Cooking with the Man. .. . The Hubbs . . . .

The hubbs got a pellet grill for Christmas this year and he has driven me crazy about it.  This was one of those gifts that he wanted and researched and picked out what he thought would be the very best one.  He has done nothing but talk about it for two and half weeks prior to Christmas.  I do not begrudge my sweet hubby something that he wants, he works very hard and we have the cash to buy it and he does do his research on the best brand, type and what company has the best deal.  I am so thankful that the best deal on this grill was local, otherwise we would have been trecking all over to find one. 
It was delivered on Friday and he did the initial burn and then on Saturday he smoked a ham.  Neither of the boys like ham very much but they both raved over the one the hubbs smoked.  I must say it was a pretty good ham.  We went shopping today and I have fixed a meatloaf and it is currently resting with the smoker.   I will share with ya later how it was.  We also bought a pork butt to smoke this weekend.  Hanging out with the family tonight, very low key New Years in our house.  Spending some quality time with the boys. 
This smoker grill thing is pretty high tech, you can sync it with your wifi and your phone and it will send alerts when your food has reached optimal temperature.  I have to admit that is very cool. 
Here are a few pictures of this very tech savy pellet grill and my boys.

My Loves

The Hubbs new love 

The meatloaf  cooking  

I will share later how the loaf was.  I have had smoked meatloaf before at one of our local BBQ restaurants and it was really good.   I hope mine will be good too.  

Stay tuned as we prepare for 2020:  Sprat will have his first official college lacrosse season, Big T will start his junior year lacrosse season,  and I might get to go to Maine and see Sprat play.  

Pepper Poppers . . .

Our garden has really been producing this year, we have had good rain and lots of sunshine.  I think our tomatoes are going to do well also.  I am looking forward to the hubbs salsa and if you are good I might share his recipe with you, it is super secret don't you know.   He also makes pepper jelly that is so good.  If you have never had pepper jelly you need to try it, you might have seen it at Christmas over cream cheese or Brie with crackers.  It is usually red but it could be green too.  You can buy it in the grocery store and those fancy specialty shops.  Make sure you do not get the mint jelly because they have that too along the same isle.  Pepper jelly is a blend of sweet and hot and it is yummy with cream cheese and crackers.  I told you I do not can, well I fibbed just a bit, we have canned pepper jelly before successfully.  I hope we will get to make some this year.
Our peppers are just starting to come in and the hubbs is already picking them.  We had them stuffed on the grill over the fourth.  Several years ago we picked up a pepper popper grill pan, it has holes to put your peppers in to hold them upright on your grill.   This is a wonderful pan to have if you like stuffed peppers.   For our peppers, the hubbs browns some ground meat and then blends with a block of cream cheese and a taco seasoning packet.  This goes in the fridge to chill just a bit while he cores his peppers.  The cream cheese mixture needs to chill a bit so it will not run out of your peppers or be to mushy.  Once you have your peppers ready stuff them with your mixture, if your peppers are too small to sit up in the popper pan you can stick a long tooth pick through them to help hold them up.  We do this for the jalapeno peppers because they are usually smaller than the other peppers we use.  I like to dip mine in a little sour cream too when I get ready to eat them.  These are wonderful on the grill.