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Fire in the Water, Earth in the Air: Legends of West Texas Music
by Christopher Oglesby
Published by the University of Texas Press:
"As a whole, the interviews create a portrait not only of Lubbock's musicians and artists, but also of the musical community that has sustained them, including venues such as the legendary Cotton Club and the original Stubb's Barbecue. This kaleidoscopic portrait of the West Texas music scene gets to the heart of what it takes to create art in an isolated, often inhospitable environment. As Oglesby says, "Necessity is the mother of creation. Lubbock needed beauty, poetry, humor, and it needed to get up and shake its communal ass a bit or go mad from loneliness and boredom; so Lubbock created the amazing likes of Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Butch Hancock, Terry Allen, and Joe Ely."

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"Indeed, Oglesby's introduction of more than two dozen musicians who called Lubbock home should be required reading not only for music fans, but for Lubbock residents and anyone thinking about moving here. On these pages, music becomes a part of Lubbock's living history."
- William Kerns, Lubbock Avalanche Journal


Subject: Stubbs Audio Cookbook Cassette
Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2005 4:43 PM CST
From: Rob Pearlman
To: virtualubbock
Hi! I worked for Stubbs in Austin from 1983 to 1986…at Antone’s and helped him open his first place (after that) on I-35. I became great friends with him and of course have LOTS of stories about him that I would love to share with you.
BUT I also have a cool document that I created (attached). You may be aware that when Stubbs first started marketing his sauce (In Jack Daniel’s bottles…labels steamed off and his put on) out of his house, he included his Stubb’s Audio Cookbook Cassette, featuring
Jesse Taylor on guitar and Stubbs talking about BBQ and how to make it. Well, at one point a while back I had too much time on my hands and decided to transliterate the whole thing. I listened carefully and typed every word or sound he uttered as I heard it. I have so much fun reading it to this day that I thought it might be something you could share with your readers!
Rob Pearlman
www.smartplanet.net
www.mmglobalbrands.com
www.skwish.net


Ha Ha….Yeah!

Hello out there all you happy peoples, I want you to settle back and relax just for a little while. Cause right now ladies and gentlemen this program is comin to ya live right outta the BBQ pit. We got a very special thing here…catered. Dedicated to the peoples who love BBQ cold beer and whole lotta blues.

This program like I said ladies and gentlemen is comin to ya live…right outta the BBQ pit. Y'know they tell me that Columbus discovered America. Right now you gonna get an opportunity to make your discovery an' you ain't gonna have no ocean to cross ladies and gentlemen. We get this program all wound up you gonna be one of the greatest cooks in the world cause that what this program is all about.

We gone teach you how to cook that good ole mouth smackin ribs, good ole juicy sausage along with the briskets beans potato salad turkey, ham, everything that goes along with BBQ ladies and gentlemen. That's the purpose of this very special audition of Stubbs himself. So we want you to settle back there and relax just for a little while cause its comin to you live, right outta the kitchen ladies and gentlemen.

When this program is finished, you too can say I am a cook ladies and gentlemen. So we want you to pay attention, remember what we telling you, we gonna go it by the numbers. We gonna deal with pork ribs, sausage, chicken, ham, briskets, beef, turkey, we even gonna go to the ocean and grab a few fish along. We gonna talk to you a little bit about the pit, preparation, how you going to become a cook. That's what this program is about ladies and gentlemen.

Okay ladies and gentlemens, right now we gone go through the main thing about cookin BBQ. In order to cook good BBQ, you got to have something to cook it on, that means a pit. If you don't know what pits is ladies and gentlemen all you gotta do is take a stroll though Texas, look at some of the parks you get a good idea what BBQ pits is made of or what they look like. One of the main things about BBQ pits, you need to keep 'em clean. You have to be able to be sure that you choose the right kinda pit. You gotta have a pit that keeps a temperature, you gotta have a pit that won't catch afire, you gwa…got to have a pit that you get all your meat in, you got to have a pit that is clean. These are very important factors before you even thinking about cooking BBQ, you have to have a good pit to cook it in.

A BBQ pit ladies and gentlemen is kinda like a beautiful woman…you pick the one you think is the most beautiful. Could look like Graba Gerdy or Marylin Monroe, as long as it's your choice. That's what this thing is all about.

Second to that ladies and gentlemens is the wood. I cook on three kinds of wood. The most plentiful wood you find is mesquite. Second to that is oak, the most wood you can't find any more is hickory, hickory is something that's almost a thing of the past kinda like the model T Ford, they done faded outta history. Sometimes you can pick up hickory chips when your using ahhh…. charcoal and uhhh through your uhhh…grocery stores or whatever. So it is very important that you know what kind of wood you gonna use and know how to start a fire and to know fire preventions. The best thing to use if you get too much fire in the pit is keep you a little box of soda along just in case you do get a…a blaze all you have to do is sprankle the soda in, they'll it will distiminate the fire.

