Are thermometers necessary?

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Lastrajm

Knows what a fatty is.
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Pit and food probe medals that is. So since my shirley purchase I've fired it up 3 times, all three times the shirley therms have not been in line with my I grill2 therm. I've checked my igrill2 calibration and all was fine. This past weekend they read 50 degrees apart. Now my question is, how many have pit probes and how many just go by "feel"? I've been contemplating a heatermeter, 3 food and 1 pit probe(s) and was wondering if it really is a necessary took in our field. The shirley seems to run pretty smoothly and I just purchased a therma pen. How plausible is it that with a couple more cooks I'll k ow exactly how my pit runs and will just go by feel and my thermapen?
 
probes lets you glance check often, not opening chambers etc... Definitely not necessary, sometimes not even convenient...

but if I were competing I'd have them... Consistency is key
 
I say as long as the therms on the pit are accurate or you know how far off they are you are good. For me the remote therms are more for notifications. Things happen and you forget to check something and then something bad happens. With the HM or Maverick it will send you a text or email or ding reminding you to add more fuel, wrap your meat or go put out the raging pit fire.
 
pjtexas1 said:
I say as long as the therms on the pit are accurate or you know how far off they are you are good. For me the remote therms are more for notifications. Things happen and you forget to check something and then something bad happens. With the HM or Maverick it will send you a text or email or ding reminding you to add more fuel, wrap your meat or go put out the raging pit fire.
Click to expand...

What maverick sends a text?
 
necessary, no. Nice to have, yes.

Food probes and pit probes allow you to know the temperature without opening the chamber. Every time you open that door to stick in a thermapen in the meat you are losing your cooking temp. So it does make a difference. Especially if you have a large chamber and it takes a while to recover.

I've been at repeated contests and have had the smoker opened up every 10 minutes or so to sauce, rotate, etc, and have wondered why some meats take an hour longer than normal, and it was all the opening and closing of the smoker. So more probes mean less monkeying with the chamber and meat.
 
I guess what I was trying to say is why do we purchase these gadgets if we already have 2-3 installed on the pit already?
 
Lastrajm said:
Pit and food probe medals that is. So since my shirley purchase I've fired it up 3 times, all three times the shirley therms have not been in line with my I grill2 therm. I've checked my igrill2 calibration and all was fine. This past weekend they read 50 degrees apart. Now my question is, how many have pit probes and how many just go by "feel"? I've been contemplating a heatermeter, 3 food and 1 pit probe(s) and was wondering if it really is a necessary took in our field. The shirley seems to run pretty smoothly and I just purchased a therma pen. How plausible is it that with a couple more cooks I'll k ow exactly how my pit runs and will just go by feel and my thermapen?
Click to expand...

I love having a pit/food probe. I have a maverick. I don't use it so much as to ensure an exact temp, but so I can monitor fluctuations or changes due to wind, cold, rain etc. During cold winters and hot summers, I like to start my smoker then go inside until its ready to put the meat on. If the prob is +/- 25 degrees of actual temp, thats not that big of a deal to me.

Also when I'm smoking a loin or something lean, I like to finish by temperature so I don't over cook it. Usually to about 140 then double check with a therapen. For Butts and brisket Ill use the meat probe to take it to about 200 before I start checking for tenderness. Yeah I can estimate time as to when to go back and check, but even if the temp is stable, the meat can still vary on cook time.
 
With the HM or Maverick it will send you a text or email or ding reminding you to add more fuel, wrap your meat or go put out the raging pit fire.
Click to expand...

The way I read it, I thought that was what you meant by the "ding"...
 
If you are in a position where you have to cook to a timeline or consistency is needed, like a competition, then being able to reproduce the same cook over and over again is mandatory, so a pit thermometer or some way to duplicate the cook environment is necessary. But, a thermometer isn't needed to know when the butts, briskets, ribs, chucks or similar cuts are done. I go by feel for that.

But, some meats, like chicken, pork loin and others are better cooked to a specific temperature, or, like sausage, need to be cooked past a certain temperature to be safe to eat. In those cases, and accurate meat thermometer is necessary.
 
Lastrajm said:
I guess what I was trying to say is why do we purchase these gadgets if we already have 2-3 installed on the pit already?
Click to expand...


I gotcha, Ive never trusted the ones in a pit... The probes are never quite level with the grate, a pain to calibrate, I fi ever custom built Id leave it out and go for the "gadgets"
 
On my 4 month old stick burner that's outfitted for probes/fans etc. I 'm yet to use it and doubt I ever will. As a matter of fact I quit using my cyberq and maverick alltogehter since getting the stick burner even on the other cookers. One exception was last week for an overnight cook for work.

Just the thermapen to get an idea where I'm at around the end of the cook and pokeing around for probe tenderness.
 
Necessary? No
I like to know what temp my cooker is running ,but I'm not as picky about my temps as some others are.I always check my turkeys with a thermometer, but other than that its all feel and color.
 
I don't use my Maverick as much with my Kettle as I do/did with my UDS. I like to see what my pit is doing, and used it as a learning tool to understand what causes temp changes, and how to better gauge the mounted gauges when the smoker is up to temp and cooking. Once I learned my pit and the difference in the mounted gauges verses the Maverick, then I quit using the Maverick as much. I still use it when I need to keep an eye on meat temp that is sensitive to a finished temp.

Omar
 
I think a decent pit therm is all that is really needed. A simple wired meat thermometer is OK for poultry or other things if you cook according to IT.. which really isn't much if you think about it. The fancier you get the more room for error you have and the more distractions you have which takes the fun out of it IMO.
 
I don't use my gadgets as much as I use to. I occasionally put a grate level probe in, just so I know exactly what that temp is, I know my offset stick burner pretty well now and can check every 4 hours or so on larger cut with my IRT (I wait to make my first look at 6 hours). Smaller, I just check asIi know they are getting close.
I wish I was better at keeping a cooking journal, I believe this would be a very resourceful item.
 
I have a weakness for thermometers ... and flashlights- not sure why. I tell myself "it's done when it's done" but for some reason I want to know what the UDS temp is ... and I need at least one other one to keep him from lying :)
 
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