Blog

IMG_0606.JPG

The Holidays are right around the corner. Nothing gets us more excited than to smoke 30+ turkeys for Thanksgiving. So let’s get started explaining how we go about smoking Thanksgiving turkeys.

First, you want to start out with a quality bird. We get our birds from Otto’s Turkey Farm in Middleville, MI. These are fresh, antibiotic free, free range turkeys who eat a diverse diet. The best turkeys around, in our humble opinion. Sure, we could get frozen birds and save ourselves a one hour road trip, but nothing but the best for our customers.

Second, we are big believers in either injecting or brining poultry, but since we are short on space we are going to be injecting our birds. What do we mean about brining/injecting and what are the differences? Brining means pulling in moisture into something via osmosis. Since a piece of meat is like a classic membrane the presence of salt acts to pull water (moisture) inside the membrane. This is a good option, but you need a lot of space and you also run the risk of cross contaminating anything else that you might be serving. If you would like a ratio to create your own brine recipe a simple ratio to get started would be 4 tablespoons per 1 quart of water. The process of osmosis will also take any other flavorings through to your protein and we would recommend making a kind of chicken soup with carrots, celery, onions and garlic in your brine. Thyme always works with poultry as would tarragon, rosemary, marjoram and feel free to experiment, poultry is a blank slate that works well with lots of different seasonings.

Since we are not able to brine our birds due to space limitations, we will be injecting them using a Chopps Injection system. This bad boy has 4 needles that pump injections into anything in seconds and since we are going to be doing 30+ turkeys we are going to need that extra power. Since injections don’t take salt to help moisture through a membrane you can really use anything you want to inject. Lots of times we will use our rub in our injection to get that flavor all the way down to the bone. This leads me our next point, we are able to control exactly where we are putting our flavor into our protein. Sure you have to be careful about how you go about this, but we definitely see the benefit of doing it this way. If you are going to be injecting your protein, make sure that you start by going into the protein as far as you would like and then slowly push the injection in as you slowly pull out your injection needle out. Spread your injections about a ¼ in. apart and if you are doing tougher cuts like brisket make sure that you are injecting with the grain so that the injection works its way through your meat.

Third, what kind of rub should you use? Well, since your protein won’t be in the smoker long enough to develop that awesome bark we all love, you don’t have to use as much sugar in your rub if you don’t want too. We use a complex blend of different spices that I can’t share here, but a good place to start would be brown sugar, kosher salt, black pepper and chili powder and any other spices that you think that would work. Poultry skin can be a tricky thing in a smoker and you have to be careful that you don’t come out with rubbery skin. One simple solution is to finish off your bird in an oven at 400 degrees long enough to crisp up that skin. If you do try this be careful if you have a lot of sugar in your rub, it will burn if you are not careful.

Lastly, Thanksgiving is about bringing people together to remember what we are thankful for, each other. Sure the Lions are in first place this Thanksgiving, reason enough to celebrate, but nothing brings people together like good food. Nothing is as good as injected, rubbed and smoked turkey fresh from the farm. If you didn’t get the chance to check out one of our smoked birds, make sure that you make plans for next year. You will not be disappointed.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. Go Lions.

Pulled Pork.JPG

Pork Shoulders are great cuts of meat for smoking. They have lots of intramuscular fat and respond very well to low and slow cooking methods like you would have in a smoker. We will go into more detail about what exactly is a pork shoulder (Boston Butt) and how we go about smoking them.

Where did the term Boston Butt come from?

In pre-revolutionary New England and into the American Revolutionary War, New England butchers would take cuts of pork like hams and shoulders and pack them into barrels for storage and transport, known as a butt. This particular shoulder cut became known around the country as a Boston specialty, and hence it became the “Boston butt.”<2> In the UK it is known as “pork hand and spring”, or simply “pork hand”. Source: Wikipedia

Pork Cuts Saddleback.jpg

Why do people call ‘pork shoulders’ ‘pork butts’?

Spoiler alert, No, it’s not because it is the butt of the pig. The top of the pork shoulder that includes the shoulder blade is called a Boston Butt. As we mentioned above, this was because of how they were packed in the American Revolutionary War period. Hence the nickname emerged – ‘pork butt’. The lower portion that includes the bottom part of the shoulder and the upper arm of the hog, is called a picnic shoulder or picnic ham. Typically, most people use the Boston Butt – and that’s what we use at the restaurant. The Boston Butt’s have a consistent size and shape that we prefer and it’s what you see most frequently at the grocery store.

