A couple of you doing smoked spaghetti sauce inspired me to try it out with a few of the extra tomatoes and jalapenos we have in the garden. (I was going to throw in a green bell pepper too, but there was a tiny green peeper frog on the pepper when I went to pick it, which startled me and I screamed and it kind of put me off bell peppers for the evening.) Shucks, I could have gotten some teensy smoked frog legs out of the deal too, dang it!!
Sauce turned out lovely-- I think next time I might leave them the smoker for longer to amp up the smoke taste, and probably throw the pork sausage onto the grill for some smoke as well.
While I had the MAK fired up, I thought I'd put on a couple of lamb shanks that I'd thawed earlier so they could join in on the smoking fun!
I think I had them on for a couple of hours total-- they took on some great color, and oh man did they smell good!
I marinated them in olive oil, garlic, rosemary, mustard seed, and paprika (my rough recollection of meathead's Dolly Lamb paste). Since we didn't have any large zipper bags to hold them, I put them in a vacuum sealer bag and sucked most of the air out before popping them in the fridge overnight.
Yesterday morning they went into the crockpot to slow braise-- I just dumped all the rub in with some chicken broth (all I had on hand) and let it cook away while James and I went to work! I tossed in some onions and cubed sweet potatoes when I came home for lunch.
We got home after work and I whipped up some cheesy grits and gravy made from the crockpot juices, and we had ourselves one fine Tuesday night dinner!!
