ANSC 117 – Texas BBQ

In 2009, Ray Riley and Jeff Savell answered a call from the university to teach first-year seminar classes, designed to place freshmen in small-sectioned classes rather than the 200-to-300 student-sized classes most common for undergraduates. One of the classes taught in 2008 was on baseball, so we had the idea that if you could teach a class on baseball at Texas A&M University, you could teach a class on Texas Barbecue, and the rest is history!

The course has been taught with a number of prefixes, first as UPAS 181, UGST 181, ANSC 289, and now ANSC 117 over the years. ANSC 117, Texas Barbecue is a permanent part of our fall semesters, with around 25 lucky freshmen taking the course.

Here are the topics covered in ANSC 117 each semester:

Introduction, expectations, a brief history of barbecue, food safety overview
Cooking methodology: pits, kettles, water smokers, barrel smokers
Types of fuel (charcoal briquettes, charcoal chunks, wood coals) and smoke (hickory, oak, pecan, mesquite)
Adding flavoring: seasonings, marinades, rubs, sauces
Pork: Southeastern-style pulled pork, Hawaiian-inspired pork loin
Ribs, ribs, ribs: baby back versus St. Louis-style; Memphis-style (dry) versus Kansas City-style (wet); Asian-inspired rubs and sauces
Chicken: smoking, cooking by rotisserie; whole or pieces
Barbecuing lamb and goat
Briskets: To wrap or not to wrap, that is the question!
Smoking other cuts of beef: shoulder clods, sirloins, ribeyes, and tenderloins
Cooking beef South American style: Brazil and Argentina
Thanksgiving Turkey: brining recipes; smoking, frying, cooking by rotisserie
Cooking whole pigs: Hawaiian, Cuban, Cajun
Course wrap up