AA5B

It’s the weekend, so I got up early, walked the dog and started thinking about what to make my kid for breakfast.

I spent way too long looking at a four hour recipe (why not, dinner is a smoked pork shoulder that I really need to get started asap) before giving it up

Started off normally: eggs over easy and sausage links. Let’s make the pancakes a little different with bananas and walnut, and top with fruit and nuts ….

Critical question: why do we buy a specific syrup for pancakes? It’s just sugar (or corn syrup). So I used the syrup from canned mangoes!!!! Tastes great but a bit thin and I didn’t use enough. It would be easy enough to thicken up, I’m sure. But why isn’t this the norm? We should have flavored syrup all the time, maybe save money over the maple stuff

Oh, and splurged with egg nog.

I generally use Lemmy through my phone browser: safari on iPhone. Starting a few weeks ago. I can no longer get to the primary url. When I try, the progress bar stops partway through, I get a long delay and eventually see “a problem repeatedly occurred on https://lemmy.world”.

I assumed there was some sort of update and was patient but it doesn’t appear to be getting fixed

As a workaround, I’ve been using https://old.lemmy.world

Is this a known problem or can someone help look into this?

Does anyone know the current state for re-flashing Inovelli Blue switches to Thread? I haven’t been paying attention the last year so I don’t know if they released that or if it works reliably. I did try looking through the community pages without finding anything definite (plus that might not include any actual experience trying it)

I recently saw a couple new Thread devices, so maybe it’s time to start using that. My entire Zigbee network was intended to be flashable to Thread: all I have is SkyConnect and some Inovelli Blue switches. More importantly, that should be a good foundation for a strong mesh to support other devices (and I don’t have a reason for a strong Zigbee mesh). I know SkyConnect multi-protocol didn’t work out but I believe reflashing to Thread is fine. I know Inovelli Blue can’t be reflashed over the air, but that’s ok. Is there Thread firmware and what are your experiences with it?

Throwing this out there in case someone has advice …..

I got a smoker this summer and have been having a great time cooking new (large) meals. But my kids are back at college and I can’t depend on my ex. How do you find people to eat your meals?

It’s a weird situation where it’s a huge pellet grill and smoking tends to focus on large pieces of meat, but not everything freezes well. I want to go gangbusters with feasts, just when I no longer have anyone to appreciate it. Anyone know if there is such a thing as cooking clubs, or something? How do you find one or how do you break into one as a single guy?

Fwiw

• kids are back from college today, ex is coming over and ex-FiL
• smoked duck with orange maple glaze
• chicken for those not willing to try duck
• rice pilaf
• arugula salad with toasted pine nuts
• I plan to throw chocolate chip cookie dough in a cast iron skillet for brownies and top with ice cream

I just got back from a 1,200+ mile road trip and Superchargers, especially with the trip planning, made it easy!

However non-Tesla chargers seem to be more common in Connecticut. I went to try one and discovered I don’t have as complete a set of adapters as I thought. What if I need to charge at a CCS charger?

I looked online and the price range is huge. I see a $64 and one close to $300, and several in between. Do you know what the difference is or what I should be looking for? Is there one you’d recommend? Is it even worth it, since Superchargers are everywhere, plus I charge at home, and CCS is likely to go away in a couple years?

I just got back from my first real road trip in an EV: over 1,200 miles in nine days! I stayed with my brother most of it, but did not even ask to plug-in. I saw many destination chargers, but filtered them out.

I charged only at Tesla superchargers. There was always one close to on my way, and I never felt too delayed. My first charging stop was at the Meadowlands, which is apparently a huge mall when they’re not playing football. It was a huge surprise to see the pop up to continue the trip before we were able to find the food court. I did follow the pattern from trip planning, to charge up frequently for short periods of 10-20 minutes, rather than wait for a full charge, and it worked very well. Basically each stop was to grab a soda, maybe use the bathroom, and go, and I always had a couple hundred miles of charge available

There was only one spot where I was worried. After sitting in traffic over an hour with the AC running, I was getting worried about reaching the planned supercharger. I exited to try a different brand, but discovered I didn’t have that adapter. Oops. However in the end, we did make the planned stop with a decent amount of charge left, despite the traffic delay and a couple detours

The final leg of the trip was 350 miles through mostly rural are with fewer super chargers. Trip planner recommended 2 quick charging stops, but by the time we ate lunch, the first stop was more than sufficient. Even in this rural area, supercharging wasn’t inconvenient!

