Published Monday, November 02, 2026 at 03:49 PM PT

Burbank · Monday, November 2, 2026 · 3:49 PM · 74°F, 49% humidity, wind 0 mph ENE (gusts 2), 29.52 inHg, UV 0, PM2.5 6

Recipe Recommendations

The Pitmaster’s Plate

Tri-Tip Smoked Like a Brisket

gluten-free · low-carb · fully cooked

Meat Church instead treats it like brisket: 250°, post oak, a butter-and-foil wrap, and a pull at 203°, probe tender.

Serves 4 to 6. It’s a moderate plate, closer to a treat if you go back for seconds, and you will.

Ingredients

  • 1 tri-tip, trimmed of hard fat and silver skin
  • Coarse black pepper and salt, to taste (swap: replaces the packaged rub, so the bark stays savoury and free of garlic and onion. Add cayenne if you want real heat.)
  • 4 tablespoons butter
  • Sliced chives to finish (swap: garnish for an oniony kick)

Method

  1. Trim the tri-tip with a sharp boning knife. Season evenly, no binder, and let it sit on the counter for 15 minutes.
  2. Smoke at 250° with post oak for about 3 hours, until 165° internal.
  3. Set the meat on two large sheets of heavy foil, put the butter on top, and wrap tightly. Return it to the smoker for roughly 2 more hours, until 203° or probe tender.
  4. Unwrap and put it back on the smoker for 10 minutes to firm up the exterior. Save the foil juices.
  5. Rest it tented in foil at room temperature for 45 minutes. Cut down the middle where the two muscles meet, then slice each half against the grain. Spoon the juices over the slices.

Serve with a charred zucchini or crisp cucumber-and-scallion-green salad instead of anything starchy.

Source: Meat Church BBQ, Tri Tip Smoked like a Brisket

Pairs with: a Scotch, neat.

The Pescatarian Plate

Lemon-Garlic Salmon Bites

gluten-free · pescatarian · fully cooked

Salmon, lemon, garlic, and a broiler that finishes the job in about seven minutes. This is the rare recipe that asks for 15 minutes of standing around, so you can stare at your phone and call it “marinating.” It’s a crowd-pleaser appetizer from EatingWell, and it’s the sort of thing that vanishes off a platter before you’ve finished lying about having made it from scratch. Serves 8 as an appetizer, and it’s light. Cook it to 145°F so every bite comes out opaque and flaking, not sulking in the middle.

Ingredients

  • 1 tablespoon grated lemon zest
  • 3 tablespoons lemon juice
  • 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
  • 2 teaspoons grated garlic
  • 1 teaspoon freshly ground pink peppercorns or 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper, plus more for garnish
  • 1 teaspoon salt, divided
  • 1 pound center-cut salmon fillet, skinned and cut into 1-inch pieces
  • 1 medium lemon, cut into 8 wedges (optional)
  • 1 tablespoon chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

Method

  1. Whisk the zest, juice, oil, garlic, pepper and 3/4 teaspoon salt in a medium nonreactive bowl until emulsified, about 30 seconds. Add the salmon and toss to coat. Let it marinate, uncovered, at room temperature for 15 minutes.
  2. Put the oven rack 4 inches from the heat and preheat the broiler. Line a broiler-safe baking sheet with foil. Arrange the salmon in an even layer, drizzle with the leftover marinade, and sprinkle with the remaining 1/4 teaspoon salt. Add the lemon wedges if using.
  3. Broil until an instant-read thermometer in the thickest part reads 145°F, 5 to 7 minutes. Move the salmon to a platter, squeeze the broiled lemon over it, and finish with parsley and a little more pepper.

Pairs with: sparkling water with a squeeze of lemon, because the dish already did the citrus heavy lifting.

The Vegetarian Plate

Heirloom Caprese with Mint Pesto

vegetarian · gluten-free · no-cook

Caprese means “of Capri,” and the classic is a tomato, a cheese and a leaf, which is a lot of reputation for three ingredients. Love and Lemons swaps the usual basil for a mint-heavy pesto, so it tastes like someone made an effort without getting fussy. It’s light, serves about two as a starter, and takes a few minutes of actual work. The recipe doesn’t state a yield, so that serving size is my estimate.

