Food Smokers and Smoking Tips/Tricks/Techniques

Taste the meat, not the heat. Charcoal is only a fuel source. I can add any variety of wood chunks to get a smokey flavor. My wsm is designed for charcoal, not sticks... And does a really good job of cooking with it. Also, compared to what I'd pay for wood in a stick burner or propane, it's not expensive. I'm about to go but 10 18.6# bags of charcoal that will last me all summer. I also have a propane grill that I'll need to swap tanks on at least twice at $20 each.

 

I'm planning on 5 packs for a total of 10. They'll go on sale again on memorial day and July 4th.

 

I grew up watching my dad grill on a Weber kettle using blue bag Kingsford and when I moved away for college I got my own. The WSM is designed to use charcoal and that was one of the reasons I decided to buy it when I wanted a stand alone smoker. As far as the cost, like several other people on here I stock up when it goes on sale and 50 bucks or so will last me for a long time. Every time I smoke food I probably save that much money. A pack of ribs at Costco is $30 and it feeds my family plus plenty of leftovers. If we go to a BBQ restaurant and get 4 rib plates with drinks for the kids and beer for me and the wife, its gonna be $75 easy. If I smoke a shoulder its even cheaper, 8-10 pounds of meat for the price of 2 BBQ sandwiches at a restaurant. That savings paid for my charcoal for the summer in one meal.

 

Yup I use charcoal for my wsm and add some wood chunks to get the flavor that I want. I don't have big trees in my backyard that I can just chop in pieces. I have a 5 fairly young crape myrtles and one young peach tree in my back yard

But there's no right or wrong here. Some like lump coal, some use nothing but wood, some just grill using propane, some use electric smoker with wood chips. Some like kingsford some like Stubbs. You use what works best for you!

 

I guess I forgot that not everyone is blessed with oodles of hardwood all around them.

 

So we shouldn't be surprised to see you on the news with they saying Dry Storage shed burns for DAYS, currently unaware of the source of the fire or why it has burned so long as we cannot get close enough to the fire due to all the meat cooking and smoking.

 

That's one of the problems with living in the suburbs. My wife's family has some land in the country we use for hunting and I get plenty of oak to burn in my fire pit but there isn't really any fruit or nut trees. It's pretty swampy land but I did get some nice cypress that I used to make an outdoor table to put between my grill and smoker.

 

Truth. It's easy to get wrapped up in "this is best" or "that is best" but in ALL of this there is no "right" way. You decide what the right way is by being open to experimenting, until you decide what your (the) right way is. Most people, when they start this hobby (I think it's a hobby) get all anxious, wanting to get to "the" answers, "the" way to do all this. No such thing.

 

@scottalot , you have some great pictures on TW Live. Love that little smoker setup you have, you've got that thing dialed in like a boss.

TW Live

 

Different strokes for different folks. Except for cut and quality of meat. There is clear right and wrong there.

 

I would like to see some explanations on the relocation of the smoke stack. I see absolutely no realistic benefit to this, and to be honest it would take the smoke out of the firebox and vent it to the outside, which is NOT what you want in a smoker. I am a slow and low smoker, so it is pretty easy to maintain 250ºF throughout the smoker.

 

I don't think it's "clear" right and wrong, but there definitely are etched in stone factors there. Having said that, it's amazing what somebody who knows what they're doing can turn out with a cheap, crappy cut of meat. But that's pretty next-level stuff, newbs should stick to the basics and get the best grade of whatever cut that they can.

 

What was it like grilling with cave men?

 

I think you misunderstood what I was trying to say, or I didn't explain it well enough. This should illustrate how extending the smoke stack DOWN INTO the smoker makes it more difficult for the smoke to exit and holds it in longer and makes it heat more evenly. Also shown is the baffle between the firebox and smoke box, which does much the same thing...forces the smoke down low (heat rises, of course). As in the stock design, your heat and smoke just rush from the firebox out of the stack, so things on the right cook more slowly than things closer to the firebox, in fact things right next to the firebox can overcook easily.

Also, IMO, 250 is too warm. I try to keep mine between 200 and 225.

 

And while we're at it, I put the pie tin full of beer about centered below the 'cloud', below the food. Helps keep everything moist and juicy.

 

Since I got plenty of charcoal now after the kingsford sale, I wanted to check how many brisket packers Igot in the freezer. Looks like I'm good for awhile.

 

I already had 6 bags. Had to do some finagling to get them on the shelf

 

Damn, ship some of that up
This way.

 

Scottalot wants to drive to the lone star state to buy a bed full of 1.97 brisket. See if he will TW express it to you

 

Well, I can get it for $2.40/lb. so that drive to Texas is probably more expensive.