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Chef Tom here with a great recipe for a bacon explosion.

Bacon Explosion Recipe

Ingredients

• 2 lb bulk pork sausage


• 1 lb bacon, raw slices


• 1 lb bacon, diced, cooked


• 8 oz pepper jack cheese, grated


• Chile Slinger Chipotle BBQ Sauce


• Reida Honey Farm Raw Wildflower Honey


• R Butts R Smokin’ Ozark Heat BBQ Rub

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Instructions

Preheat your Yoder Smokers YS640 to 275ºF. Place the sausage in a gallon zip-top bag. Press the sausage out into an even layer. Using scissors or a knife, cut along the edges of the bag and turn the layer of sausage out onto your work surface.

Season the surface of the sausage with R Butts R Smokin’ Ozark Heat BBQ Rub. Mix about 4 parts Chile Slinger Chipotle BBQ Sauce and 1 part Reida Honey Farm Raw Wildflower Honey. Warm the sauce to blend the two and make it a bit more fluid. Set aside half of the mixture and reserve for later use. Brush a layer of of the sauce mixture on the sausage. Spread the cheese and cooked diced bacon evenly over the surface. Roll the entire thing into a log.

Lay out 1/2 of your sliced bacon parallel to one another. Fold back every other slice (a couple of inches) on one side. Lay in a slice of bacon from the remaining 1/2 lb, perpendicular to the first layer of bacon, then fold the original slices back. Now working from the opposite end do the same thing, alternating the slices folded back, and adding another slice next to the last, forming a weave pattern with the bacon.

Place the sausage log at one end of the bacon weave and roll the sausage, encasing it in the bacon weave. Transfer to the cooker and smoke until the internal temperature reaches 150ºF, about 90 minutes. Brush the outside of the bacon explosion with the reserved sauce mixture and continue cooking until the internal temperature reaches 160ºF. Rest 10 minutes then slice to serve.

This recipe was prepared on a Yoder Smokers YS640 Pellet Grill.

 

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Chef Tom breaks down our method of preparing competition chicken thighs. This is the recipe we use in KCBS competitions and incorporates tips, techniques and methods we have learned from competition barbecue pitmasters like Andy Groneman of Smoke on Wheels Competition BBQ (Kansas City) and "BBQ Brian" Misko of House of Q (British Columbia, Canada).

Competition BBQ Chicken Thighs Recipe

Ingredients

• 6 Skin-on chicken thighs


• 1 cup Butcher BBQ Bird Booster Chipotle Chicken Injection, Mixed


• 4 Tablespoons Plowboys BBQ Yardbird Rub


• 1/4 cup Butcher BBQ Grilling Oil Chipotle


• 1 cup Plowboys Sweet 180 BBQ Sauce


• 1 cup Firebug Grilling Sauce Hot BBQ Sauce


• 1/2 Cup Reida Honey Farm Wildflower Honey


• 2 teapoons JP Custom Smoke Chicken Scratch Finishing Spice

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Instructions

Remove the skin from the thigh. Place the skin on a cutting board with the outside of the skin touching the board, fat side up. Using a sharp boning knife slice the fat from the skin, taking care to not puncture the skin. The skin should be very thin when finished.

Looking at the backside of the thigh, you’ll notice that one end of the thigh bone has a rounded end that sticks out further than the other. Using poultry shears, cut the end of the bone off. You may need to slice around the end of the bone to get your shears in there. This should allow the flesh to cover the end of the bone, and keep the bone from protruding from the end, negatively affecting the shape of the finished product. Trim any excess fat from the meat of the thighs. Continue to trim any pieces of the flesh that will stick out or cause an uneven shaped thigh. You may need to go back and do more trimming as you assess the group of thighs as a whole. You want them all to be shaped and sized as evenly and similarly as possible.

Combine the Butcher BBQ Bird Booster Chipotle Chicken Injection with water (according to the directions on the bag) and mix well to dissolve. Using a marinade injector, inject the flesh of the thigh in several places. Place your thighs in a zip top bag with the remaining injection and soak for one hour. You do not need to soak the skins. Just wrap them in plastic wrap and store them in the refrigerator.

Preheat your Yoder Smokers YS640 Pellet Grill to 275ºF.

Remove the thighs from the bag and pat mostly dry with paper towels. Season all meat surfaces with Plowboys BBQ Yardbird Rub. Lay out your skins and lightly season the side that will make contact with the flesh. Carefully place the thigh on the skin and wrap the skin around the thigh, covering as much flesh as possible. Excess skin can be trimmed and/or tucked under the thigh. A little excess is good, as the skin will tighten as it cooks. Too much excess will negatively affect the bite.

Apply a layer of Butcher BBQ Grilling Oil Chipotle to the bottom of a foil pan. Carefully transfer the thighs to the pan, shaped and arranged as identically as possible with the skins precisely in place. Transfer the pan to the second shelf of the cooker and smoke for 30 minutes.

After the initial 30 minutes, cover the pan with foil, and continue cooking. At this point you can mix your sauce. Combine 2 parts Plowboys Sweet 180 BBQ Sauce, 2 parts Firebug Grilling Sauce Hot BBQ Sauce and 1 part Reida Honey Farm Wildflower Honey in a sauce pan. Stir to combine. Warm the sauce by placing the pan in the cooker.

Using an instant read thermometer, like the Maverick PT-100, to monitor the internal temperature. When the thighs reach an internal temperature of 150ºF, remove the pan from the cooker. Place a wire glazing/cooling rack on the second shelf of the cooker. Carefully dip one thigh at a time in the sauce. Mind the skin, doing your best not to smudge the sauce as you remove it from the sauce. Transfer the thighs to the wire rack after dipping. Continue cooking until the internal temperature reaches 160ºF. Just before removing the thighs from the grill, lightly sprinkle the tops of the thighs with JP Custom Smoke Chicken Scratch Finishing Spice.

Remove from the cooker and store in a cooler or cambro until ready to box.