And always remember to not to get too much heat in the pit and depends on the kinda meat that you cookin'.

We'll get into all these details as we go along with this cookbook.

Right now I'm gonna grab me a cold Budweiser HAHAHAHA! You know beer is a thing that goes with the bluuuues! You always have to take you a little break n' get you a good ole cold Budweiser beer. It's good for ya. Keep you from sweatin so much cause the pit's gonna get hot.

So as we move along into this program ladies and gentlemen, next thing we gonna talk about is meat. It is very important that you know what kinda meat… what your tastebud means you know? You cannot substitute chicken for pork ribs, pork chops for beef, beef for turkey, turkey for fish. You have to have the right thing in mind. And believe me, you need to have the right thing in mind when you makin' preparations for food. It's very important that you have everything you need right where you got it…right in the pit area.
Where you got your meat all cut up n into pieces that's small enough to go inside of the pit where they won't be hanging all on the outside. That includes a equal cut-- it's very important that all your meat be put into equal sizes.

So we gone deal here now with pork ribs. Notice please, for Stubb, the kinda rib that I like to use is called "three and down". "Three and down" means a slab of rib weighs three pounds…to two twoun…"three and down" means three to one. Not over four pounds then you have the ribs weigh from three to five or eight, whatever the size you have. But the best rib to BBQ is "three and down". And, be sure that the rib fits into your pit. Always remember one thing here I might point out, never start a fire with meat in the pit. Be sure, for cooking ribs again, we dealin with ribs right now, you want to maintain a temperature of a hundred and seventy five degrees inside the pit, no more than two-fifty. That's where you start your fire. Be sure you got your fire already goin, to where all you gotta do is put your ribs in and always remember to put your fat side up. Now this is the important p… thing to remember right here that you wont ever put ribs on top of each other. You wanna allow enough space in between so the heat can pelitrate, so you get a even cook.

Now a lot of peoples go to mirinatin. Uhhhh this is one other thing that I want to emphasize, that I mirinate as I cook. Normally I put my ribs on the fire, I let em cook about thirty five minutes, and then I do my thing with my salt and my pepper, maybe a little vinegar, for mirinatin'. One thing you wanna remember that never put nuthin on your m…ribs or any kinda meat that's got sugar or syrup. This is what cause it to turn black and crystallize. You wanna use a good salt and pepper base and a little vinegar and watch it. This is most important when you cookin ribs. At one point when you see it turning a little bit on the brown side, you have to watch it, then to remember you have to love what you doin. You have to have feelings for what you doin. You have to really understand and a good set of eyes and a good quick set of fingers. And the moment you ribs start to getting real uh…a brownish color, then you need to flip it to one side and let the other side catch up with the other one provided if it's not cooking right or not getting it a even cook. In most cases, you gone get a even cook if you follow this real slow unique way of keeping your eyes on em and watchin em. And not havin your pit too hot nor havin it too low. And about two hours and a half, you will take off and enjoy some of the most dedicated ribs that mouth ever said good morning to.

Okay, next thing we gonna go to here, we gonna go through chicken. Most commonly thing you find cookin in a BBQ pit in the home is chicken. MOST people can do this. First thing you wanna do is be sure you got your chicken cut in all equal parts. I prefer cookin chicken cut in half. This way you don't have all the little pieces to fool with. You put the chicken on same as you would ribs, bout the same temperature, uh…you might wanna increase your temperature like from two twenty five to two seventy five for cooking chickens. Chickens its need a little bit more heat because it's got to get cooked all the way through to the bone. And you use the same system for mirinatin. You cook it and mirinate at the same time. This way you wont get your meat all dark or burnt or too much salt or too much pepper. And remember to keep your pit at that temperature keep your meat inside of the pit rather than having it hanging on the outside, or too much meat stacked all over top of each other.

One very important thing to remember about chicken ladies and gentlemen, chicken need to be fully cooked and the one way to make sure that it's fully cooked is to take you a piece off when you think it's fully cooked, get you a knife, and cut it right to the bone. Should you see reddish meat, a little blood drippin, then you know it's not done. You know to return it to the pit and cook it just a little longer.

Say man what's wrong with them horses out there? Them Budweiser horses!

Ah, the next thing we gonna get into ladies and gentlemen is the big meat…that's the briskits. Briskets is the most common known meat you find in any BBQ joint. Brisket is a piece of meat that weighs anywhere from five to 25 pounds dependin on what you wanna use it for and how many people you want to feed. My thing for briskets is to not to weigh less than eight, more than 13 pounds for your home cookin. This enables you to be able to handle it so you won't have so much weight to deal with, and you don't have to get your fire out of order, and putting in more or less heat. Uhh…you do the brisket ALMOST the same as you do all the other meat we've spoken of. You put the briskit in the pit with the fat side up…ALWAYS remember that. You let your brisket start cookin for about an hour. Then you use your basic mirinatin for whatever you want to put on it. And for a brisket, it takes anywhere from six to eight to ten hours to cook it.