For the spice rub, we use a little different blend than we use on the brisket. For pork we use a sweeter rub that works well with pork. Pork is a blank slate, so to speak, and reacts well with a variety of spices. Since we do use more sugar in this rub it is important that you smoke at a lower temp, our temperature is usually around 225 degrees, so the rub doesn’t burn. Also, with the extra sugar we do get that nice bark that we have been talking about.

The shoulder is made up of quite a few muscles and has the shoulder blade right in the middle of it. Because of this, the shoulder does take quite a while to smoke. It takes up to 10 hours or more to be done and we shoot for 195 degrees to be pull-apart-tender. When we temp out our shoulders, we usually insert the thermometer right under the blade bone since the area around the bone takes longer to cook. We suggest you have a meat thermometer, but if you don’t, the shoulder blade coming out of the meat smoothly is usually a pretty good indicator that your meat is done.

For the sauce we like to have a vinegar component since it pairs so well with pork. Our Vinegar with Sriracha pairs very well and adds a heat element that we really enjoy. Also, our red sauce has vinegar in it and with its sweet, savory taste profile, it works very well. The good news is that most sauces will work well, so don’t be afraid to be adventurous.

Saddleback187(1of1).jpg

Saddleback27(1of1).jpg

bbq myths saddleback.jpg

First of all, we love it when people come in and want to talk BBQ. It’s a passion for us and we believe very strongly that we can always learn more about our craft. While we do take a lot of pride about our BBQ, we would do things differently if we were in a competition or on our own patio with our smokers at home (talk about taking your work home with you, at least in a good way). Here are some examples about what we mean.

Bonus Myth! – That Brisket is way too fatty!
-Added April 4, 2017

Brisket is a very fatty cut of meat, which also gives an incredible flavor and it’s one of the reasons that it works so well in the smoker. That fat bastes the brisket through the long process of smoking, giving it that rich beef flavor that everyone loves so much. But, you are in luck if you prefer a leaner cut of brisket. Since the brisket is made up of two muscles that are pretty different, everyone can win. The flat part of the brisket is much leaner and if that is what you prefer all you have to do is request the lean part of the brisket. If we have it left, usually that is the case, then we would be happy to serve it to you. If you prefer a juicier cut with a little more beef flavor ask for the moist end of the brisket.

Myth 6: You have to inject your meat for great BBQ!

We don’t inject any of our meat. We use only the top cuts of meat and we honestly don’t think that they need any enhancements to make them taste good. Plus, if we injected all of our meats it would take most of our day to get this accomplished. Not to mention the potential of cross contaminating something, which is always a big concern for any restaurant. Plus, most commercial injections contain MSG which a fair amount of people are allergic too.

Myth 5: Ribs need to be fall off the bone tender.

RIbs cooked till they fell off the bone in a smoker is just a poor decision. They are not even close to being as juicy and have no texture to them at all. Sure they need to be tender and you should be able to bite clean through them with little effort, but falling off the bone? That’s just blasphemy.

Myth 4: That crispy exterior on our meat is burnt.

That crispy crust is something we take a lot of pride in. First of all, that’s where we have put all of our seasonings so if you cut this off you take away most of the flavor. Sure it looks dark and it feels dry to the touch, but trust us, if you try it you will love it. A couple of weeks ago a customer came in and tried our ribs. He took one look at the bark and automatically thought they we going to be tough, dry, just plain overcooked. He was ecstatic when he bit into them and they were juicy, tender and full of flavor. Give it a try and you will be surprised when you want to ask for a piece with more bark.

Myth 3: All good BBQ is smothered in sauce.

We love sauce and think that it has a definite place in BBQ. However, we like the opportunity for our customers to try our BBQ and to taste the bark that we have tried so hard to create. Also, we believe that you should be able to taste the type of meat that you are eating. If you coat it in sauce you might not be able to get that experience. Please try our sauces, but first try our BBQ to get an idea of all the hard work that it took to bring it to your table,

Myth 2: Food that has a pink ring on the outside of the meat isn’t cooked.

What you are seeing there is what’s called the smoke ring. Not to get complicated, but the smoke combined with the protein combines to make a rosy color on the outside of the meat. You could never get undercooked meat on the outside, all meat cooks from the outside in. So if you see it, don’t worry, we check all of our BBQ for doneness with a digital instant read thermometer.

