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Combining Dishes/M.P. Dijcks

Unknown
edited November -1 in EggHead Forum
I missed a question that I would like to answer about the small Egg this weekend as I was out of town. A Mr. M.P. Dijcks wanted to know how to combine some veggies with his meat and fish for two people in the same cook on the small. [p]I think a person needs to look at his meat first and the cooking time and temp it will take to see what veggies might go with the meal at the same temp. Even with the small, it is possible to not only cook the meat, but also cook a veggie or two and maybe even the bread or dessert as well in the same cook. With a cook like this, all the items may not go on at the same time but they can be done to where you are ready to eat when the longest item in the cooker gets done. For example, you decide to do chicken for the meat and figure that this might be best cooked at say 300-325 degrees. You select two bone in chicken breasts as the meat. Again, you asked about cooking for just two people. You figure that this meat will probably take about 75 minutes to get done at this temp. This leaves you with about any veggie you want to cook along with this meat. Some examples might be baked beans, say slabbed potatoes, mac and cheese, baked potatoes although they may have to be placed on the cooker first. How about fresh green beans and new potatoes, or maybe a broccoli and cauliflower dish with cheese over the top, scalloped potatoes with some chunks of ham and the list just goes on forever. About any veggie will cook at this temp. Now for your bread or dessert to go with your meal. Any type of pan bread will cook in this time frame. Most all desserts will as well cook in this time frame. [p]Now lets cook this meal in the small Egg and I will assume that you do have the ability to cook on two levels if you are planning to cook combined dishes in this cooker. This is very easy to make or there is a fellow on the forum with a real slick setup for this. I would place the two chicken breasts on the lower grid and right beside them, I would place my small retangular baking pan of scalloped potatoes as these are the two items in the cook that will take the longest and I want them on the lower grid. I have also decided on corn bread for my bread and this will also go into a small baking pan on the top grid. This will only take about 25 minutes at this temp so I will wait until my lower grid is about half done before I put it on the cooker. I still have room on the top grid for one more item in a baking pan and I think I will do some baked beans as this should go good with this meal and can get done in the time frame I am using for the meat. [p]You also asked about fish and some veggies to go with this. This also can be done but when you get into grilling which is very quick, you need to change the way you cook on the small. You want to do the veggies and the sides first at whatever temp they need and then change the temp and change over to a direct cook for your grilling. An example might be some cod fish and the sides you want are mac and cheese, maybe some fresh small asparagus with cheese over the top, a muffin tin of yeast rolls, and this time, a small dump cake for the dessert. Looking at this cook, I would start with a temp of about 350 degrees and place the mac and cheese which I have in the baking pan on the lower grid and right beside this would go another pan with the asparagus as I feel that these two items will take the longest to cook. On the top grid would go another pan with the dump cake which will take about 40 minutes and right beside it would be my muffin pan with my 6 yeast rolls which will take about 35 minutes to bake. When these items are done, I would change the cooker over to direct and raise the temp to about 400 degrees and cook the fish which will only take about 9 minutes at this temp with some good thick fillets. [p]I hope this helps and I have many pictures of this type of cooking and be more than happy to try to help you with any cooking on the small Egg. [p]Dave