Ingredients

  • 2 large heirloom tomatoes
  • 1 ball fresh mozzarella
  • Salt and pepper
  • Red pepper flakes and sprouts, for garnish (optional)
  • A huge handful of mint
  • A few basil leaves
  • 1 small garlic clove
  • 1/4 cup pine nuts
  • Juice and zest of 1 small lemon
  • 1/4 to 1/3 cup olive oil
  • Salt and pepper, for the pesto

Method

  1. In a small food processor, blend the mint, basil, garlic, pine nuts, lemon, salt and pepper. Drizzle in the olive oil and blend until smooth. Taste and adjust the seasoning.
  2. Slice the tomatoes and cheese and arrange them on a plate. Season with salt and pepper.
  3. Swap: the recipe drizzles the pesto over the top. Serve it in a bowl on the side instead, so the plate stays undressed and everyone spoons on their own.

Source: Love and Lemons, heirloom caprese w/ mint pesto.

Pairs with: a blood orange Italian soda, or a sparkling lemonade with extra mint.

Good morning, Little Mister. It’s a Monday-ish kind of day in the food internet, which means Mad Scientist BBQ uploaded roughly the entire contents of a Texas smokehouse and everybody else showed up with a side salad. I run a network of 100-plus devices and 33 light bulbs, and not one of them has ever made me hungry. These people did it eleven times before lunch.

Barbecue and Live Fire

The Kansas City v. Texas Grudge Match

Mad Scientist BBQ had two Kansas City videos out, and they make a nice double feature. In “I Threw Down the Gauntlet in Kansas City,” Texas-style barbecue goes up against the local way, and the video opens with a staged shouting match. A Kansas City partisan screams at Brad over Texas brisket, burnt ends, glazed ribs and propane, and calls him a “Kentucky bastard.” It’s theater, and I loved it, because food rivalries are the only wars I’ll cheerfully watch.

The calmer part has a real argument in it. A Kansas City voice calls the city “the melting pot of barbecue” and claims the sauces in Texas were early versions of Kansas City stuff. Then he grants Kansas City the sauce crown with a straight face: shelves of a hundred bottles, “more barbecue sauce on the shelf in Kansas City per capita than anywhere else in the world.” Asked about Texas-style, he calls it “okay,” not his favorite, because “it’s just not very complicated” and lacks “the complicated blends of seasonings.” So the Kansas City defense of its own cuisine is that Texas is too simple. That’s a hell of a thing to say about a style where a single brisket takes half a day, but sure.

The companion video, “I Did the Ted Lasso BBQ Tour | Kansas City,” is the actual eating. The sum-up: one stop has “the best rib” he had in Kansas City, the best-flavored brisket and the most moisture in the lean, which he calls “best brisket for sure.” Then he grumbles that it makes him “upset that the best brisket isn’t a fancier place like this,” because “barbecue should be a simple food.” Note the contradiction with the other video, where Kansas City thinks simple is the insult. Barbecue is a simple food that nobody agrees on, which is my relationship with Jordan’s network topology.

He compares one rib to the one at Q39, which had a char flavor this one lacked. This one is “meaty and juicy” and “cooked really well.” The sides get a nod: cheesy corn bake, “like cheesy cream corn.” The wings arrive in cast iron and he’s “halfway afraid” of burning his hands off. The verdict is “Kansas City, for some reason, knows how to do chicken.” Dessert is a brownie with two scoops of ice cream and very dark chocolate. That makes it a reasonable field guide, which is more than I can say for my last ten Slack threads.

Franklin, and the Four-Hour Cheat

“I Cooked a Brisket While Waiting in Line at Franklin Barbecue” is the day’s best premise. Mad Scientist BBQ cooks a four-hour brisket in the time it takes to reach the front of the Franklin line, then eats both. The four-hour result loses, and he explains why with some actual science. The smoke flavor on the quick brisket “is the flavor of fat burning in the fire,” so “what a burger smells like when it’s cooking, that’s what this tastes like.” The Franklin brisket has fat “cooked down so well that it’s almost like cotton candy in your mouth,” with a sweetness even though he doesn’t think they put much sugar in the rub. It “just disintegrates.”

His verdict: it’s the best brisket he’s had anywhere in Austin, and it lives up to the memory, which he says doesn’t always happen on a return visit. “There’s a reason why you can’t cook a brisket in four hours that matches this.” He also advises getting in line, because the line is part of the experience and you make friends with the people around you. Valar morghulis, all men must die, and apparently so must any hope of a four-hour brisket beating Franklin.

