Food Smokers and Smoking Tips/Tricks/Techniques

Thermoworks Smoke 48 hour sale, 20% off...

https://www.thermoworks.com/Smoke

 

Anybody here put a thermometer port in their Weber? I'm thinking about it as it's a pain to snake the probe wires through a vent (which also means you can't close it completely).

$9 Barbecue Smoker Temperature Probe Port - Stainless Steel Probe Port for Smoker Thermometer Probe Port Grill Thermometer Cooking Probe - BBQ Grill Temperature Probe Port

https://www.amazon.com/Probe-Port-Barbecue-Thermometer-Stainless/dp/B06WWGVTYM

 

I've thought about it because I have an older WSM without the silicon gasket, but one day I just bent a tiny bit of the corner of my coal door at the top to allow the wire through. Works great, never see any real leakage, so I guess I'm good enough with that for now.

 

I just put mine in, and put the lid on top of the wires.

I have just shut the door on the wire, with minimal leakage, much more is leaking out the top vent!!!

 

Ive done both those but once upon a time a probe wire started going whacky on me, so I attributed it to the potential pinching, hence the little bend in the door. I agree though, even with a little bend in the door for putting the wire through, there's no appreciable leakage.

 

Did a BLT for lunch with the smoked bacon from yesterday, and a fresh tomato from the backyard.

 

BBQ this weekend was a hit did about 20-25 lbs of brisket and about 10lbs of pulled pork, all with PF Meat Massage from @bvbull200. Ended up with very little meat left, 2 pans of baked beans gone. Party went till about 1AM. All in all was a great success and a great one last bash at our house before we bug out on Friday.

 

Definitely needs another pound of bacon . But looks great!

 

I like the looks of that. I out to put one in my kettle since I use it so much for smoking small meals.

The dome therm on that particular kettle is pretty dang accurate, but the problem is that when I'm smoking I'm typically using the Slow'n'Sear tray from Adrenaline BBQ. It works like a champ, but when you position the vent over the meat to get good smoke draw across your meats....the therm is directly over the offset coals.

One of those ports may work out really well.

I'm grateful I lucked out on my WSM and picked up one with rubber probe port. That thing runs really well....truly set it and forget it.

That looks all kinds of good.

Wife wants me to use the bacon I cooked this morning on a pizza later on. Not gonna bother with grilling it. It's almost 100 degrees here. This 'un will be done inside.

Sounds like a righteous feast.

 

Cleaned out the fridge today and sliced & diced some leftover stuff and made a pair of pies.


Unlike prior pizza cooks........these pies were made identical.....none of the nonsense of white sauce & red sauce versions.














Rolling some newish tunes from my old school band during this cook. Also did this 'un indoors because it was a hunnert degrees today and I'd already been working on stuff outside.





















Leftover corned beef, brats & bacon went all up in 'em.











Fungi needed, too.........


























Parmesan, butta, jalapeno dust worked out well on the crust.

 

My wife’s birthday present.

 

Dinner time

 

You bought your wife a grill for her birthday?

 

My wife bought herself an offset charcoal smoker 2 years ago and taught herself the in’s and outs of smoking. Her biggest complaint was the time commitment with charcoal. She couldn’t be too far away for long or she would lose her heat. A friend of ours in Michigan has been smoking for a few years and he just upgraded to a Camp Chef pellet smoker and has been raving about the ease of use. This got my wife thinking about an upgrade and she started doing her research. I told her this will be an expensive upgrade so lets invest in something she will have for years with all of the features she will ever want (without being stupid about things). She settled on the Traeger and after calling around trying to find who had stock and shipping etc she found a place that just had a Father's day special that ended the day before. They offered to backdate the paperwork and she was able to upgrade to the next model up and after the sale it was $100 more than the model she originally committed to. Double the cooking space an extra probe and a pile of other features.

I paid about half of the smoker which was fair considering she bought me a Yeti 75 for Christmas and then a Yeti Two 20 soft sider cooler for my birthday. We normally aren’t big gift people so this last year was really out of the norm for us. Yesterday was initial fire up and seasoning of the grill. Today is the official test and first smoke with the new grille.

 

My first pork butt (for pulled pork) is on the Weber 26 Kettle as of 00800! Trimmed it up and rubbed it with Pitfaced butt rub last night (thanks @bvbull200 ). Using Kingsford with mesquite along with apple wood chunks. Hope to have it done and in the cooler by 5pm or so.

 

Nice! You're going to like it. Only comment (my opinion...) I would make is to not waste time and/or money on the "flavored" charcoals. Just get the regular cheapo Kingsford and flavor it with the wood chunks of your choosing.

 

Agreed, and that's quite a bit of wood you have on there anyway. Usually its best to have 2 or 3 chunks like that on at one time, then add more as it burns up, stopping after the first few hours. For this cook, just make sure your top vent is almost wide open so the heavy smoke can get out.

 

Yeah, I normally use lump hickory on my kettle as I find plain charcoal doesn't do anything flavor wise (when grilling steaks, burgers, etc), so I figured I'd try this one. Guess I didn't think about the wood chunks providing enough smoke flavor. What can I say - I'm a pellet pooper smoker up to this point!

Top vents are wide open. I'll be more judicious with the wood chunks next time. I just wanted to make sure I get some smoke in the pork!

 

You'll get plenty of smoke for sure... too much smoke though and it's nasty, acrid, bitter etc. Basically creosote. Per Meathead Goldwyn, about 4 ounces of wood when the meat goes on, then add another 4 ounces when that first batch dies out a bit, then stop. By that point the meat has absorbed most all the smoke flavor it's going to absorb. Anything after that is just surface nastiness. Ive done it every which way, and at this point I do believe in what he's saying.