One thing about a brisket ladies and gentlemens, I want you to emphas…remember this point, that most peoples think you cook with smoke. Smoke is the purpose for aroma. You need heat. You must always remember that. Keep you live heat in your pit so you got the heat to cook with and you got your aroma to smoke your meat with.

One danger point here I might point out if you have the tendency to cook your meat too slow, it have a tendency to spoil. If you cook it to fast, you gonna burn it up. So those are the two difference between them.

And its always important to remember the weight factor and the kind of meat that you cookin.

And for briskets, you have to remember just to put em in the pit, leave em for about an hour, and then you slowly mirinate em. Uh you don't wanna get too much salt or too much pepper and you can put in a little garlic powder, whatever your taste bug is for when you wanna use your mirinatin'. Most peoples ah, in this day and age, don't like certain types of ingredients reason why I'm putting it this way. You have to sss…sss..sudisfy…ah uh satisfy your own tastes. Your own values. But under any circumstances when you cook your meat properly, you gonna get the best taste for all of it. So when you invite your friends over from New York, Chicago, uh…Rome,
Italy or Paris, France you have your backyard cookout, you have something to be proud of, something to really enjoy.

And for one thing, you savin' money by doin this yourself.

The next thing we gonna get into is the big bird. You know most holidays, we have what we call Thanksgiving, Christmas, Fourth of July, uh…we wanna go to the big bird, better known as the turkey, the gobble gobble gobba. HA HA!

Ahhh….lotta peoples goes out and buy a bird, a turkey. Uh, I can tell you, you can cook a turkey yourself. It's not a lotta problems, just take a lotta love and understanding. Maybe that ole' husband or that ole' family or somebody might been mad at you all your life might be proud to know that you have prepared them a good meal rather than goin out and buyin it.

So, ah… the best thing to do is be sure your turkey weighs uh from fifteen, eighteen pounds, dependin on the number of people you wanna feed, and my strongest suggestion is to put that turkey and let it…be sure you thaw it out, and all the loose things out of it, from both ends and get you pot, just a regular ole boilin pot that you can put a lid on, put it in there and put cold water on it, let it come to a, not a boil, cause you don't want it to tear the breast and tear the meat up or tear the wings up. And let it simmilate for about an hour. With nuthin on it, just plain ole water. And uh... after an hour of cooking there you wanna take it out and be careful that you don't burn yourself or tear it up, take it and put it into your pit. Ahh… the best way to do a turkey to keep from putting it on your rack in the pit is put a piece of foil paper underneath it. And put your marinatin ss…pepper and salt or whatever you putting on and then take your foil paper and kinda fold it up a bit. And leave it in there for about fff…four or five hours, then you come back to it, you take the foil paperl and releases it and leave it in on the pit, and leave your turkey right in where it get heat from all parts of your pit. And you watch it, if it need slightly turning to one side, you do that. And the main thing you wanna do is handle it with love and ceere, you don't wanna break the wings turning it over or uh have scrambled turkey. You wanna be very careful with this…bird. Because you remember you feeding your loved ones and you want them to be happy and you want them to be proud of you. And ahhh.. it should take a turkey no more than eight hours in the pit, seven hours total weighing from fifteen to eighteen pounds. Course if you get a bigger bird, you have to 'llow for a little bit longer time for cookin it. And, that is about the way you do a bird and you can call your friends and your neighbors around and you gonna have a vwery good Thanksgiving turkey or Christmas turkey and you'll be able to enjoy it.

The next thing we gonna talk about here is ham. There's a lotta ways to cook a ham, but the best way is to remember when you buyin a ham to know whether or not that it's raw, gree or already pre-cooked. It's very important to know those three things. If you got a pre-cooked ham, look at the l…whatever, n the label reads on it, n it'll give you mostly what you need to do to it. If the ham is totally raw, then you have to go through the process you do the turkey. And…ahhh... do the same thing as you would a turkey. Remember, you don't ever want to use any sugar or syrup or anything that crystallize an' turn dark while you cookin your meat. And…next thing we gonna talk about is the ocean.

Say man, what's wrong with them mules? Them horses is actin' up out there. Well, it's time to take a good ole' break right here, I'm gonna jump outta here right now and grab me a Budweiser. HA HA HA!. You know, when you, when you got Bud, you said it all! You just can't sit here and do this coo…cookin' and enjoy this good music without a good ole' cold beer. And that means Budweiser. Cause it's the king. Got to be the king 'cause he sits on the throne!