Myth 1: Restaurants should never run out of food.

Trust us, we agonize over how much to put on our smokers and we would love nothing more than to never run out of food. However, we only have so much room on our smokers. With Wu Tang Wings on Wednesdays, as an example, we can only fit so much on at a time. In order to make everything fit, we have to make some hard choices about what we might have to cut close to get wings on for that special one day special. Please be understanding when we sell out and don’t be afraid to call before you leave to make sure we have what you are looking for. With the exception of Burnt Ends on Friday, we will reserve anything else for you.

Since we started our blog we have been talking about quality blue smoke and how that’s the best seasoning that you can use on BBQ. In addition to that we need to also talk about rubs and their role in BBQ. What constitutes a rub and why is it so important?

First, rubs include, but are not limited to sugar, salt, black pepper and other assorted ingredients. A good general start to a good BBQ rub would be 2 parts brown sugar, 2 parts kosher salt, 1 part black pepper, 1 part chili powder and then you would round it out with a few of the following: garlic powder, cumin, thyme oregano, etc. Typically people make different rubs for beef, pork and poultry to better suit the different taste profiles. We have a different spice rub for all of our meats at Saddleback. We have a more savory rub for our brisket. A more sweet and spicy rub for pork. We have an all around rub for our chicken. We know there are lots of good commercial rubs out there, but in order to get the results in flavor and to create a great bark – we need to create our own.

Second, why are rubs so important to everything we do in BBQ? Well rubs have a direct effect on the creation of bark, the dark crispy outer coating on our briskets and pork shoulders. Think of toasting bread and its effect on not only the taste of the bread, but also the texture. Some see the dark, crispy outer coating and think it must be burnt. Oh no, that’s where the rub comes into creating that magical sensation of sweet, salty, crispy goodness. It makes any pitmaster die a little inside when someone cuts off what they think must only be burnt. With a good rub you also help attract good smoke onto your BBQ. The coarseness of our salt, sugar and black pepper help to “catch” the very fine particles in blue smoke. That’s why our BBQ will have that dark brown (almost black) color and you know that we have done our job right.

We will go into more depth on our rubs when we break down our meats and how we smoke each of them. Each one needs its own rub to not only help season the meat, but to also help create that great bark that we all love.

BD1ECAAD-CE85-4E9D-8859-D9D168D457F5.JPG

Did you know that we have our own garden? We have a garden plot down the street that we planted tomatoes, jalapenos, habaneros, pickling cucumbers and fresh herbs to use at the restaurant. Through the REO Town Garden Program we have a double plot lined up for next year. To take advantage of all of the new space, we are going to add collard greens, asparagus, tomatillos and potatoes. Also, we buy some of our produce from a local urban farmer to put the best and freshest produce on our menu. You can’t get better produce that you grow yourself or hyper local and let ripen on the vine instead of on a truck shipped in from outside of our great state.

Ever heard the term Scratch Kitchen? For us that means we start with basic ingredients and transform them into something special (No pre-made items here). Everything from our rubs, bbq sauces and sides are all made from scratch. Some items are a labor of love, like collard greens that take hours to perfect. Or in other cases we just feel that we can make something better than what’s offered commercially. For example, the spice rubs that we use on our meats.

We only source the best cuts of meat for our bbq. For example, we only use Certified Angus Beef or CAB for our briskets. Only the top 10% of Choice Beef makes the grade for CAB. These animals have room to graze, eat a diverse diet, and are better treated animals. You can really tell the difference in the quality of fat on CAB briskets. Fat on a commodity brisket is hard as a rock. Fat on a CAB brisket is nice and soft and is able to render down after 12+ hours in our smokers. Sure, we have tried different grades like Prime, Wagyu and Kobe briskets, but for us the comparison did not justify the price we would have to pay. By using CAB briskets, we feel that we are offering the best quality at a more reasonable price.

We don’t have microwaves or use freezers in our daily operations. Sure it would be easier to heat up things in a microwave or freeze something to use it later. Except this does not keep with our ethics about producing the best, freshest, quality food for you. Just like how we smoke our meats, low and slow with real wood fires, we make all of our food from scratch with the ingredients that we even grow ourselves.

