Speaker 1: 0:00

All right, it's a little bit late this time. I try to get these episodes out at midnight on launch day and this one isn't even getting recorded till after 5 pm. It's been a busy week. Uh, dolores has been a little bit under the weather. Her voice has gone hoarse. She's coughing, decided. She didn't want to do the episode, being, you know, coughing during it or being horse-like, so I'm going ahead and going to do this one myself.

Speaker 1: 0:28

I've done some solo episodes. As a matter of fact, this podcast started out that way, but it wasn't until I brought the lovely wife Dolores on board that the downloads, the people, started engaging a little more. So this may be the worst episode in a while, hopefully not, though I got some stuff lined out we're going to talk about First of all. It is episode 47. So I want to talk about the five Can you pick them if you've been watching or listening to any of this the five top podcast episodes on the audio format? I'll go into that, you know, thought that'd be fun to look at. And we're also going to talk a little bit about a Lake Texoma trip that I took. I went to Lake Texoma with some friends. I went striper fishing. Did we catch any stripers Stick around. I'll talk a little bit about that.

Speaker 1: 1:16

Also created the video you can find, and we also, over the weekend, cooked something. Now this I was filming it and I got the filming of it started, thought it was going to be a great video, won't be able to release the video. Storm showed up, everything went crazy, ended up pulling it out of the Weber Smoky Mountain, and I'll talk a little bit about that. But I'm going to tell you how I cooked it, how it turned out and a little bit about that daggum storm. We're going to not be able to release that video. It just messed everything up. And then next week I'm going to be having Chef Deborah Erickson. If everything goes as planned, I'm going to be talking to her this week and I'll get it edited and get it out next Monday.

Speaker 1: 2:06

Now, this is a very interesting and a very great story. Her name is Deborah Erickson. She's the founder of the Blind Kitchen. You can find her at TheBlindKitchencom Look her up on Google and she went to culinary cooking school and was a blind student. She was the only one in her class and since then she went ahead and made it through the class successfully and also has created the blind kitchen, which where is where she helps those that are visually impaired or completely blind do what we all love to do. I mean, if you're listening to this, you probably love to cook, want to cook, maybe grill, and she even created a product, or she's got a kit designed for people that love barbecue, that want to do outdoor cooking, so they can do it safer and easier. And we're going to be talking about her story next week and we're also going to go into some of the products she's developed, how she's able to do this and make great food while also being visually impaired. So that'll be on episode number 48, when we get a chef and CEO and founder of the Blind Kitchen on the Okie Smoking Podcast so excited about that.

Speaker 1: 3:34

I also want to talk about the meat slicer that I reviewed. Once For All sent me a meat slicer that I actually use to make smash burgers, so we're going to talk about that in this episode. I told you we've got us a jam-packed episode. I've actually got notes here so I don't forget. You kind of got to put notes out when you do the podcast or you just kind of go stagnant and it goes all over the place. So trying to stay organized the best I can, and then we'll look and see if there's any comments I want to read from youtube or anywhere else. So let's get right into it time to fire up that grill.

Speaker 2: 4:14

From smoked pork to smash burgers. Outdoor cooking just tastes better. This is the oaky smoking podcast, and here's your host, john Barry.

Speaker 1: 4:37

All right, welcome back in. Before we get started, let me just give a shout out to everybody listening to the show. It's quite amazing and while this high 90% of the people listen to this show I'm looking at the stat right now from the United States. That's normal, that's what you would expect, but that's only 90%. 10% of you guys are listening from other countries, so I'm just going to give a shout out. If you're listening, we have someone from the UK listen quite frequently. Canada had five people Finland, israel, france, hungary, ukraine, spain and Germany. So all you people out there from all over the globe listening. I appreciate it. I get some repeat viewers from countries and things and then from the United States got people from a lot of people from California, irvine, new Jersey, katy, texas is always jumping in here. If you are from any of these that continue to listen to the show, in the show notes below there's a click link that you can click. Send us a text, just say hi, we'll shout you out in the next episode. That'd be great because we could see we don't see your information or anything. Link that you can click. Send us a text, just say hi, it will shout you out in the next episode. That'd be great because we could see we don't see your information or anything, but we could just see that city popping up regularly. So we know you're always listening to the show Bronx, new York, chicago, illinois someone's always listening from there. So thanks everybody. The show is doing fantastic. We'll get into more of that when we do the top five episodes.