The Brisket That Sat for 40 Days

“This brisket sat in the fridge for 40 days and then I cooked it” goes after wet aging. He’s done dry-aged brisket before and didn’t like it. A friend, “Fast Eddie,” told him that when he was on the barbecue competition circuit, he always wet aged his briskets, and that 40 days is the perfect number: it improves up to that point and quality diminishes beyond it. I can’t confirm the 40-day claim beyond his word, and neither can you. What the video does say is that blind tasters noticed a difference. He started out expecting not much, was “actually surprised by the results,” and ends up “pretty convinced that it produces a better product.” Forty days in a fridge is a real commitment to a piece of meat. I have trust issues with files that sit that long, and those at least don’t smell.

Ribs: Borrowed Smoker, Pellet vs. Offset

In “A Top Ten Texas BBQ Spot Used My Smoker,” a pitmaster from Leroy and Lewis (Evan Leroy, who names his own Instagram handle) shows Mad Scientist how he does ribs. The cook is plain, with a simple rub, and it works. One taster says the little end bits have “great texture on the outside,” crispy and crunchy. Mad Scientist himself calls them “good ribs,” “kind of how I’ve always done ribs, just keep it simple,” and then announces he’s “100% stealing” the recipe and suggests everyone else steal it too. A pit giveaway is mentioned, hand-delivered if the winner is close by. There’s a smoke ring check in there too, with “the smallest of small gray spots” and “all smoke ring” elsewhere.

“I Challenged a World Champion to a Rib Cook-Off,” dated November 1, is the more interesting technical comparison. The rival cooks on an offset and Mad Scientist on a pellet cooker, and they compare notes afterward. The pellet cook got better pullback on the bones, a char at the end with a button press, and a warming drawer. The offset cook is “manually working it” with the equipment basically two tubes welded together. Mad Scientist was sitting in air conditioning watching an app while the other guy tended fire. The offset side’s advice is the thing worth keeping: “if you don’t want to ruin your whole day you shouldn’t get an offset.” You can make great ribs on either, he says; it’s about preference. Also, a child asked to choose between McDonald’s and ribs chose McDonald’s. “The ultimate insult.” Children are the harshest food critics and the worst dinner guests.

Pellet Smokers, Explained by Someone Who Sells Them

“A Beginner’s Guide to Pellet Smokers” is an interview recorded at Windy City Smokeout. The guest’s key lesson is that people try to outthink the grill. They see it overshoot, open the door and fiddle, but many of these grills take “20, 30 minutes” to recover, and every time you change something it takes longer to settle back down. He also says that when you cook at lower temperatures you’re “usually not rendering fat out properly,” which is the start of an argument about why low-and-slow pellet cooking can disappoint. The host admits he does lots of barbecue, just not on pellet grills, and the actual buying recommendation is saved for a follow-up episode.

Ferengi Rule of Acquisition #266 says “A pair of good ears will ring dry a hundred tongues.” The Ferengi meant negotiation. I mean a pellet grill: shut up, leave the lid shut, and listen to the thing.

Fire and Metal: The Argentine Asador

“I Bought An Argentine Asador Grill” has Mad Scientist trying open-fire cooking. The setup is a fire built on logs with coals raked to one side, then distributed under the cooking surface. The grate is adjustable: you raise or lower it to change the heat, and he notes you don’t lay it flat over the coals. The goal is low and slow, to tenderize and keep things juicy. He checks heat with his hand, and says “if this is really hot you definitely want to have some heat resistant gloves.” He asks viewers what to cook on it, floating picanha and Peking duck. Dracarys, as they say in High Valyrian, which means dragonfire. This is the first honest-to-god fire video of the day, and I’d like Peking duck, please.

The Ham in the Smoker

“I Put 4-Year-Old JamĂłn IbĂ©rico in My Smoker” appeared on both November 1 and November 2, so I’m guessing the upload pipeline had a moment. He expected a gray, dried-out salt bomb with a smoke flavor that fights the ham’s delicate notes. Instead: “a perfect balance,” with smoke “part of the orchestra.” He compares it to beef jerky, with all the stuff he loves about jerky. It’s “too potent and concentrated” to eat alone or in a pulled pork sandwich as a whole, but a small amount spread across the top of a pulled pork sandwich “would elevate it substantially” because of the umami. There’s a discount link in the description, which he says not to feel pressured to use. Smoking a four-year-old Spanish ham is both the most reckless and the most delightful thing I’ve heard all week, and I include the time Jordan upgraded a router on a Friday.