If it was easy, everyone would do it. Sure we could do it the easy way and sleep more and have cheaper prices, but we want to deliver only the best possible bbq for you: Craft BBQ.

IMG_2398.JPG

At Saddleback, Craft BBQ all starts with the type of smoker that we use. We use a completely wood fired reverse flow smoker to get the best results. In order to get the best smoke possible to give you the best tasting food we have to burn all wood (no gas fired smokers here). Sure, it would be easier and we would sleep more if we used a gas fired smoker, but we think an all wood smoker offers our customers the best possible BBQ flavor.

What is a Reverse Flow Smoker?

Smokers are pretty primitive designs. You have a fire box to provide heat to cook your food and the smoke stack helps by pulling the heat and smoke across your food to flavor it. Where the fire box and smoke stack are located in relation to each other defines what type of smoker it is. With an offset smoker the stack is on the opposite side of the fire box and is offset to the fire box. On a reverse flow the fire box and stack are on the same side. The smoke travels down the length of the cooking chamber and then reverses and leaves the stack on the same side as the fire box. Why do we like the reverse flow? Well since the air is going down and then back it makes the temp in the cooking chamber more even. Also, we are able to add on another cooking chamber to the back of the main chamber directly above the fire box to cook on. Since we are limited by space to cook all of our proteins the extra space is very important.

What is the importance of all wood fired smokers in providing the best BBQ?

Great question. The best, most powerful seasoning for BBQ is smoke. Rubs are important and we will explain those in another blog, but they pale in comparison to good quality smoke. Smoke is made up of quite a few different chemicals, but what mostly flavors your food are the kinds that you can’t see with the naked eye. So the smoke that you can barely see, with just a slight blue tint, is what we are after. In order to get that type of smoke you need to have fires that have enough oxygen and are burning pretty efficiently. Air flow for us is of the most importance. We have actually lengthened our smoke stacks on our smokers so that they pull more air. We never, ever, use dampers to limit the flow of oxygen to our fires. Since our fires burn efficiently, with enough oxygen, we get that blue smoke we are after. Blue smoke has all the complexity that we know and love without the acrid, bitter after taste that you get with fires that burn inefficiently and have a distinctive white look to them.

If this was easy everyone would do it. We spend lots of time staring at fires and trying to predict what fires are going to do. We have to be able to keep our temps extremely consistent (225°f) for hours and hours. It takes dedication and patience to pull this off, but we believe (very strongly) that this is the only way to get you the best BBQ available. Craft BBQ.

D120F552-99AB-496D-8B83-8C356357886F.JPG

SB and Reotown.jpg

Looking back on it, when we were searching for a location to open a BBQ restaurant more than a year ago it is now apparent that REO Town chose us, not the other way around. With its long proud history, we felt like REO Town provided a neighborhood with a soul and personality all her own. An area of town that offered more than just a storefront. REO Town is considered the birthplace of the commercial car market. More than one hundred years ago Ransom Eli Olds opened the REO Motor Car Company right in this very neighborhood. REO Town has experienced the ups and downs of the auto industry, as many of our Michigan communities have, but the neighborhood has persevered and become stronger because of these struggles. The long complicated history has made REO Town and its residents stronger, more diverse, more creative and more artistic. REO Town is a community with its own character that is shaped by its many challenges and many more opportunities.

When we opened Saddleback BBQ, we wanted to offer more than just a typical BBQ restaurant. We wanted to create premium Craft BBQ. Craft BBQ is rooted in our nation’s rich BBQ history, but with a twist that is all our own. Like REO Town, we respect our proud history and pay homage to it, but we also try to push our craft forward with new and creative updates that are happening all the time. Many of these updates are based on the feedback from people like you, our loyal customers.

A little BBQ History (The way we see it)

In the BBQ world there are 4 major regions that have contributed to making BBQ what it is today.

• Texas, with its German/Czech influence and abundance of cattle have contributed the classic salt and pepper brisket.

• Memphis, with it’s dry rubbed pork ribs have set a standard all her own.

• Kansas City brought a sweet, tomato, molasses bbq sauce to the party.

• The Carolina’s “Respect the Pig” mantra have contributed whole hog BBQ. Since they can’t agree on what sauce they like – they have also contributed a vinegary tomato spiced sauce and a classic mustard based sauce as well.

We at Saddleback have been greatly influenced by them all and now we have set off on our own path.

