Food Smokers and Smoking Tips/Tricks/Techniques

Smoked a turkey yesterday for around 7 hours.



Eye spy a taco back there too, it was intentional




Here it is done, it was good probably cooked it a little too long but I was worried about it not being done.

 

Here is some bacon I made over Christmas:

 

Yeah, 7 hrs sounds like a pretty long time, but I'm sure it was still tasty!

 

I pull turkey at 160-165 and let it rise to 170. Keeps them super moist and safe to eat. My last smoked Turkey was insanely good.

 

Went to look at the char griller akorn but didn't buy it. Looked pretty nice though. Even the mini akorn was neat but a lot of money for that little thing ($200). The big one is $300, so about a third the cost of a BGE. Tempting.

 

Yeah I ended up pulling it at 170 and it rose to 180.

 

That is a fine looking bird there, I love me some smoked turkey. Got where I don't even like it oven cooked.

I like using butter flavored Pam spray or any other sauce concoction every hour or so to keep the skin moist.

 

I was really considering getting get one as well, but I decided to hold off for a while. I have a 15 year old char-broil gas grill with a perfectly usuable cast aluminum body just sitting collecting dust. I had been using it lately about once a year to cook a thanksgiving turkey with gas fire on one end under wood chips and the food on the other end.

I decided to dismantle and convert this to charcoal/wood fire only. I am going to play around with this some and see if I can figure out a way to smoke low and slow on it with any degree of consistency. I know it may lose heat faster with the aluminum.

The best things I hear about the Akorns or the BGE's is ability to maintain a steady cooking temp with very little charcoal consumption due to the insulation.

 

Yeah, the key is the insulation or double walled design, depending on what you're talking about. I love my steel keg but it won't run for more than about 6 hours at 250 on a chimney of coal.

 

What all did you do to it before putting it in? And what were you cooking it at? (temp)

 

Look what I just brought home towed with my 2011 Metallic Grey DC

 

Oooo a Gator Pit. Nice

 

I only sprinkled it with a chicken seasoning and made sure that the smoker was really hot. Once it was in there every once in a while I sprayed it with water and made sure the water bowl was full.

 

Any Big Green Egg types here? I have three and live in the middle of Texas.

 

I love the Big Green Eggs. Had two of the three going Sat. morning.

 

Nice!

 

http://youtu.be/3gr1qvlnyXk
just a quick video seasoning the gator

 

damn it..i want a Gator pit now!!

houston is like a million miles away

 

Still haven't bought a Char-Griller kamado but as soon as they're on sale at all I'll pick one up. I'd love for Menards to put their red one on sale. I'm back from vacation so I'm taking an easy Saturday after mowing and pruning this morning to cook a brisket very low and very slow. Just pulled it off the smoker after 5 hours of smoking at 225 and now into an oven at 225 for as long as it takes to hit 195. It's at 138 after 5 hours so it may be another 8 or 10 hours - no clue. I bought a probe thermometer so I won't have to pull it out of the oven to check, so now all there is to do is wait. I might wrap it in foil if it gets too dry, but for now it doesn't have much of a bark so I'm letting it cook on a rack to hopefully develop a nice tasty crust.

I also bought a new rub to try - Tasty Dead Cow Shake. It's a dedicated beef rub, so we'll see if it works better than the Sticky Pig rub I usually use.

Update: I noticed my smoker was holding at 200 and still putting out some nice light smoke, so I thawed some EZ Peel shrimp, put some rub on them and threw them on the smoker. Should be done in about 30 mins. I didn't peel them so I assume the taste will be pretty mild but we'll see. I've never done shrimp before. I should have peeled half of them I guess, as a test!

 

Love it so far, I'll be cooking two briskets,@ 4 slabs o' Ribs chix and sausage this weekend for a gathering at my house for about 40. I'll post up some pictures of the process! I fiended for one of these pits for about two years before the wifey said go ahead and order!