After you got your Budweiser, we gonna get right back here and talk about…fish! Fish is another thing that comes in all dif..different categlories. But it's only one or two ways to cook it. If you cookin' it in the pit, it's always best to have uhhh…heat! It takes probably more heat cause you need to cook fish faster than you do any other meat that you cookin'. It will take less time to cook fish, than it would any other meat we've spoken of. And, you wanna be very careful that you fire is right, not over two-twenty five for cookin fish. And you wanna mirinate it a little bit, you wanna put some foil paper underneath, 'cause it's hard to handle, where you won't tear it all up, and you gonna have to use some quick eyes and some quick fingers. And remember that when you cookin' fish, it's not like chicken or anything else that you got. Uh…it take aproximy two and a half to four hours to get you chicken…I mean d…dd… to get your fish really smoked to where you can really enjoy it.

The next thing we gonna go to those mouth ssssmackin sausage. No matter what you say about sausage, ahh… you got about fifty thousand different kinds of sausage, so again, you have to use your taste bug. Texas, particully Texas has got all kinds of sausage in it. You have the German sausage, the Japanese sausage, the eye-talian sausage, Belgians, or whatever. The main thing about a sausage is same thing holds true with your turkey; whether it's pre-cooked or not. In most cases your turkery…I mean your sausage is pre-cooked. You have to look at it, and if it's raw, you don't need to season it, you don't need to mirinate it because it's got a skinned on it, and you wanna use a very low temperature while you cookin' your sausage. And you wanna watch sausage more than anything that you cookin', simply because it will cook and busssst. It'll tear up on you. And once you get it all torn up you got a miserable mess and you don't want that 'cause you wastin' your money. That's the idea of this cookbook; preparin' you to cook where you can save money and enjoy yourself and have a whole lotta love doin' it. And…like I say again, you just have to pick out what you like in sausage. Sausage come in turkey sausage, wild geese sausage, polecat sausage, uhhh…armadillo sausage or whatever you want. But to remember to check the labels. And after followin' all these processes ladies and gentlemens, comin' right outta Stubb's kitchen, you can say "ladies and gentlemens, I know that I'm a cook!"

And we gonna come back here in a minute…w…what's wrong with them mules, them horses man!? HA HA. HEY man, is that a Budweiser keg out at them horses?! Well, they cain't get at it can they? I think them horses is getting' drunk on me man! They keep movin' around out there! Say, tie them horses to another place man…get away from that Budweiser beer! HA HA HA!

OKAY we gonna get here now to some beans, and…potato salad, and coleslaw. This is the common things you use with barbecue. Ahhh...beans, to barbecue is like "T" on Texas and "D" on Dallas, they just goes together. Potato salad is just like the gulf coast, the Brazos river and the Colorada. It makes up Texas. Coleslaw sits in anybody's territory. So, uhhh…it's little to do with beans ladies and gentlemen. Most thing to do t'beans is boil 'em. Put 'em on a pot, watch 'em, be sure you got the rocks, and all that other stuff out of 'em, put you some fat back in 'em, and cook 'em until they are soft and TENder! You can add a little chili powder, little garlic, little mexcan mexcan or whatever you so desire. And…you gonna have some of the beans that is equally delicious to your barbecue. One thing about beans, you got to dehayderate the little gas outta them, else you gonna get it all through the house at night, and one way to do that, put you a little bakin' soda in 'em. N' that'll smooth out all that eazzness so you'll sleep comfortable at night and won't…KILL nobody. HA HA ha ha!

And potato salad? Ahhh… there's a thousand ways to make potato salad, ladies and gentlemens. MY way of makin' potato salad is get you the medium amount of potato salad, boil your potatoes, don't overcook 'em, peel 'em, mash 'em little bit, dice 'em, add little mayonnaise, little mustard, lil' sweet relish, celery, onion, bell pepper, season to your taste. YOUR taste. Therefore, you'll have some of the best potato salad that…has ever been made.

This program ladies and gentlemen, like I say, it's comin' to you LIVE. Right from Stubb's kitchen. Right outta the pit. Ladies and gentlemens I also want you to remember that Stubb's barbecue sauce is some of the best that ever been put together. Nobody makes Stubb's barbecue sauce like Stubb do. You will remember that that sauce is made to go on anything you get out to cook for barbecue, I mean hamburgers, whatever you wanna use it for.

Also, ladies and gentlemens, we got a mail order situation, for Stubb's barbecue, BIG bottle of barbecue sauce. You need to send a check or money order to post office box sixteen forty-four, Austin, Texas seven eight seven sixty seven. Also ladies and gentlemen ,we get a cookbook and a great big bottle of barbecue sauce shipped to you for only twelve dollars, ninety five cents plus two dollars and thirty five cents for shipping charges.

God bless, and if you enjoy this, you gonna have it the world over right outta the deep hearts of Texas. Thank you!


The above transciption of Stubb's Audio Cookbook was done by Rob Pearlman.

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