Saddleback’s Take on BBQ
We don’t do things the easy way. Like our forefathers, we only use all wood fires to cook all of our meats. That way we are only getting the best smoke to flavor our food. Why is that important? Because wood smoke is the best spice that you can use to flavor BBQ. With the sweet complex flavor you can only get from true wood fired smokers, we feel that’s the only way to BBQ. We could make it easier on ourselves, and sleep more, but we wanted to offer more for our BBQ.

Craft BBQ at Saddleback is about attention to detail. This includes: The choice of wood (a cherry hickory blend), the meat we use (Certified CAB briskets) and all of our side dishes are made from scratch. We believe this attention to detail provides our customers a truly special and unique experience. There are no short cuts. Our BBQ takes hours to make with constant attention to even the most mundane detail.

In our future blog posts we will go into more detail about our smokers and our whole “BBQ” process. We will also talk about our choice of smokers and why we have selected the wood that we use. We will also give an explanation of our sauces and the history of how they came about. Look for Craft BBQ 101 coming soon. If you have any questions that you would like us to cover, please let us know!

Thank you for your interest in Saddleback BBQ. We couldn’t do it without you.

• Matt Gillett, Brad Broughman and the Saddleback Team

*Disclaimer: This is how we see BBQ, but there are no right-or-wrong answers in BBQ. It all comes down to what you like and what tastes best to you. By no means are we saying that our way is the only way. This is just how we see BBQ and we look forward to hearing from you!

We’ve heard complaints from several people that they have missed our Facebook updates or that our emails are being delivered to the “promotions” section of Gmail. We put together this quick tutorial to teach you how to fix it so that you can keep updated on special events, news, menu changes and discounts!

Here’s how to make sure you see our updates on Facebook:

1. Go to the Saddleback BBQ Facebook Page

2. Click on the “Like” button at the top and select “Posts in News Feed”

4. Select “See First”

Bonus: If you’d like to receive notifications about our updates so you don’t miss anything, click on the Notifications Tab and choose which events you’d like to be notified of.

Not seeing our Emails?

If you are having trouble receiving our emails in Gmail, they could be going to the “Spam” or “Promotions” folder. Here is how to fix that. Go to your Spam folder select the email and click “Not Spam”. If our email is ending up in your “Promotions” folder, select the email and choose “Not Promotions”. If you’re having trouble finding the “Promotions” folder it could be located under “Categories” in the left hand menu.

That’s all there is to it! We hope this helps. If you have any questions feel free to email us using the About Us page.

ORDERS ARE CLOSED FOR 2018!

If you need one, send me a chat message below and we will see what we can do.

You can bake them, fry them, stuff them or baste them - but nothing beats Smoking them!! Let Saddleback Barbecue handle all your Thanksgiving needs.

Let us do the cooking so you can enjoy some Lions Football. Our talented staff is preparing all of the sides as well as dessert so all you have to do is re-plate it and take all the credit. Everyone wins!!

Only 30 Turkeys available and they will go fast. Order and submit your deposit soon!
If you have any questions, Email: catering@saddlebackbbq.com

RESERVE YOUR TURKEY NOW!

We get our birds from Otto’s Turkey Farm in Middleville, MI. These are fresh, antibiotic free, free-range turkeys who eat a diverse diet. The best turkeys around, in our humble opinion.

Injected & Smoked Turkey's
14 lbs- 16 lbs - $129

House Made Sides Avaialable
Mashed Potatoes, Sweet Potatoes, Turkey Gravy, Mac & Cheese, and/or Stuffing.

Dinner Rolls
12 Detroit Made Hawaiian Brioche Rolls: $12

Order now!

Pickup for Turkeys will be scheduled between 9am - 11am on Thanksgiving. (Thursday, November 22)

RESERVE YOUR TURKEY NOW!

Scroll all the way down to "Thanksgiving Reservations"

Regardless where your travels take you over the Fourth of July holiday, why not bring some of Lansing’s Barbecue to entertain with? Saddleback Barbecue is now accepting pre-orders for Pulled Pork, Chicken Quarters, Brisket and Ribs to be picked up on either Friday July 3rd or Saturday July 4th in the AM. We are also offering coleslaw, potato salad, mac and cheese and baked beans for your enjoyment.

Smoker space is limited so reserve your food now! Orders must be received by July 1, 2015.

To place your order call (517) 253-7556 or email info@saddlebackbbq.com

CityPulse