Summer in February

Winters can seem to drag on and seem endless. To get through it, we have an annual Summer in February picnic. It's a summer family barbecue in the middle of winter. Groundhog's Day has nothing on this. You ever have a Thanksgiving style food induced coma on Groundhog's Day? Didn't think so.

The tradition started a few years ago when we gathered at a camp on the Sacandaga for a pot-luck picnic and a bunch of outdoor winter fun. The food kept getting better and the event quickly picked up an alias, Pierogie and Rib Day.

Other than a little of the coordination, my contributions to the meal are the ribs and sausage. I've got a burn barrel for making charcoal. At some point in this barrels history, it was a 55 gallon drum of tomato paste. With a few modifications, this thing has been generating charcoal for barbecue for over 10 years. You cut a small door towards the bottom. This is where you shovel out the coals and control how much air the fire gets. You drill holes so you can make a grate of rebar above the door. My grate is by the lower barrel rib. The grate supports the burning logs and allows coal sized pieces to fall to the bottom. Once you're done cutting and drilling, you basically have a giant charcoal chimney.

Start a fire an you are off to the races. With the door at the bottom open, you can turn this into a jet engine. With is closed, you have a more controlled, slow burn. Although this year, I got smart and used a bunch of coals from the wood stove to heat the pit. Usually, I have to make two fires.

The pit is just a stack of old concrete blocks. In the summer, I just put the colas on the ground. You can't do that in the winter. The coals thaw the frozen ground then water comes out of the once frozen ground and puts out your fire. Ask me how I know. The work around is some bricks and an old cast iron grate just above the ground.

 I cooked two rack of ribs and a few pounds of sausage in there. Instead of the usual rub, I went with one recommended by Mr. Dave. Here's a link to the recipe. As to be expected from a Mr. Dave recommendation, the rub is great. My wife's uncle took the extra rub I had home with him.

Off to one side of the pit was a slope my father-in-law set up for the kids. They had fun with it. Here's my nephew on a sledding run.

Once the food started, it never seemed to stop. There was a big taco dip with chips. On paper, I shouldn't like taco dip, but I love it.

I threw together a Buffalo cheese dip. Not bad. It's one of those things that isn't fantastic but for some reason you can't stop eating it.

 Aunt Carol fried up a ton of pierogi. There are only 9 in the pan...she fried up a lot more than 9.

My mother-in-law makes some seriously good deviled eggs. Her potato salad is great too.

Now that's a lot of pierogi. The ribs came out tender and the combination of smoke with the rub wa delicious.

Here's Round 1 for me.

Hope you left room for dessert. In addition to ice cream, there were lots of cookies - some gluten free thin mints that really tasted a lot like the real thing, chocolate cherry cookies and kissing hands. Plus an apple square and a chocolate rum cake.

After the kids went to bed, there was a loud, highly contested six-handed pinochle game that went until 1 AM. Just like in the summer.

Summer in February Featuring SPAM

A family tradition to break up winter has been the Summer in February picnic. The idea is to have all of the fun foods you would have at a July picnic in the dead of winter. This has also been called Rib and Pierogi Day. No matter what you call it, the day is a lot of fun and there is always way too much really good food. My responibilities for the meal are the ribs and sausage. This year I added a little bit of Spam. I saw it over at the Cowgirls Country Life a few times and decided to give it a whirl.

I've made sweet Italian sausage and posted about it a bunch of times. On Saturday afternoon, I made about 3 pounds of it. I also made a new to me fresh sausage. Not sure if anyone else has made it before, but it has been on my radar awhile: Srirachia sausage.

Started with some pork butt. It was a little lean so I added some fatback.

Salt and pepper were added at the same ratios used for Italian sausage. Then I added sriracha sauce until it looked wet. Probably around a quarter cup.

Ground it up and cased it. Then I made the rib rub...

Once the ribs were going in the pit on Sunday, I broke out the can of Spam (currently on sale at Price Chopper). I can not remember ever having had Spam before.  It was everywhere in Hawaii. We have hot dogs on treadmills in our quickie marts, they have warmed spam sushi under heat lamps in theirs.

I cut a criss-cross  pattern in the Spam and filled the cracks with brown sugar. As I was doing it, I couldn't help but smile because I was putting organic brown cane sugar on Spam. Slightly opposing sides of the food spectrum there. I drizzled on a little Jim Beam too.

Duke is no dummy. He knows something good is cooking...

 Here's what he was sniffing out

Aunt Carol's pierogi frying station ready to go

As it cooked, the Spam kind of opened up.

Carol's hard at work frying...

My mother in law makes some seriously kick-ass deviled eggs. Her potato salad is top notch too.

Sausage getting plated. Sweet Italian is on the plate. The sriracha sausage is on the right.

Spamity Spam

There were two, delicious trays of these bad boys.

I'd say the pierogi and sausage stole the main course show. The sweet Italian sausage came out great and the sriracha sausage had a nice little heat to it but the spice didn't overwhelm the other flavors of the hot sauce. This is definitely one to make again. I could eat those pierogi all day. The Spam was decent. My father-in-law didn't care for the Spam. He said it was too used to it just fried. Uncle Lou liked it. He said it didn't taste like Spam anymore, it just tasted like a baked ham. Having nothing to compare it against, I thought it was OK. If I make it again, I will make the cuts deeper. I only went halfway through the block of Spam. I'd go as far as I thought I could go without breaking the block next time. I think I'd skip the bourbon too. All in all a beautiful February day.
 

Rib and Pierogi Day 2010

This family festival is also known as Summer in February and was held on Valentine's Day this year. Nothing says romance like gluttony with the family. I'm not sure how the tradition started, but it has been going on for at least 5 years. We were trying to date the first year, but no one was sure. Anyhow, in the middle of February, a large portion of family gets together, ribs and sausage are cooked in a pit over wood coals, leftover Christmas pierogi are fried up, and all the side dishes would comfortably fit in at a summer picnic. Good eats like potato salad, pasta salad and deviled eggs. First, let me introduce Duke. He graciously agreed to host the party at his house.

Here's the pit used to cook the ribs and homemade sausage. Not sure why the picture of the food rotated, but the software won't let me fix it. The ribs were about done so they got moved to the sides when the sausage went on. The darker colored sausage is hot, the lighter rounds are sweet.

Once the ribs were finished, Aunt Carol started frying pierogi.

They get some seasonings and a little paprika to help with the browning.

She did a great job. They were fantastic.

Here's some of the spread. If you left hungry, it was your own fault....