or sometimes the Crazy Football League.  Its 3 down football versus the 4 played by our southern neighbors, played on a longer and wider field.  My team sucked this year ( Toronto Argonauts ) well they sucked last year and the year before that I think ( starting to feel like I live in Buffalo with the Bills )  and now I find myself working on my French so I can support the eastern team, Montreal.  The league tries to create some regional rivalry, east vs west, and almost screwed that up this year.  But I digress.

As a good Canadian, a decent smoker, and the need to drink copious amounts of booze and eat things from the smoker, I am assuming the responsibility of hosting the Grey Cup party this year.  It's a tough job but someone has to do it.  The Grey Cup is the trophy being played for.  I am playing for no hang over Monday morning !

Of course I need a menu as there will be food:  Sounds like pulled pork to the rescue.  My plan is to marinate for 48 hours, smoke for 4 hours probably with mesquite and then move it into the slow cooker for an overnight cook on low.  The temps here are sub 30s at night now and it makes it pretty tough on the DBS to fight the cold.  Plus I would rather do a long cook in the slow cooker than the DBS for safety reasons.  The butt is about 7.5 pounds and I am betting on an 18 to 20 hour cook time?.  If its done early, I will just FTC till dinner?  Of course I will make some BBQ sauce to serve along side and maybe even serve the sauce warm along side the pulled pork.

Since this is primarily a male gathering and there will be profanity, intestinal gas expulsions and probably some burps, we probably need another kind of meat.  I am thinking I will smoke a whole flank stank, ( I just happen to have one in the freezer ) then low and slow it in the DBS, let it rest and put it on the slicer.  Add some onions, peppers and cheese and some fresh made bread ( probably a baguette of some kind sliced down the middle and slathered in butter, EVOO and garlic and it becomes my version of a Philly cheese steak Sammie.  Think this will work?

I have a briskett getting happy in the fridge now transforming to pastrami.  Steaming hot it will be served.

And for a touch of Canadiana, I have about 8 pounds of peameal bacon curing in the fridge right now.  Whats more Canadian than back bacon on a bun and a cold beer with an alchol content higher than 5%?

A home made tater salad, maybe I will smoke the taters, will round things out and turn it all into tater salad on Saturday, post game day. 

Salad will come in a 12 oz bottle containing all of the food groups.  Grains, wheat, barley, malt, water for hydration to be served with a dressing known as "head", or foam on top of the glass.  In more scientific circles, its known as beer.   LOL

No game day work for me.  Serve yourself strategy.  For me at least, English will become optional by half time and a good time should be had by all except anyone from Regina who will have their little green noses rubbed in French Canadian do do !

[KevinG]

Sounds like a good time. Too bad we don't get to see that sport down here. Would be interesting to compare the two games. But with all that food it might be worth a trip up north   ;) :D

[Ka Honu]

... For me at least, English will become optional by half time ...

If you're not speaking fluent Martian by the middle of the second quarter, something is definitely wrong - a plan is only as good as its execution. 

[FLBentRider]

Sounds like a plan to me.

Have a good time!

[oakville smoker]

But will the food strategy work?
Enough time for the pulled pork?  Will the flank steak strategy work?

Kevin, the cannuck game tends to be a game played in the air, the ball is changing hands more frequently, not nearly the same proportion of running in our game as in yours.  A QB needs to have an arm up here and know how to use it.  Run the ball on first down, get 3 or 4 yards and then have to make 6 or 7 yards or kick the ball away as you run out of downs.  The NFL can put me to  sleep if its an exhibition of 280 pound guys running a touch over 3 yards every series and slowly moving the ball down the field.  But I have friends that drool over the NFL.  Maybe its the tail gate parties, not sure.  Having said that, I always wonder why the NFL games are not higher scoring.

[Ka Honu]

... I have friends that drool over the NFL.  Maybe its the tail gate parties, not sure....

It's likely the cheerleaders (and Faith Hill).

