First time smoking meat in 5 years!

[Learning to BBQ]

Brilliant comeback after 5 yrs! Those dino bones look grrrrrrrreaaaat!

 

[Pailong]

Everyone, I'm overwhelmed by the kind comments from you all! It's definitely given me a boost to keep going and not wait so long again!

I feel like I have a better understanding of how the kettle runs now and how best to control fire in such a tight environment. Maybe one day I will get a stick burner/offset smoker and then learn how to control the fire in that!

Thanks for the feedback guys! The only thing I have yet to cook is a brisket. I know now I can confidently try a brisket on a kettle cook but I'm based in the UK and here in UK/Europe, it's definitely not normal to get an American packer-cut style of brisket (with point and flat). Also, our meat here isn't as fatty as USDA Prime or anything like that, we often have to deal with leaner cuts of meat here!

 

[jzadski]

Just like riding a bike. Yup looks like you haven't missed a beat

 

[ModelMaker]

So...what you been doing the last 5 years?
Short prison stretch?
Ed

 

[Dr. Trout Bum]

Those beef ribs look amazing...welcome back!

 

[Smoke on]

Looking very good from here. Looks like you knocked off the rust from your five year slumber. Nice job!

 

[JEStucker]

Out of curiosity, how did you have your vents set up on the Kettle?
I've got a 22" Weber Kettle that I typically grill on, and my Ugly Drum does most of my smoking, but lately I'm wanting to branch out and do more on the Kettle. I'm 99% sure I can get the snake charcoal method to work, but knowing how far to have the bottom vents and the top vents open always gets me at time...
or is it more trial and error to see what works? (I've heard lots of "Top vent always wide open" comments in the past)

 

[woodbutcher1]

Awesome job on those ribs,nothing lost since your last smoke.:clap2:

 

[Pailong]

Out of curiosity, how did you have your vents set up on the Kettle?
I've got a 22" Weber Kettle that I typically grill on, and my Ugly Drum does most of my smoking, but lately I'm wanting to branch out and do more on the Kettle. I'm 99% sure I can get the snake charcoal method to work, but knowing how far to have the bottom vents and the top vents open always gets me at time...
or is it more trial and error to see what works? (I've heard lots of "Top vent always wide open" comments in the past)

The snake method definitely works! My snake method setup you see in my first photo lasted exactly 8 hours (it even had probably another hour left in it but I finished cooking at 8 hours). I didn't need to add any extra briquettes at all. I added extra wood chunks but I don't think I even needed to do that as by the end the meat had absorbed all the smoke it needed to but I just kept it going regardless cause it had been 5 years so I was being extra diligent! I also felt like the wood chunks igniting and burning added to my desired temperature, cause my snake coal wasn't a thick setup (not like the 2x2 snake methods I've seen, which burn more briquettes at one time I think?). That might just be me in my head but yeah, that's what I did for my first cook after 5 years.

For me it is trial and error (sort of, I'll explain what I do). I've also heard lots of "top vent always wide open" and I think the idea with that method is that you want the top vent always wide open because it pulls the air out, so it helps create that airflow and is stronger pulling the hot air out rather than having your bottom vent open to "push" air in. I think the same applies to an offset smoker - I've always seen people leave the chimney wide open and they control the fire with the firebox door/shovel messing around with the coal bed and wood. Again, I believe it revolves around the idea that having a wide open chimney/top vent will create a pressure for the smoke to escape through, which is why a lot of the times you will hear people say that the area right next to the chimney on an offset smoker is actually the hottest area for the meat to smoke at, cause all the hot air is being concentrated and rushed through the exhaust/chimney hole (I've seen a Franklin BBQ video someone recorded whilst visiting the restaurant and they think the hottest area is near the firebox but one of the workers correct them and say that it's actually right next to the chimney exhaust hole on the opposite end of the firebox). Even though I haven't smoked meat in 5 years, evidently I've been watching a lot of Youtube videos and researching my technique to pick things back up again!

So what I did for this cook was once I got the snake lit and placed a wood chunk on it to start igniting, I put the lid on (no meat on the grill just yet) to allow the internal temperature to rise to the desired range before putting meat on. I place my wireless thermometer on the cooking grate right where I will be placing my meat so I get an accurate reading of temperature of where the meat will be placed (and when I'm cooking the meat, I place the thermometer right next to it so it's as accurate as it can be on grate level). So with the snake lit and a wood chunk igniting and lid on, I open bottom and top vent wide open and wait for temperature to rise, then when it's at range, I start closing the bottom vent bit by bit until the temperature stabilises and stops rising (or dropping) and then I put the meat on, close the lid again and watch the temperature to see what it does. In essence, I start with all vents open and then to control it at first, I mess around with the bottom vent. On this cook I noticed that once the bottom vent was basically almost fully closed, I still needed my temperature to drop as it was a bit high so then I had no choice but to close the top vent halfway (and sometimes even 3/4 closed) to get my desired range of 275-290F. So with that being said, I think it depends on the type of briquettes you're burning as well but I would go with just controlling the bottom vent first and if that doesn't work and you have no more room to close the bottom vent, only then mess around with the top vent. That's how I did it, priority 1 was bottom vent, priority 2 was top vent. I think the best thing you can do is buy a wireless thermometer and clip it to the cooking grate right next to your meat to observe the temperature and control it that way (I used the Maverick ET732, which a lot of people use).

Hope that makes sense! (bit of a long answer!).

 

[Moose]

Here's Some Feedback...

Any feedback would be appreciated!

 

[Pailong]

Haha thanks man!