No more range anxiety here it, it worked very well …… although admittedly in urban areas in the northeast where superchargers are fairly common. Still, destination chargers were common and I could have plugged in at my brothers.

Anyone else forget how to use a regular grill? Apparently I can no longer control my heat, and toasting buns are beyond me. Back to the Traeger, I guess

Do you have any amusing stories where you messed up?

I tried Paprika chicken! The jalapeños were the thing: I could smell them from the neighbors house!

Huge hit, very forgiving, and fast, but more of a grill item than a smoker item. My Traeger made it easy and almost foolproof, with the wireless meat thermometer. The recipe has a huge hit with my family! Love that salsa, but if you don’t have much spice tolerance, beware.

This was actually the first time I’ve cooked dark meat chicken with skin on since I was a kid, my teenagers’ first introduction to that, believe it or not. That’s where the recipe falls down. The cooking temperature was perfect for the meat, but there’s no way you’re getting crispy, browned skin with that.

I did set the grill to 365° instead of 350° but that wasn’t enough to make a difference. Granted, I haven’t checked the accuracy of the temperature setting, but it cooks food in the expected time at the intended temperature, and I have confirmed the meat thermometer matches. Next time I use this, I’ll try the last 10 minutes at max temp to see if that helps

Has anyone gotten a good crispy skin from their Traeger? What time and temp? My propane grill gets much hotter, but I really don’t want to use both for one food

Finally an all around success! Helps to be a bit less ambitious and pick something that uses less time.

• https://www.traeger.com/recipes/prosciutto-chicken-breasts

Oink and cluck. I’ve done bacon wrapped stuff before but really like this prosciutto better!

• https://www.traeger.com/recipes/vegetable-salsa-verde

I did have to have help making the salsa, and the sweet potatoes needed a lot more time than the other veggies. I’d never had salsa like that but it was perfect to liven up plain root veggies.

• https://www.traeger.com/recipes/grilled-peaches-cinnamon-mascarpone

Outstanding dessert and easy to put together.

Continuing the learning experience …..

• https://www.traeger.com/recipes/salmon-smoked-avocado-salsa
• on stovetop: https://spicysouthernkitchen.com/pecan-rice-pilaf/
• made this morning: Pineapple Gazpacho
• sourdough loaf (did not make)

Absolutely fan-effing-tastic

But, things to learn…

• I planned ahead and bought ahead! Yay!
• recipe manager generated a shopping list. Yay!
• great recipes, but a lot of work to bring them all together
• but missed one bunch of cilantro
• saved by the meat thermometer! — the import to my recipe manager somehow lost “step 3, increase temperature to 450°”

It really pays to be flexible, and I had compromised and bought pre-made loaves of sourdough. When things were looking late, I served the gazpacho and bread as an appetizer.

The pecan pilaf was not only outstanding, but it was not at all affected by sitting in the pot 40 minutes waiting for salmon! This is a lot of work for rice but I highly recommend!

Salmon was really good (not dried out) especially with that avocado salsa, despite cooking over an hour (30 min at 165°, 15+ min getting up to temp, 20 or so at 450°, 5-10 min oh shit I didn’t allow notifications for the meat thermometer ). Kudos to salmon for being so forgiving!

I found a two year old thread on great smoker recipes on that other site. Where do you get yours and what is your favorite?

Let’s add some resources to the sidebar - I’m not going to blindly add from that other site but will be happy to add anything you find useful, even if just copy-paste from there

The big grill claims to fit 7 racks of ribs…. But three St Louis fills it pretty good. I may need to make the corn bread inside.

This time I planned slightly better, thanks to a recipe app, and generated shopping lists, but …… didn’t get to the store until morning, got a late start, endured massive crowds and got a really late start

This is not the recipe I wanted to follow but it’s the one I have time for: https://www.traeger.com/recipes/all-american-spareribs