Meat Lovers Trio

I was getting hungry for tongue. My Mother-in-law used to pickle beef tongues & they were delicious and very tender. Too bad I never got her recipe. I found a good recipe by a guy called Thirdeye for boiling, skinning & smoking one. I bought a beef tongue, some grits, and ring bologna from my butcher.

Saturday I washed the tongue & got it in salt water for the overnight soaking. I decided to have some Cajun crackers to go with all three for my Sunday supper so I made a batch of the crackers for an overnight marinade & would smoke them.

The grits from my butcher are like pan pudding; the ingredients are; pork, pork heart and tongue, beef heart, steel cut oats, water, sugar, salt & pepper.

Sunday morning I got the tongue on to boil for an hour and a half in its beer, water and herbs. I had it on a plate to cool & my wife had a fit! I said just don’t look at it or you won’t want to eat any. After it cooled I skinned it & trimmed fat & muscle. I mixed up a rub for it, smeared with some Dijon mustard & coated with the rub. It went in the fridge for about 3 hours before smoking. I mixed some apple juice, cider vinegar & Worcestershire for spritzing.

I smoked my Cajun crackers for an hour on smoke 170 deg. Then I got my meat on & laid a strip of bacon on the tongue. The recipe said do the tongue at 200 deg. & should take 2 hours to get to 150 deg. IT. I started on smoke P3 & dropped a P# every half hour; at P0 it was running 200+ deg. At about two hours it was up to temp so seared on my Weber Q100. I didn’t get great sear marks. I turned & spritzed it twice during the smoke, replacing the bacon on top.

I finished the grits & bologna at 250 deg. I wanted the grits to get to 170 deg. IT & the bologna to split. It took about another 15 min. I let all cool some & then in the fridge until supper time.

I sliced all & served. I had my grits & tongue on Cajun crackers with some horseradish sauce & some bologna. For sides I had some cheese & some of my spice slaw. My wife had the tongue on crackers, some of the bologna & a green salad. The tongue was good, tender & taste like beef roast. It wasn’t melt in your mouth tender but pretty good. I didn’t care for the grits as well as I do pan pudding on crackers. I will probably use the leftovers to scramble with eggs. It all tasted good with the Yuengling!

Thanks to Thirdeye for the recipe!

Link for tongue recipe

The Raw Tongue

On to boil

After boiling

Applying rub to trimmed tongue

Cajun Crackers

Ring bologna & grits

Ready for the smoker

All on the smoker

Bologna & grits ready & my piece of bacon!

All cooling

Trio sliced & ready to serve

My Plate, my supper

Smokin Don