Speaker 1: 6:05

All right, so let's go ahead and first start out with my Lake Texoma trip. Now, this is something that we've done three years in a row. Now it's me and some friends of mine, and the way it originally started was one of the guys I work with retired and we decided to all get together and have a little retirement party. But instead of like just a retirement party, he's got a boat, loves to fish and decided we would all just get together and go to the lake for a weekend, catch go striper fishing. And we've looked for and found a guide. There's plenty of guides on lake texoma and other lakes as well. You pay them, they provide the boat, they provide the poles, they provide the bait and when you're done, they even clean the fish. I mean, what else can you ask for? It's worth the cleaning of the fish if you catch something. So they do that, bag it up for you. So we've done that three years.

Speaker 1: 7:04

Our first year we caught limit 60 fish and three catfish. So the guy that was retiring decided he wanted to do catfish and caught three catfish. And then this second year we caught around 30, 35. Didn't do quite as well of stripers, but this last year we didn't catch any stripers. The water was completely muddy, murky. We've had so much rain before. We went like a month every day just rain, floods, and the lake was pushing that water through, making it murky, murky, dirty and you couldn't see through it. And it was clear.

Speaker 1: 7:44

And there's one thing about stripers when you go striper fishing it is not easy to catch them unless the water is clear. We went out for an hour or two, didn't catch really anything. So the guide being the guide he is. So let's change it up, let's go catfishing, and that's what we did. So all the way to the bottom, for the most part, cut bait, cut shad and put them down in there and ended up catching 25 plus catfish, was able to have a catfish fry, so it all turned out well. They still clean the fish for us, so you don't have to specifically only catch stripers and if you have a good guide, we went to a few different locations of the lake to find the the perfect spot and of course, he's got the device that tells you the fish where they are and really good. Personally, I prefer a catfish when it comes to cooking them over stripers, but either one is really good. We got some Louisiana seasoning and seasoned them up that way and after they were clean before that you like to rinse them, and we did that we rinsed them in some water with salt and some seasonings, garlic, some pepper that we had in there.

Speaker 1: 9:09

We had a little Airbnb we had just stayed in, let them soak for about an hour and I went ahead and I got my Camp Chef and we fired up the Camp Chef Always take a cast iron skillet with me. We went ahead and put some grease in there. We bought some grease at a store next door and then found out there was some above that. We didn't need everything we purchased left out there for the next guest. We always do and I'm sure they'll be wanting to fry up some fish, so have them prepared for that.

Speaker 1: 9:37

But it turned out fantastic. Had some onion rings, had some fries what else did we have, seems like, was that it Onion rings, fries and fish? The fries actually weren't all that great, it was just some frozen fries. I threw them in the oven. They tasted freezer burn, but the fish was great. Onion rings was great, but the fries just missed the mark. Everything else was like fresh fries were frozen. So what can I say? A shortcut always turns out not all that great. Uh, so came back from there. Um, of course, while you're down there, a little poker, lost a little bit of money, nothing much. We only bet dimes and nickels and quarters. So a few bucks just for fun and had a good time. We'll do it again. I'll talk about it again when we do it again In May probably date could change of 2026, go on our fourth Lake Texoma, unless they change the location fishing trip.

Speaker 1: 10:38

Each time we've had a different guide and the next time probably won't be any different, so we could do a repeat guide. I don't know, I'm not the one setting it up, I actually set up this last one and uh, as guys we go out there and switch who's going to. Uh, take it by the reins, get the room booked, get the guide or whatever you decide to do. Heck, maybe just go rent a boat, but I don't know who's going to clean the fish. That's what that's what we really like about that. The guide is the fact that they uh will go ahead and cook the fish and, uh or not, they don't cook it, but they'll clean it for you. So excellent time there and uh, that was our Lake Texoma trip uh, 2025.

