For Soph’s birthday we’re having friends and family over to a meal. We initially planned a roast, but got worried about the stress of having to time everything to be served up at once, so we veered off to slow barbecuing that will have lots of flexibility in serving time. No surprise here that nearly all the recipes are from America’s Test Kitchen!

So we’re doing a Kansas style beef brisket, which starts with an overnight rub.

The brisket smokes on the barbecue, until the smoke runs out, about 75 minutes in this case.

Then it gets coated in a quick barbecue sauce and transferred to the oven for two hours at 130C fan, until it reaches 90C internally and then it stands for half an hour before carving.

We’re also doing a separate Kanas barbecue sauce to go with it. I suspect I’ll be dipping bread in this!

That brisket isn’t going to feed everyone, so we’ll also be smoking up some chicken, which we can keep warm in the same low oven as the brisket if needed. Obvious, being an ATK recipe, the chicken gets brined before smoking :)

For veg we’re having corn on the cob, plus carrots & parsnips (mostly from the garden) roasted in maple syrup.

Potatoes are going to be of the ‘super-stuffed’ baked variety. These use the microwave to speed up the cooking, only finishing them in the oven. After microwaving the potatoes get their tops cut off, the middle scooped out and mixed with Boursin cheese, and then stuffed back in. The ‘super stuffing’ comes from baking extra potatoes that are used just for extra stuffing for the served potatoes.

We’ll be having the sourdoughs with the meal.

And of course the birthday cake.

And then… well it all got eaten!