What: Cha Cha Hut Open House
When: January 9, 2010, 3:30pm – 8pm (or we run out of food)
Where: 2310 Bridge St. Roxbury, NY (next to the Roxbury Motel)
Cost: $15 for full menu buffet (beverage not included)

You’re invited to drop by for our open house to sample all of our menu for one low price. This is not our official grand opening. It’s an event for us to work out kitchen issues before opening and for you to sample our menu in the new space.

Hope we see all of the Grill Club folks at this event or at the Hut in the near future. Sign up for the Grill Club to get the latest on this event and our upcoming Grand Opening.

We smoked Bambi!

Or at least Bambi’s ribs.

With the first real winter snow fall coating the valley, we fired up the smoker to take a run at 11lbs. of venison ribs. I had done a smoked venison roast and had grilled moose strip steaks, but smoking venison ribs was a new one for me. Not much online about doing this – other than most hunters choose to not take the ribs. So, I decided to treat them like grass fed beef and work from there.

When raw, the ribs are a dark dark red with basically no fat. That should have been a bit of a warning sign, but I missed it. I decided to go with the Cha Cha Hut BBQ rub – created for pork and chicken – but probably should have opted for the Brisket rub (a bit less spicy and suited to beef). With ribs prepped and the smoker up to 260 degrees, in went Bambi for the next three hours.

While the ribs cooking, we headed off to an open house at Hudsonpress Print Studio (777 Carroll Hinkley Rd. Roxbury NY 12474). The studio is owned by artists Gerda van Leeuwen and Peter Yamaoka. Absolutely wonderful pantings and pottery plus great food and conversation made for a nice way to spend time while Bambi smoked.

Returning home, we found the ribs done and ready for resting. Out of the smoker, into foil and into the cooler to rest for a bit. (Yep – coolers also keep things warm…) Cherie’s experiment for the evening was the latest in Cha Cha Hut baked items: a sweet potato biscuit. Like a denser buttermilk biscuit, one of the tasters for the evening called them “moist scones”. They went so fast we forgot to take a photo though the blurry pic at the right shows Sean eating one. (The photo is perfectly clear – it’s Sean that is actually blurry.)

All in all not a bad first run at both venison ribs and sweet potato biscuits. I’d give the ribs 6/10 and the biscuit 8/10. A bit more moisture in the rib cooking, less spice in the rub and a shorter cook time should do the trick with Bambi. Slightly smaller biscuits will make for biscuit perfection.

Good thing we have more venison ribs coming soon…

After debuting the Cha Cha Hut Mex-I-Can sauce at a Grill Club, several people suggested using it for tacos. The Mex-I-Can is essentially a spicy Mexican BBQ sauce, so it seemed certainly logical. The following day, we sat down in the Cha Cha Hut Test Kitchen and whipped up a plate of Cha Cha Hut Pork Tacos (see photo below).

I figured if it works for pork, it should also work for beef. The photo above shows the Cha Cha Hut Brisket Tacos.

We’re planning on making these weekend specials:
3 tacos (with cheese, lettuce & tomato) $7
add a side of sour cream .75¢

As I was setting up for a recent Cha Cha Hut focus group (topic: portion size & pricing) I decided to make a little video showing the smoke my smoker generates. It should be noted, most of what appears to be smoke is actually steam.

The video is a progression throughout the day starting with the smoker being lit (no smoke/steam) to running at full cook with brisket & ribs (the maximum smoke/steam).

The end of last week was quite a busy one.

FRIDAY
We delivered the site plans and permit application to the New York State Department of Health. (That’s a slice of the plan above…) We now have a couple weeks wait while the DOH review the plans.

SATURDAY
It was a trip to New Jersey for research. First off, dropped by Bourbon BBQ in Wyckoff, NJ for lunch and to get some ideas for the Hut. Same concept we are setting up: order here – pick up there, no plates/glasses just paper cups and baskets lined with wax paper. I had the brisket sandwich with a side of beans and slaw. Cherie went with the pulled pork and mac & cheese. Everything was pretty good (a little dry but good). The sides were a little bland, but certainly fine for what they were. Only one house sauce – a nice spicy sweet tomato based one. I picked up a pint of their rib rub because it was packages in a Chinese takeout box. Thinking I might “borrow” that idea for the Cha Cha Hut rubs.

Next up: IKEA. Probably the best – and least expensive – way to get the counters and furniture we need. Of course, going on a Saturday may not have been the wisest choice, but we did find everything we need to furnish the Hut. Once we have the DOH approval on our plan, we’ll be renting a truck and making a return trip to purchase – though we’ll be making that trip on a Tuesday or Wednesday.

SUNDAY
Our landlords are a group of folks who own several properties along Bridge Street. We had not met half of the partners until Sunday and they wanted to discuss our cook house. The meeting went great – much discussion of BBQ and our plans for the space. In the end, they gave us the go ahead to start the build on the cook house. We’re hoping to have the poles in this week and a completed smokehouse around Thanksgiving.

So now it is a waiting game. Waiting for the DOH to give it’s approval to our plan. Waiting for the cook house to be built. Waiting to see if we can find more funding. We’re finishing up the menu (keep tweaking the selection/pricing), shopping around for signage and continuing work on our recipes.