Speaker 1: 11:21

Now, before we go any further, let me just go ahead and talk about our last guest on this show, and it is Ryan from the Flat Top Noob and he has an excellent the Eee Show on YouTube. You can check him out by searching the Flat Top Noob Griddle, cook, eat and More or Poor or poor guy outdoor. They're all three on there. But an excellent show, a lengthy show, and we talked last week if you would like to check on that, it would be episode number 46 went everywhere, from some cooking, some griddling, his first cooks. I bet you can guess what it is. It's like there's a certain item you always want to cook first on a flat top. If you want to see what that was, be sure, and check out our last episode. Excellent guest. I will definitely have him on, and Doug and Rob in the future as well. So great stuff there. Check out all of his video and audio version. Next week I already mentioned we will have Deborah Erickson on from the Blind Kitchen Moving forward.

Speaker 1: 12:38

I also want to talk about our recent cook and I touched on this in the beginning and it is our Dr Pepper brisket and not brisket I hope I may have said brisket at the beginning it is Dr Pepper pork shoulder. Now, uh, this was really really good and what I did is I went ahead and, uh, infused it, had a needle and put about a half a can of Dr Pepper and just went ahead and put that all through the center of the pork shoulder, got it real good and juicy. I just love it. And when you put it in there and you start to see it bulge, you know you push it in there and it gets fat. You know you're getting that juice in there. Love that. I don't do a whole lot of that. I like to do pork shoulders that way. Sometimes I've done brisket not a whole lot and a pork loin. I don't know there's just something to just get some good flavor. You could use apple juice or whatever, but I used the full flavored dr pepper and cooked it well.

Speaker 1: 13:41

We then added some seasoning to it, which we use the dirty bird seasoning completely coated the thing in full so that it was completely covered in this seasoning, very, very liberally, and then cooked it at 225 on the Weber Smoky Mountain. I did all this about 6 am on Saturday. It didn't get done to about 6 pm on Saturday, cooked it all day. After about four or five hours I went ahead and wrapped it, added another half a can of Dr Pepper to it and wrapped it in foil and continued cooking it until done at about 200 to 205 degrees and went ahead and took some claws to it. After we let it set for 30 to 45 minutes, it come apart nicely. Add a little more seasoning on top, threw them between some sliders and some of your favorite barbecue sauce, and it was just amazing. Alongside with that, we actually even cooked some ribs.

Speaker 1: 14:41

Now, the ribs were spare ribs and I seasoned them up a little different because Dolores, as you probably know or may not, but she is keto for the most part, except on special occasions, and since I'd put the Dr Pepper in the pork shoulder, she went ahead and wanted some ribs. We were actually cooking, for there was several people here. So we had needed a decent amount of food, and I don't mind, we've been eating leftovers for a few days, so nothing wrong with that. Heat it up and eat it. And she had some of her Boar's Night Out White Lightning, which is zero carbs. Put that on there. I think she put some garlic zero carb seasoning on there as well, and then I cooked them up for about six hours, wrapped them about halfway through and then during all of this, next thing, you know alarms going off on phones, everything's storm, storm, storm. Uh, turn on the tv storm, hell, storm of the century. Billion dollars, multi-million dollars. I'm looking at it and it's coming right at us. It's not far away. I'll usually ride out the storm, just let it cook. And I says man, this thing. They started showing pictures of hell. Stones were as big as a baseball. I said could get as big as a grapefruit, you never really know. But this was significant enough to where I said I've got to bring it indoors, went ahead and got it off of the Weber Smoky Mountain, put everything in the oven to let it continue in there.

Speaker 1: 17:11

At that time the momentum of the video and everything just kind of went apart. I could have filmed the storm and everything sure, but it came in and just went pouring and then stopped five minutes later. I ain't getting no hail, I ain't getting no wind. Maybe a little bit Sun come out. You watch the radar, that massive storm. As soon as it got to my neighborhood it just shrunk. It was full force, got here and just poof was gone. Could have just left everything alone, waited to 30, 45 minutes and the sun was out and I would have continued on, would have continued the video and everything would have been fine. But it is what it is.

