Small scale cooks.

Teefus

So, it’s just the two of us. Bride of Teefus and I don’t have the appetites we did when younger. We like quality versus quantity. We like some leftovers for lunches but the days of full packers and multiple slabs of ribs are over. We love the food, but just need to scale it back. 

I’d love to hear what y’all like to cook on a smaller scale. 

JohnInCarolina

Kebabs are probably one of my favorite small scale dishes to cook.  Get your protein and vegetables of choice, a decent marinade, and some rice or whatever for a side and you can have a really great meal for two that’s quick and easy and pretty safely small scale.

HeavyG

Stir fries.

TEXASBGE2018

We have a family of 4 and I hardly ever cook Full Briskets. Most of the time I smoke small 2-3lb chuck roasts. It's the same flavor as point brisket without the need to package and freeze the extra 12lb we wouldn't eat that day. We also like to get Flat Iron Steaks. For 2 people that's probably a couple meals if you get a larger one. Another great option is to grab a wagyu ribeye freeze it for about an hour and then thinly slice it. You can use that for stir fry's or cheesesteaks.

paqman

I am in the same situation.

We typically share a steak.  For ribeyes, I get the spinalis and SWMBO gets the “eye”.  We slice tenderloin and share it or keep leftovers for cold salads later in the weeks.

1 rack of ribs shared between the two of us.

Plate short ribs (brisket on a stick) instead of a full brisket.  2 bones per cook, the rest gets frozen.

Half a burger…

Photo Egg

Shrimp and grilled fish are quick and easy.

4TheGrillOfIt

We cook small scale through the week using the small Egg.  Chicken thighs, salmon, pork chops, burgers and steaks are easy to size down.

I do grilled salmon once a week.  I buy about a 1 1/4 lb filet and cut it into 3 steaks and season it with Deez Nuts.  I serve it along side rice and coleslaw or grilled asparagus.  Easy and delicious.  It is one of my wife’s favorites.  

Acn

When I get a brisket for our family of 3 I usually trim 3/4 of the flat immediately.  The point and bit of flat will get smoked and provides us with one brisket meal and a brisket centric 2nd (chili or hash usually).

Depending on the size of the packer, that leaves around 5-7 lbs of flat.  Maybe a couple of lbs gets ground and the rest is sliced with the grain into strips about 3” wide and then thin sliced against the grain.  That works well for stir fries, or marinated and grilled quickly (3-4 minutes total over high, direct heat) and used in tortillas or lettuce wraps with a sauce or salsa, some cheese and/or crema, or some thin sliced veg.

Botch

HeavyG said:

Stir fries.

This works very well for me, and there's only one here.  A six-pack of thighs has two being frozen, and four meals w/ no leftovers, and just by varying the vegg/sauces/rice vs noodles, I'll have four very different lunches.  
 
I haven't cooked a brisket since I retired, but @Acn's ideas have me thinking...

RRP

One of our new favorites such as tonight have been my personal pan pizzas made using 6" tortilla shells for crusts. Used to be Saturday night meals were BIG steak nights with some heavy duty sides to boot. 

RRP

BTW while we have cut back on the quantity and not quality as said above, we also frequently enjoy first an evening meal and then have the other half in what I never call “leftovers” but I call them “make aheads”.

OTOH some good friends of ours can get two meals out of a single 8 or 10oz filet!…I’m just NOT going to try to match that! BTW they are not doing that to save money…in fact I am clueless why they are even doing thst, 

lousubcap

For small meals(two here), off the beaten path steak cuts such as hanger, skirt, zabuton and pichana are favorites.  Seafood cuts are another great option.  However, I much prefer the challenge of the big protein brisket cook so that happens around every 4-5 weeks. I have two sons within 15 miles so that cook is easy to distribute. 
For me the enjoyment is the cook more than the outcome.  But I am old and have a lawn so consider that.  Cook what you enjoy both with the cook and the eats.  FWIW-

Teefus

Great suggestions. I’ve already made the move from Brisket to Chuck Roast. Bride of Teefus prefers the “Texas Chuckie” to Brisket too. The nice thing about a good chuck is you can mix up the rub profile and get different results. I have an English Prime Rib Rub that is killer on chuck. We’ve done a few smaller pork shoulder roasts and single rib slabs too. I get my Low and Slow fix without a mountain of food at the end. 

The thing I miss about many small scale cooks is the low and slow ritual. The cook is half the fun and something I really enjoy. I recall my Uncle lamenting the era of the gas grille. He’d say “BBQ chicken used to be a three beer job start to finish. Now it’s only worth a beer and a half. How is that better?”

SGH

Perineum is extremely quick and easy. However we cook it on a smaller scale due to lack of availability more than anything else. It’s hard to get your hands on big quantities of it unless you work in slaughterhouse or have connections with one. 

With that said, many times people simply overlook perineum when looking for anus. 

lousubcap

@Teefus- just drink faster! Issue solved  .

BigGreenKev

Could always cut a tack of ribs in half and freeze the other half for a later time. Chicken breast or w and veggies is our go to.  Stir fry is good too

Teefus

SGH said:

Perineum is extremely quick and easy. However we cook it on a smaller scale due to lack of availability more than anything else. It’s hard to get your hands on big quantities of it unless you work in slaughterhouse or have connections with one. 

With that said, many times people simply overlook perineum when looking for anus. 

Taint cooking that.

fishlessman

these were all cooked on a 10 inch mini. spring chicken did a video

https://youtu.be/dYGge_k7FUI

fishlessman

butcher cuts short ribs about 1.5 inches wide. simple med/rare steak with grilled oyster shrooms

Teefus

How does one delete a post made in error?

Teefus

fishlessman said:

these were all cooked on a 10 inch mini. spring chicken did a video

https://youtu.be/dYGge_k7FUI

Nice! Bride of Teefus is a movie maker too. A mini would be fun. I have a large so it’s pretty much dedicated to low and slow plus roasting. The Weber kettle handles grilling duties. It’s all about the right tool. 

Botch

Teefus said:

How does one delete a post made in error?

Quickly.  Like, within 59 minutes.  

Teefus

I figured that much out. There were options to edit but none to delete, at least that I could find. 

Botch

Ah.  The only thing I've figured out how to do is just replace my post with "...."