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Smoked Pork Butt

October 23, 2019 by Jeanmarie

In our very first post about our electric smoker, 10 Foods to Smoke in Your Electric Smoker, I mentioned pork butt, which is sometimes called pork shoulder. The thing is, most people smoke a pork butt to make pulled pork, but in doing that, you are so missing out on something WAY better: Smoked Pork Butt for slicing. It’s smokey, juicy and A-MAZ-ING.

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Smoked Pork Butt | Smoked Pork Shoulder | electric smoker smoked pork for slicing

Smoked Pork Butt for Slicing

It turns out, that my family is not actually a fan of pulled pork. I used to make it a couple times a summer in our crockpot before we got our electric smoker, but now, my husband confesses that he actually isn’t a big fan. I mean he’ll eat it, but if we are going to take the time to smoke a pork butt, we are not going to smother it in barbecue sauce. And, truth be told, it’s way easier to smoke a pork butt for slicing because it is fewer steps.

Preparing the Meat

You do have to plan ahead because it is better if the infusion step has time to soak in overnight, but 4 or 5 hours will do the trick. And you will need a special tool to do this step: an injector. But the key is apple juice or cider or apple juice concentrate.

Use the injector to add apple juice directly to the meat. Poke holes throughout and on all sides, adding juice until it “leaks.” Then set the meat aside for at least four hours, but overnight is better.

Half an hour to an hour before you are ready to smoke, bring your meat to room temp and coat it with yellow mustard, then liberally apply your favorite dry rub. We like to make our own. Check out our recipe for a mild rub Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub.

Prime the Smoker

While your meat is coming to room temperature. You can get your smoker ready. Preheat to 225°F. Load your wood tray according to manufacture’s directions and allow your smoker to fill with smoke. We like to use hickory because it gives the deepest smoke flavor, but you could use apple to stick with a theme.

Add the meat, smoking to an internal temperature of 165°F. Wrap in foil and let your meat rest for 20-30 minutes. Or (as happens to us often!), if you are not quite ready to eat, you can let it rest longer, just wrap it in foil, then in a towel, then you can put it in a cooler and use the cooler the opposite way you use it to keep something cold (that means no ice!).

Smoked Pork Butt

When you are ready to eat, just slice it up and serve. You could add a barbecue sauce, we like to eat it just the way it came out of the smoker: juicy and smokey and delicious. With all that apple, it seems so autumnal. Perfect to eat with homemade applesauce (my son’s kitchen specialty) and roasted butternut squash. (Leftover butternut squash? Tomorrow’s breakfast: Butternut Squash Prosciutto Hash. Left over pork? Reimagine that leftover as Smoked Pork Fried Rice–recipe coming soon.)

If you are looking for other great electric smoker recipes, be sure to check out my Electric Smoker Page with an index to all of our electric smoker tips, tricks and recipes.

Smoked Venison Steak Fajitas

October 16, 2019 by Jeanmarie

Taco Tuesday is perfect for our family. Tuesday is one of the days I get home a little later, so an easy weeknight meal of tacos or nachos or taco salad is perfect. But sometimes, Taco Tuesday needs a little change up like fajitas, like Smoked Venison Steak Fajitas.

I know, right now you are thinking, smoker on a weeknight? Well yeah, actually, we have found a few things that you can smoke in under an hour that are perfect for weeknight smoker meal. (Check out my post here.)

Smoked Venison Steak Fajitas | Smoked Steak Fajitas | smoke the meat in your electric smoker and then add it to the veggies cooked on the stove top | Whole30 | Gluten Free | Dairy Free

Smoked Venison Steak Fajitas Preparations

If you are going to take the time to make fajitas in the smoker, then you need to make your own fajita rub which like my Venison Tacos starts with chili powder and ground cumin as the base ingredients. Then just add some Kosher salt, dried minced garlic and crushed red pepper flakes.

Apply the rub liberally to a pound of venison chops or steaks. Reserve at least a teaspoon of the rub for the vegetables. (If you are looking to speed this meal up, chops will cook faster because they are smaller.)

Preheat your electric smoker to 225°F and add wood chips according to the manufacturer’s directions. We like to use hickory for its smokey flavor. Allow the meat to sit at room temperature with the rub on it while your smoker comes up to temperature.