Speaker 1: 18:01

I just ended up saying I'll just do another video later on it, talk about it on this and I'll have some footage of some of it maybe. But I just didn't because it's it was starting to rain so fast I had to get everything throw it in. You know, I didn't get to get out there and get shots or anything, so I just let it go. Was it good? It was great.

Speaker 1: 18:23

Now I don't really know and nobody really seemed to think they could tell there was Dr Pepper. So I'm not real sure, even me, you know. I don't know if the Dr Pepper cooked out, because I would have used Dr Pepper Zero and maybe I'll try that one time so that Dolores would be able to eat it. It'd be zero carb, it'd be keto, but everything I've read said don't uh, because of the sweetness. But you know, honestly I'm not sure it'd matter. So I'm probably gonna do a dr pepper zero and maybe when I do the video again, that's what it will be. So sorry video didn't come. I will be redoing that very soon Less than a month, I'd say. We're going to be having it again. So I showed a sneak peek on a couple of posts and we'll get the video out. I'll redo it Whatever. Smoky Mountain probably, or maybe the pit barrel this time Might do the pit barrel Be pretty cool. Haven't brought it out in a little while? I think that'd be really, really cool.

Speaker 1: 19:30

Now I want to talk about something else that I did and I purchased. Well, I actually didn't purchase this. I said it wrong. A company sent me, reached out to me their once-for-all meat slicer and they reached out to me via email. And I've had a few companies reach out to me and I don't just I'm not going to just have them send me everything if I'm not interested in it.

Speaker 1: 19:55

I was interested in this when I saw what it was. It's a meat slicer and it comes with several blades on it, so when you slice it it'll do multiple slices at once. I'm not sure the exact amount I think like eight maybe and you can do it in two different sizes two millimeter or four millimeters, so you can have different sizes of the meat. Perfect for like slicing for a beef jerky or uh, carne asada and season it up. Uh, philly cheesesteaks be excellent. But what I really liked even more was the fact that you could create it. You slice it, you can turn it sideways, slice it again, turn it 180, slice it a few times, three to four times, and you've got your ground ground steak. So you can make you some steak burgers very, very easily and I did a smash burger on the b-aver using this little slicer. And you can use it for cutting chicken and various things it.

Speaker 1: 20:57

I was very impressed with it. I had a lot of feedback on it, even had a couple people click through and purchase it, which is pretty cool. So hope you're enjoying it. If you did, and I want to tell you, if you want to see more information, watch the video. Check out my website okiesmokincom. Slash once for all. That's O-K-I-E-S-M-O-K-I-N dot com slash once for all. Very simple. It'll take you straight to my page. I'll also link it in the show notes of this episode or the YouTube description, so you will be able to go to it, read about it, watch the video and yes, there's an affiliate link and you can buy it if you want to and help support the Okie Smokin' podcast. But for the most part, I was absolutely impressed with it. It is very sharp, so just be careful.

Speaker 1: 21:56

All right, let's get to what I've been waiting for Our top five videos. I said that wrong Our top five audios. These are from our podcast audio version and let's just see. We'll start at number five and the number five. We've had actually 52 episodes recorded. We've had some bonus episodes and things like that, but we're officially calling this episode 47, and none of the bonus episodes made a top five. I have to remember what some of these are. Number five check it out was just a few weeks ago Grilling Wisdom with Doug from Griddle Cook Eat and More People are really flocking to that one, so very interested to hear what he says and an excellent guest I had on the show. So you're at number five, doug. Number four the number four audio podcast of all time. Spice it up, exploring bold flavors. So I do talk a lot about spices, jalapenos, how to make chicken spicier, whether I'm cooking sausage or eggs, burgers or fish, you know, put a little Tabasco on it, give it a kick. So if you're interested in that, check that out. Spice it up, exploring bold flavors. And of course, I didn't put what episode number they are, but you can scroll through and find them.

