I am lucky enough to get to cook on a trailer smoker once or so a year. It’s a family cooker but it’s so big unless you have a crew of people it doesn’t make sense.
I cooked on it last Labor Day weekend with great success. I’d only ever cooked on a patio sized smoker twice before this so my temps were all over the place and I never felt like I got the hang of it. The results were simply amazing though. Best ribs I’d ever made, best brisket I’d ever made. All was great.
Fast forward last weekend I got to use it again. Now I’ve got 8 months of weekend cooks on my LSG smoker under my belt and I swaggered up to the beast with the confidence of someone that thinks he knows everything.
Results this time were far from desired.
Left hand side of smoker I had grate level probes reading around 300 where I placed the ribs and didn’t think anything of it. 2 hrs in when I first opened to see if they needed a spritz the bottoms were all burnt. SOB. I moved them and then the sausages, turkey breasts and quail to the right side of smoker. Grate temp there was much lower. Everything took longer to cook which is fine but once I tried the birds they all tasted like they were roasted not smoked. Hardly ANY smoke flavor at all!
I suffered over what the hell happened for a few days until it finally dawned on me. Last year only the far stack was open. This year both stacks were open and on further inspection the far stack was barely cracked. This explains why the direct heat was hitting bottom of ribs on left side and why right side was so cool and lacking smoke.
Everyone still enjoyed the meal but as they say, the devils is in the details!
(They should also say, never spend 10 hrs cooking a meal without first inspecting your equipment!)
I cooked on it last Labor Day weekend with great success. I’d only ever cooked on a patio sized smoker twice before this so my temps were all over the place and I never felt like I got the hang of it. The results were simply amazing though. Best ribs I’d ever made, best brisket I’d ever made. All was great.
Fast forward last weekend I got to use it again. Now I’ve got 8 months of weekend cooks on my LSG smoker under my belt and I swaggered up to the beast with the confidence of someone that thinks he knows everything.
Results this time were far from desired.
Left hand side of smoker I had grate level probes reading around 300 where I placed the ribs and didn’t think anything of it. 2 hrs in when I first opened to see if they needed a spritz the bottoms were all burnt. SOB. I moved them and then the sausages, turkey breasts and quail to the right side of smoker. Grate temp there was much lower. Everything took longer to cook which is fine but once I tried the birds they all tasted like they were roasted not smoked. Hardly ANY smoke flavor at all!
I suffered over what the hell happened for a few days until it finally dawned on me. Last year only the far stack was open. This year both stacks were open and on further inspection the far stack was barely cracked. This explains why the direct heat was hitting bottom of ribs on left side and why right side was so cool and lacking smoke.
Everyone still enjoyed the meal but as they say, the devils is in the details!
(They should also say, never spend 10 hrs cooking a meal without first inspecting your equipment!)