While the meat is sitting, you can start to prepare the peppers and onions. Slice an onion or two, two or three bell peppers and a jalapeño (remove the seeds for less heat). Mince 3-4 fresh garlic cloves.

Once your smoker has filled with smoke, you can add the meat to the electric smoker.

Melt 1/4 cup of butter (use ghee to make it Whole30) in a skillet over medium heat. Add the vegetables and lower the temperature so they will cook slowly while the meat is in the smoker. Once the vegetables have cooked down, add the remaining rub to the peppers and onions.

Serve

Remove the venison from the smoker when the meat has reached an internal temperature of 145°F. Slice the meat into thin strips and add it to the pepper and onion mixture. Serve as desired.

We like to top our fajitas with salsa, guacamole, sour cream and cheese on a flour tortilla, but if you are looking to have Whole30 Fajitas, you could serve them on a lettuce wrap with guacamole and compliant salsa or you could have fajita bowls by serving the meat over rice or cauliflower rice or hash brown potatoes. The possibilities are endless. And don’t forget to save your leftovers for Whatcha’ Got Omelette or Clean Out the Fridge Breakfast Hash.

Smoked Venison Steak Fajitas

A homemade fajita rub on venison steaks or chops which are smoked in your electric smoker then served with stove top sauteed peppers and onions.

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Prep Time 20

Cook Time 1

Course Main Course

Cuisine Mexican, Whole30

Servings 4 people

Equipment

electric smoker
hickory chips
skillet

Ingredients

Fajita Dry Rub

2 tbsp chili powder
2 tsp ground cumin
1½ tsp Kosher salt
1 tsp dried minced garlic
½ – 1 tsp red pepper flakes

Vegetables

2 bell peppers color of choice
1 medium red onion
3-4 cloves minced garlic
1 jalapeno seeds removed if desired
¼ cup better or ghee

Smoked Venison Steak

1 lb venison steaks or chops

Instructions

Dry Rub

Add all the dry rub ingredients together in a mason jar.
Shake to mix throroghly.

Smoked Venison

Reserve 1 teaspoon of rub for the vegetables.
Apply the rub liberally to the meat on both sides. Allow to sit while the smoker comes up to temperature (225°F) and fills with smoke.
Smoke the meat for about 1 hour. Meat should reach an internal temperature of 145°F.

Vegetables

After the meat has gone in the smoker, slice the peppers and onions.
Melt butter or ghee in a skillet over medium heat.
Add onions, peppers and garlic. Saute until vegetable become soft.
When the vegetables have cooked down (about 30 minutes), add the reserved rub and turn the burner back to low. Allow vegetables to continue to warm until the meat is done.

Fajitas

After the meat comes out of the smoker, slice into strips and add to the vegetables.
Server with guacamole, salsa and cheese on tortillas or to make it Whole30, serve on lettuce wraps, cauliflower rice or over hash browns with guacamole and compliant salsa.

Keyword Dairy free, Electric Smoker, Gluten free, Whole30

Clean Out the Fridge Breakfast Hash

October 9, 2019 by Jeanmarie

A while back, I wrote about how we use up our leftovers in the morning in an egg scramble that we like to call Whatch’ Got Omelette, but recently, we have taken that delicious little food invention to the next level with what we are calling Clean Out the Fridge Breakfast Hash.

Clean Out the Fridge Breakfast Hash | use leftovers and frozen potatoes to make a quick and delicious breakfast or breakfast side

Just like a Whatch’ Got Omelette, Clean Out the Fridge Breakfast Hash takes advantage of using up leftovers and the combinations are endless. Instead of starting with a base of eggs, this starts with a frozen potato of your choice. We go with tater puffs when we are not doing a Whole30, but you can easily make this Whole30 by using a frozen shredded potato like our Whole30 Western Quiche, just check the ingredients for a compliant brand.

Because you are starting with frozen potatoes, you will want to start by heating the fat of your choice in a large skillet—bacon fat is perfect. (We love our 12 inch cast iron skillet from Lodge.) Add some chopped onion. If you are using tater puffs, you will want cook them in the fat until they can be broken up with the side of a spatula before adding your other ingredients.

Once your potatoes are about half done, you can add the leftovers of your choice to make your most amazing, always different breakfast hash.