Speaker 1: 23:26

The ultimate outdoor cooking debate smokers, grills and griddles. And what I've found is on this podcast, when I mention brisket, when I mention outdoor smokers, grills, debates, things like that, they do really well. This is one that me and Dolores talked about and we were discussing, you know, what's better on a smoker and what's better on a grill or what is better on a griddle. And as she had mentioned this a couple of years ago, she would have said she'd prefer a smoker on the pit. Boss, smoke it a big, thick, juicy burger for an hour and a half and then maybe sear it at the end burger for an hour and a half and then maybe sear it at the end, throw cheese on it Excellent, those are good. She's changed, though. She now says a burger goes on a griddle. I don't disagree. So what do you cook on a griddle Steak? Do you cook that on the griddle or do you cook it on the pit boss? That's our episode.

Speaker 1: 24:26

That one was not very long ago and people are still listening and downloading it on the podcast ultimate outdoor cooking debate smokers, grills and griddles. That came in at number three, our number two video, and I mentioned this brisket brilliance and the blackstone griddle awakening. You mentioned, uh, brisket, you mentioned black blackstone, you mentioned griddle Getting a lot of downloads, so that one was talking about a brisket that I had made and some other things we did on the blackstone. So you might check that one out. And our number one podcast episode to date of all time is a really new episode and I'm seeing that because I think people are. We've gotten more subscribers on the podcast. People are watching the current episodes more than they are the past episodes because new, new people are less likely to go bounce and just start listening to random episodes and it's again a really new one. From Philly cheese steak sausages to smash tacos cooking success stories that's our number one all-time downloaded episode on the podcast. That's our top five. So thought I'd just share that with you. We are almost to 750 downloads on this podcast and it is just going really, really well. So thank you all for dropping in and listening to the episodes. You can also find the video version on YouTube on the Okie Smoking channel, and there'll be a playlist right there.

Speaker 1: 25:59

Let me go ahead and see if there's any questions that I need to answer, and there's a brand new comment I hadn't actually seen yet from Annie Smoking Pot talking about. So I put a photo of our Dr Pepper pork butt on there and she said oh, I bet it is going to be delicious. It really was, so I'll be remaking that video. Thanks for that. On our once for all meat slicer, someone said this looks super cool. I just wish you could fully disassemble the blades so you can sharpen them. And yes, that is a disadvantage. I don't know if there's any way to sharpen the blades with them all attached as they are. Unless there's, there may be some some way. I'd have to. I'd have to look and see if there's anything, or they have anything for that. So yeah, it is all in one great, awesome tool. Someone also also commented on that video.

Speaker 1: 26:51

Smash burgers is where it's at with ground up steak, and that's what I'm saying. This is so simple. You could just go ahead and slice the steak and do it a few times, smash it up. You'll want to use a steak with very or relatively high fat content. Sirloin may be too lean and so you know you could still smash it. It may be more ground up.

Speaker 1: 27:14

I did a couple of them and some of them didn't stay quite as well as the first one that I did and I did mess up. I was called out. You know, ryan, sorry man, I didn't show the crust, so maybe next time we'll get the money shot of the crust on that. I just went straight to the burger. Let's see what else we got On Griddle Talk with Ryan from Flat Top Noob, the YouTube video. Bones Brews Barbecue said Ryan, the toot show gang has been getting some air time on your podcast. I love it. Gang has been getting some air time on your podcast. I love it. From an older video someone said that they have it's the breaking in my new pit boss pellet grill. I have that one Next week. Be sure and check out our episode with Deborah Erickson and then we'll get Dolores back on as well soon. And thank you for tuning in and we'll see you guys on the next episode, for sure.

Speaker 2: 28:14

Thank, you for listening to the okie smoking podcast. Episodes drop every monday. Don't forget to follow this podcast or you might miss out on some delicious creations. You can also find us on our website, okiesmokincom, and on youtube and other social media platforms. Until next time, keep firing up that grill.