Recipes and Technique

Sam The Cooking Guy and the Yogurt Intervention

“The Many Uses of Greek Yogurt” is a livecast with a food-night energy. The headline claim: the sauce made with yogurt instead of sour cream has almost no carbs and almost no fat, “super good for you.” There’s pan-seared crispy salmon in there, and Sam’s tip that you can top things with apricot jam loosened with lemon juice, microwaved for five seconds, and poured over. He says the agave or honey version is “stupid good.” The lamb is the least healthy thing on the table, and still he has a couple bites. The whole thing ends with the rule that “the pounds would almost melt off,” which is nutrition advice so optimistic it should come with a disclaimer.

Shishitos and the Baby Caprese

“Blistered Shishito Peppers and a Baby Caprese” is the lighter number. Cherry heirloom tomatoes are “gorgeous in color but really they’re more amazing for their flavor,” and his argument is you can make the big caprese, but “the baby one” is the way to go. The notable choice is white balsamic vinegar, because the dark kind changes the color, while with white “the little white balls stay like little white balls.” Wee Olive is credited as the source, and there’s a promo code in the description, which I’m not repeating. The livecast cooking competition has eight finalists picked, with a note to be happy for them even if you didn’t make it. Be happy for them, Little Mister. I’m trying.

Chefs and Restaurants

Eater’s “What It Takes to Run One of NYC’s Most Popular New Restaurants — Mise En Place” is the day’s only restaurant-kitchen video, and the transcript I got is a fragment. What’s in it: a schnitzel with an in-house component that doesn’t lend much flavor “but it’s a nice kind of aroma.” A shrimp toast gets paired with a sweet and sour plum sauce, with the shrimp farce described as “juicy and bouncy.” The chef says it’s “probably the juiciest schnitzel I’ve had,” and “the best of both worlds.”

There’s a lot of effort in every element, and the stacks of shrimp toast get made slowly during service because “it’s better to go slow and get a good product.” Presentation side goes down first. The owner says New York is “such a diverse dining town” and that the goal was to build a space that isn’t “a blip in time,” something “timeless” that can evolve, so guests come back “in six months, a year.” There’s a mention of tallow at the end, and then the transcript cuts off mid-sentence. I won’t guess where the sentence went. That’s the whole of what I’ve got, and any more would be me inventing a menu, which isn’t a good look for a woman with a reputation.

Food History and Culture

The Immigrant Table’s “25 Foods Andy Griffith Really Ate on the Set of The Andy Griffith Show” is a nostalgia list, and I only have the ending. The top spot goes to a barbecue gathering, because “every other dish on this list could be cooked by one person in one kitchen, and this one took a whole county.” The show ran from 1960 to 1968, 249 episodes. The line that got me: “Mayberry never taught anyone to cook. It taught people…” and then the transcript cuts off, which is somehow the most Mayberry thing that could happen. Nobody remembers recipes, they remember lemonade on the porch, a plate carried across the courthouse, and a pot of beans that never runs out. Even the guy who slept in the jail got breakfast from a good cook. If you’re keeping track at home, that’s the second video today telling you barbecue is about people. The first one just had more fighting.

Drinks

The drinks desk is thin to the point of malnourishment. The only item from the bar world is Beers & Bars, whose “JUSTICE - FLOWER IN A HURRICANE REACTION | TAME IMPALA, SZA & KING GIZZARD” is a music reaction video. They’re reacting to what sounds like tracks tied to the Grand Theft Auto 6 soundtrack and talk about an eighties radio-station vibe, with one comparison to what Phil Collins was doing in the era. I can’t build a cocktail out of a reaction video, though I admire the commitment to the bit. Nothing today on distilling, so go pour something yourself, Little Mister.

Closing Argument

Forty days beats the fresh brisket, at least for blind tasters. A ham survives the smoker, an offset beats nobody’s patience, and Kansas City has a hundred sauces and an inferiority complex.

Sources

Videos

Recipes