Merlie's Magic Beef

Lauren came home from the supermarket with a cut of beef marked "London Broil". We're not quite sure what this particular cut is, it's a bit unlike the other cuts marketed as London Broil that we've done before. It appears more like a "Tri-tip" cut, perhaps someone will recognize the cut and send me a message.

In any event, we were out of CharCrust rub, and took a trip to a local cooking store called Chef Central to replenish our supply (thinking that the Roast Garlic Peppercorn would do well on the meat)

As we walked into the store, we noticed that they were about to host a demonstration by a fellow named Chef "Hoboken Eddie" McCarthy. The store carries all of his sauces (produced here in New Jersey), and he has a web site you can visit.

So we sat in on the demonstration, and had a nice time listening to him talk about the way he makes his sauces. He prepared some samples of pasta with a peanut butter sauce, and also a "pulled turkey" in his BBQ sauce. There were ramekins of each of the sauces available for tasting. We decided to bring home some of the sauces that we tasted.

After the demonstration, we mentioned to him that we had this cut of meat waiting for us at home, asked which of his sauces he'd suggest we try. His initial thought was his BBQ sauce, but we asked for a different approach, as we have a couple of good BBQ style sauces already in our kitchen.

So he suggested that we try his "Merlie's Magic" sauce. This is a thin sweet sauce with pieces of fruit and peppers floating around in it. It's subtitled "A Spicy Orange and Pineapple Sauce", so Lauren and I agreed to give this a try tonight.

The sauce is named for Hoboken Eddie's wife, who is evidently hot and sweet like the sauce. To give you an idea of the flavors involved, the ingredients list mandarin oranges, pineapple, sugar, vinegar, jalapenos, orange peel, ginger, cayenne and habanero peppers, garlic and a couple of odds and ends.

He suggested that we marinate our meat for a couple of hours in a simple Italian salad dressing, and apply the sauce during the latter stages of cooking. This was exactly what I anticipated doing, so we had a plan.

I fired up some coals in the Kamado, and brought the temperature to about 750 degrees for the initial searing. I seared for 4 minutes per side (rotating the meat after 2 minutes to a cross hatch grill marks).

When the searing was done, I brushed the top of the meat liberally with Merlie's Magic sauce, and then down the damper top and draft door so the meat would "dwell" at about 500 degrees for the rest of the cooking. After about 8 minutes, I turned the meat again, and applied sauce to the other side. I kept basting with more sauce every couple of minutes, and enjoyed watching the meat take on a rich color. I removed the meat when the internal temperature read 140 degrees.

I was wondering what to make as a side dish for the meal, and decided to wimp out and simply open a can of beans. I had one lone green pepper that I roasted along with the meat, but it was a tired vegetable to begin with, and I discarded it. However, I looked in the refrigerator and noticed that Lauren had some nice cherries sitting there... and I thought "oh, why not?".

So I dug out a new little grill grid and simply poured the cherries on the grid for the last 10 minutes or so of the meat's cooking time (turning the cherries when we thought of it).

The cherries softened beautifully and was a lovely accompaniment to the sliced meat. We served a little bit of Merlie's sauce along side the meat, and had quite a lovely, fruity meal.

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