Food Smokers and Smoking Tips/Tricks/Techniques

This is a good read for you guys with the Brinkmanns. He addresses the air issue with several more holes.

http://home.comcast.net/~day_trippr/smoker_mods.htm

Some of his mods are a little over the top, but at least he's thorough.

 

Are you using lump hardwood charcoal or compressed briquettes? I use lump hardwood, start it in a chimney over a couple pages of newspaper with a little veggie oil sprayed on it and it never goes out. If it's breezy out, my problem is too much heat, not too little.

 

Briquettes

 

Temp was staying up decently now, not getting anymore smoke action though all the wood had burned up. The small pieces I got didn't seem to last very long. Maybe getting something that's larger pieces would last longer?

 

The fire bowl on this one one sits inside another base part and then the main body sits on top of that then.

 

THX for the link!

 

Well since my wood was all burned up and I wasn't getting anymore smoke I just threw it in the oven where it's been.

Bought a chimney fire starter thinger to use for next time for easier addition of coal. Also going to use the lump hardwood charcoal next time as well as getting much bigger chunk wood that won't burn up as fast.

Also going to take a look at the above link, thanks. That's the exact identical model I have so hopefully it's helpful. At the very least I'm going to install an actual temperature gauge so I can keep a closer eye on things and not just "warm" and "ideal" lol.

As you can see in the pics in that link, the vents in the bottom are slits and holes in the fire pan. Took me seeing that to remember what it looked like.

 

Durn this thread. I had to go get a little 3 lb shoulder and 3 lb brisket. Both going on the smoker in about an hour, lol.

 

Well, had to end up throwing my shoulder into the oven way earlier (if any) than anticipated, but all things considered, it turned out decent. Likely because as mentioned a pork shoulder is pretty forgiving. Honestly, I'm actually more disappointed with the sauce i made than I am the result of the meat. The meat could definitely use some work, but I made a spicy vinegar sauce to put over for sandwiches which ended up a little to spicy. I like a little bit of kick, but this was a little too hot. Good flavor still but I could have used it down a notch on the hottness. My own fault though for adding too much red pepper seasoning since the first test seemed too tamed but definitely got hotter as i cooked it down.

Overall what I learned was I need to be a little bit lazy and get the meat smoking a little earlier. I need to do better with the charcoal (next time will go try the lump hardwood coal whatever blah blah blah along with using a chimney started to get it going) along with using larger pieces of flavoring wood. Additionally I'd like to add a real thermometer plus vent in the bottom of the fire pit to try and better regulate temp.

Definitely a learning curve here but as mentioned above you can eat your mistakes and this "mistake" is definitely edible so I'm okay with it!

 

Looks good to me man! I've tried sauce a couple times but I gave up. There are 300 BBQ sauces on the shelf and I live half way between KC and Memphis, so there are enough local sauces for me to try one a week until I'm 80. I'd definitely eat that.

 

Looks good to me too!!!!

 

Everything looks awesome in here! Makes me want to break out the egg today.

 

Here is the smoked chicken from last Sunday

 

Yum. Haven't tried chicken yet. but I think I'll brine a turkey breast this week and smoke it on Sat.

Wish I had a source for fresh, non-frozen turkey.

 

I havent even look to see if the turkey are fresh yet. I havent smoked a turkey yet so I dont know how it is going to turn out. Hope it is good!!!

 

A good brining if its frozen. I wouldn't brine a fresh turkey as it may make the flesh mushy, and if you do just do it for a couple hours tops for flavor only.

 

Honestly I wasnt going to brine it either. I dont know I am going to have to find some recipes. I know that I wont brine the chicken before smoking. The last one I smoked came out awesome with nothing more then a dry rub.

 

From this weekend, smoking some baby back ribs and salmon

My smokin' set up


Ribs n salmon


Mmmmmmm, smoky goodness


The finished product. 2 racks of baby back ribs, with Stl bbq rub, Hickory smoked, with sweet baby rays sauce

 

Nice!!! How long did you smoke the salmon?

 

Not long. I had my temp at 300*f for the most part, so I had it on for 20 minutes and it was done. It was closer to the heat source than the ribs were also.