[classicrockgriller]

IMO, I'd do the pulled pork asap and pull it, mix it, and fridge it. Let everybody get to know each other and re-heat at game time. That will take some pressure off. I think it taste better the next day. It's just not as dramatic as pulling your pork in front of your friends. ;D ;D

[Quarlow]

OMG CRG that was bad even for you. ;D ;D ;D

[classicrockgriller]

oaksmok, here is a link to vaunted vinegar sauce by Habs that is easy to fix and can sit as another add-on sauce.

http://www.susanminor.org/forums/showthread.php?p=99#post99

[oakville smoker]

Thanks much.
I started laughing out loud when I read CGs reply about pulling your pork out in front of your friends.
A few years ago I was on a vacation in Pto Vallarta and a local guy kept calling his male apendage his "pork"
You might have had to be there for this one, but damn this was hillarious

I just might start this on Friday night instead of Saturday and pull it out of the crock pot Saturday night.
Sauce sounds good and it will be there beside my "pork"

I have a feeling this thread could get piggish but thats where pork comes from? right ?

[classicrockgriller]

Your friends will be impressed with your pork. ;D

[Slamdunk]

"My team sucked this year ( Toronto Argonauts ) well they sucked last year and the year before that I think ( starting to feel like I live in Buffalo with the Bills )"

Oakville, come on, you have the Toronto Argonauts only sucking for 3 years??? It's longer than that!! Although you did beat my team - the BC Lions this year.

How about your beloved hockey team - the Toronto Maple Laughs - they've sucked for - what? - 44 years?? And now you've got our ol' ex-GM to straighten things out ??? Good going and good riddance!! I hear all the pubs back there are advertising free beer if the Laughs make the playoffs!! I don't think they like the Laughs chances!!

However you're a fellow smoker so I will give you the benefit of the doubt..even if you are an Easterner...

I'm doing something similar this w/e for Grey Cup. A friend of mine who is a transplanted Saskatchewan Rider fan is hosting a Grey Cup party as his team is in the game. For our neighbours to the South, the Rider fans are very similar to the Oakland Raider fans, except Raider fans are a little more reserved.

So, I've volunteered to bring some goodies to the 20 or so all-male (ya, we aren't inviting the ladies either - too much chatting, not enough burping and testing what direction the wind is blowing) party.

I've got 5 pounds turkey jerky in the brine. And am just testing the buttermilk brine chicken wings - half with Frank's hot sauce and the other with Garlic spare rib sauce.

Then on Game day - about three dozen ABTs.

The host is providing the garlic sausages, chili etc.

Oh, and I'll be Drinking good ol' Canadian beer.....

[Quarlow]

Barring the fact that "THE MAPLE LEAFS SUCK"  and as I am from B.C., I must remind you that ..........oh .....it's been what........is it 76 or 77 years since the Canucks won the S cup..........ooops did I say that outloud. My bad.

[oakville smoker]

What can I say to that.  The Argos have sucked since John Candy's demise.  You have to be over 40 apparently to throw a football in this town.  No one will ever say that I am  the smartest guy for cheering for a losing franchise.    However if I was a BC fan, I would be  drowning my sorrows in Brador beer and eating myself to death with artery closing smoked meat from Scwartzs or Dunns watchinga girl swing on a pole on St Catharines Street right now.

As far as the hockey team that apparently plays in this city, thank god I am not a fan.  In the olden days I worked myself through school being an usher at Maple Leaf Gardens and had to go to every Leaf game for 5 years whether I wanted to or not !  Its a little like drinking way too much tequilla, getting sick as a dog, wishing death on yourself and never being able to drink the stuff again.  Same with the Leafs.  having said that, I have to attend a Leaf game for a business meeting in a couple of weeks and I would rather have my wisdom team pulled through my lower extremities with no gas, than have to sit through this.  Especially when a beer in that place is 13 bucks !  A beer and a thible of wine last Thursday at the Jimmy Buffett concert set me back 22 bucks and I am sure there was no more than 3 or 4 ounces in the wine glass.

I will now go and work on my French.  I must support the Als.  Calvillo killed the guys from BC on Sunday that apparently showed up pretending to be a football team.  Even my Argos might have fared better.


Just thinking,tis post gives a whole new meaning tp pulled pork.  LOL

[Slamdunk]

Quarlow, I think it's only 30 years isn't it!!  :'( :'( - still better than the Laughs!! Oh, do you mean the Vancouver Millionaires?? I don't even think the original 6 NHL teams were in existence then!! So I don't count those years before the Canucks were born.

And Oakville, yes my Lions were totally embarrased by a much better team!! Although I didn't cry in my beer - I did have more than my normal allotment to drown my sorrows.