Amazing Breakfast Hash Combos

Looking for inspiration for your Clean Out the Fridge Breakfast Hash? Here are a few of our favorites:

Steak and Zucchini Hash: leftover grilled steak with leftover grilled zucchini and onion

Smoked Venison Steak Fajita: leftover venison steak fajitas

Taco Hash (pictured below): left over Venison Taco Meat. (Our Venison Taco recipe is Whole30 and can be totally made with any ground meat.) Serve with salsa and other taco toppings of your choice.

Picnic Breakfast Hash: leftover hot dogs and hamburgers

Bacon Cheeseburger Hash: Cook 4 or 5 slices bacon before adding the potato. Set your bacon aside and then cook your potato, add leftover cheeseburger and crumble the bacon.

Spinach, Chicken and Sausage Breakfast Hash (pictured above): a couple hands full of spinach, grilled chicken and grilled or smoked Italian sausage

Serve Up Clean Out the Fridge Breakfast Hash

Clean Out the Fridge Breakfast Hash is perfect served with a yolky fried egg. However our daughter loves it with scrambled eggs, so it’s totally your choice. Heck, it could even be a breakfast in and of itself with all that potatoey and meaty goodness.

Looking for other great breakfast ideas, checkout our page that indexes all of our Whole30 and non-Whole30 breakfast recipes. If you are looking for the perfect Whole30 breakfast hash, check out my favorite Butternut Squash and Prosciutto Hash. It is sweet and salty and quick for weekday mornings.

Whole30 Western Quiche

September 25, 2019 by Jeanmarie

Who doesn’t love a Western Omelette from a diner with all those peppers and onions and ham. So how about a Western Quiche? How about making it Whole30 by changing the ham to prosciutto and the crust to potatoes. Whole30 Western Quiche just became a thing in our world.

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Whole30 Western Quiche | Whole 30 | Dairy free | Grain free | Gluten free | eggs, peppers, onions, prosciutto in a shredded potato crust

Sunday Brunch

Unfortunately, at 40-50 minutes of cook time, this Whole30 Western Quiche does not make it a quick weekday breakfast like Apple Cherry Paleo granola or Butternut Squash and Prosciutto Hash. That is unless you make it ahead on the weekend and then reheat pieces (which you totally can do), but it is delicious nonetheless.

Start with Shredded Potato Crust

This is easily made grain and gluten free with a shredded potato crust. You can shred your own or use a a frozen variety. (Just be sure check you ingredients because dextrose is sugar and it’s hidden in several brands whose ingredients I checked. Try Cascadian Farm Organic Hash Browns.) In a mixing bowl, stir together the potatoes, a tablespoon of diced prosciutto and black pepper, finely chopped onion and a beaten egg.

Then, pat the potato mixture into a greased 10 inch pie plate. I like to use melted ghee brushed on; however, I have used olive oil too. Bake at 400°F for 20 minutes. Remove the crust from the oven, brush the top with more melted ghee and return to the oven for 10 more minutes or until the crust has browned up a little.

Whole30 Western Quiche Filling

While your crust is baking, prepare the filling for your quiche. Chop up the rest of your onion and the green (or red or orange) pepper. Stir the onion, bell pepper and prosciutto together and set aside until the crust is ready.

In a glass measuring cup, measure 1 cup of unsweetened almond milk. Break three eggs into the milk and whip with a whisk (I could not do without this two cup glass measuring cup from Pyrex or this 9 inch flat whisk by Norpro).

Bake

When the crust is done, add the onion, bell pepper and prosciutto mixture to the crust, then pour the egg mixture over it. Bake 30-40 minutes until the egg has set up completely.

Allow to cool for 5-10 minutes before serving. And enjoy.

Whole30 Breakfast

We love breakfast around here. There are so many great foods that seem to come in the morning. And we are big fans of eggs and stuff added to them. If you are looking for other breakfast ideas (some Whole30, some not), be sure to check out my Breakfast and Brunch page. And enjoy a delicious quiche or some unconventional breakfast hash like Butternut Squash and Prosciutto Hash or Farm Stand Corned Beef Hash (not Whole30 unless you can find a corned beef that is compliant).

Whole30 Western Quiche

Diced Prosciutto, onions, peppers and eggs baked in a shredded potato crust.

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Prep Time 15

Cook Time 1

Total Time 1 15

Course Breakfast

Cuisine Whole30

Servings 6 people