A brisket, a brasket.....or something.

The brisket that was intended for Sunday's dinner was re-heated for Mondays dinner, to a resounding chorus of, "Eh." I will do it again, because I love slow cooked shredded meat, but will definitely mess around with the seasonings.

I saw this recipe and I happened to have a bottle of liquid smoke (Kaliis uses it in her collards and often cooks at my house on holidays). Now The Crockpot Lady is not kidding when she says that a little liquid smoke goes a long way, and I was not thrilled at the prospect of "wet beef jerky", so I only used two tablespoons. I also used fresh garlic, as that is what I do. It really does make the house smell amazing while it's cooking, garlicky and smoky and oh my god good. I shredded it, mixed it with apple cider and bottled bbq sauce, and left in in the crock for another hour.

Verdict; it was not smoky enough for me. I'll add more liquid smoke next time. Other than that, it's hard to go wrong with slow-cooked beef.

I served it with seared greens and mashed celeriac. Celeriac is a delicious sub for mashed potatoes and abundant this time of year. We get them through our CSA. They are delighfully wierd looking and subtly flavored - I mashed mine up with cream, butter, rosemary and roasted garlic. The only thing to watch out for is that sometimes they are really starchy and won't get creamy when you mash them. A lot of people will throw in a couple potatoes to the mash, and that's really nice too.

Almost forgot - I roasted garlic in the crock-pot! When I cooked the brisket, I put a layer of foil on top to reduce the cooking area so that it wouldn't dry out. Then I prepped the garlic like you would for the oven, wrapped it in the foil packet, and just tossed it in on top of the other foil. It was perfect! I actually have a small crock and will be roasting garlic in that from now on.

Speaking of smoked foods, Jeffrey and I had a Business Dinner at Apollo Grill last night. (I'm serious you guys, there were spreadsheets and everything.) They are running a gnocchi special that is de-friggin-licious. Gnocchi with smoked chicken, cranberries, walnuts and winter squash in a light gravy-like pan sauce. It took all my willpower not to lick the bowl. I'm going to try to figure out the pan sauce part and make this at home, because when they take it off the menu I'm going to be a sad girl. I had a dirty martini with organic tomato vodka - so yummy. Hayes makes a damn good martini.