Smokers (BBQ - not grilling)

[drjfjr]

I did a pork shoulder butt May 5th. It was an 8.5 pound butt and my smoker was a master built propane. Temp was 225 to 230 for the whole smoke. It took 25 hours for the butt to reach 196 degrees. 2.5 hours per pound is what I calculate on a pork shoulder to reach tender temperature. Sometimes that is low.

 

[Fred W]

I beat midnight by a good bit. Finished it off in the kitchen oven at 300F. Ran it up to 203F and then turned the oven off and let it rest awhile. Yes, the house smells like heaven. I'm typing this on my iPad and can't be bothered with photos on this POS. But I took some and will post them in the AM. I'm beat after getting up at 4:30. But I will disclose that it is delicious. Very delicious.

 

[Fred W]

OK, here's the BBQ pR0n.

Mmmmm... pork!

The finished goods:

 

[Knifemaker]

Looks good Fred. Unfortunately I've eaten like 3 pounds of pulled pork over the last few days so sadly, your photo doesn't effect me as it normally would......

 

[08FJR4ME]

So is that wedding before or after NERDS. Starting to sound like a re run from last year. LOL

I have been deliberating what to cook in the smoker this weekend. Time to look at the fliers again.

Dave

 

[Fred W]

Long after NERDS. It's in October. I'll be in Stowe for the whole week this year!

 

[Knifemaker]

11 days later and still enjoying pulled pork for lunch at work...

Doing a pork loin and some brats on the 17th...

 

[08FJR4ME]

I ended up smoking a pork butt. 12 hours on the smoker and another hour in the oven. Didn't get done until 1:00AM in the morning. I started to late. It was good though and I put some in separate bags in the freezer for later to enjoy. One thing new I did try was putting some potatoes on the smoker. They went about 6 hours and we had them with our normal supper. They were great. Try it next time. You will be pleased.

Sorry, no pic's,

Dave

 

[eflyguy]

For an evening gathering, I always start butt around midnight. If for afternoon, then early evening the night before. Basically 16-18 hours.

 

[Fred W]

You getting the hang of that OK Joe now Dave? Or was the pork shoulder done on the WSM?

I've got a little Weber Smokey Joe that I bought for tailgating back when 2nd daughter was still playing tennis in college. I'm thinking of finding a big stock-pot and converting it into a Mini-WSM. It would be fun to bring it on the road and make people salivate. And because... you can never have too many smokers.

Even though it will be small, I don't think I'd be able to pack it on the bike.

 

[eflyguy]

That's a pretty defeatist attitude, don't you think?

 

[Fred W]

Oh geeze. While researching the Smokey Joe conversion I just mentioned, I think I just found something that could be very useful. It hasn't been mentioned by anyone here yet, so this device may be news to you all. It's the Maverick Tip-Top-Temp.

This device is a mechanical means to regulate the pit temperature. It does operate a little differently than we typically run our pits. Normally we leave the exhaust wide open and throttle back the intake air. Using something like this, (contrary to some of the directions) you would want to open the intake just a little more than you normally would for a particular temp and then let this device regulate the exhaust flow to control the intake air flow.

It's really designed to be used on Weber kettles and Kamodo cookers, but since my UDS has a Weber Kettle (clone) lid on it, this should work well on that too. A little fiddling and I might even be able to get it attached to the chimney pipe of my OK Joe offset.

They are selling them on Amazon for $35, which is a whole lot more reasonable than the BBQ guru or other blower type of temp regulators. I think I'm going to try one.

 

[TomInPA]

Nice find Fred! That might work on the top-vent of may BSK (big steel keg), but the exhaust vent is a cruel environment for condensible oil, grease and particulate that can really gum up a vent. I wonder how well this would work under those conditions.

 

[Knifemaker]

Cool. But I don't think I'd use it on a large offset. On mine, choking the exhaust fills the food chamber with more smoke (that won't be moving) leaving stale smoke, and would take a lot of time to alter the temperature there as it's a distance from where the fuel is burning. Not to mention the exhaust at the top of a tall smokestack like mine isn't a good indicator of temperature inside.

But as designed, it looks like a great thing for kettle grills. The settings simply go from 0 to 9, so I guess you'd need a temperature probe in the grill so you could fiddle with the control to hit your desired temperature. Hopefully it will cover that range.

 

[08FJR4ME]

You getting the hang of that OK Joe now Dave? Or was the pork shoulder done on the WSM?
I've got a little Weber Smokey Joe that I bought for tailgating back when 2nd daughter was still playing tennis in college. I'm thinking of finding a big stock-pot and converting it into a Mini-WSM. It would be fun to bring it on the road and make people salivate. And because... you can never have too many smokers.

Even though it will be small, I don't think I'd be able to pack it on the bike.

Down to just the Oklohoma joe smoker now. The little webber has seen better days and will be in the scrap heap soon. I did get better results in the little webber than what I am getting now. The butt would just fall apart in the webber. On the O/Joe It just doesn't get to that level. On the webber I had the water bowl over the fire producing steam. I think that helped a lot to break down the meat. I haven't tried that on the O/joe yet. I will have to experiment some more to see if adding a water bowl will help in the next attempt.

 

[Fred W]

Nice find Fred! That might work on the top-vent of may BSK (big steel keg), but the exhaust vent is a cruel environment for condensible oil, grease and particulate that can really gum up a vent. I wonder how well this would work under those conditions.

Well, it is designed to work in that environment. I bet you could shoot some sort of solvent at the pivots every few uses and keep it moving freely. I guess it depends on how strong the bi-metal spring is. The feedback I've read seems to say that it actually does work OK.

Cool. But I don't think I'd use it on a large offset. On mine, choking the exhaust fills the food chamber with more smoke (that won't be moving) leaving stale smoke, and would take a lot of time to alter the temperature there as it's a distance from where the fuel is burning.

I've read the conventional wisdom about stale smoke being a problem if you close the exhaust down, but I don't really get it. I don't see why it would matter whether you choke down the air inlet or the exhaust outlet as to how fast the smoke can flow through. The smoke can only leave the smoker as fast as new air is vented in, so the rate would be the same at the same temperature.

Not to mention the exhaust at the top of a tall smokestack like mine isn't a good indicator of temperature inside.

Could insulate the smokestack, which would be good for promoting better draft anyway. Or, maybe there is a way to install one in the chimney near the bottom. It would take some finagling.

You getting the hang of that OK Joe now Dave?

Down to just the Oklohoma joe smoker now. The little webber has seen better days and will be in the scrap heap soon. I did get better results in the little webber than what I am getting now. The butt would just fall apart in the webber. On the O/Joe It just doesn't get to that level. On the webber I had the water bowl over the fire producing steam. I think that helped a lot to break down the meat. I haven't tried that on the O/joe yet. I will have to experiment some more to see if adding a water bowl will help in the next attempt.

In a vertical smoker the meat gets a lot more direct convective and radiant heat from the fire below. I'd suggest try running your OK Joe at a slightly higher temp (maybe 275 - 285F) and you should get similar results. And make sure that the pork shoulder gets well up above 200F internal for a good while.

The biggest knock I have on the offset is it takes more fiddling around to hold a steady temp. That's why I'd really like to see if I can get the Mavrick TTT to work on there with a full load of charcoal. If I could get a steady temp with less fiddling I might be able to sell off my drum smoker.

I'm not a big fan of water baths. Tried it once in the drum and it just seemed to make a steamy mess and didn't do anything good for the meat flavor (it was a brisket flat). It also used up fuel to make the steam. I liked using a dry diffuser plate better, and for the pork shoulder may not even use one of those, just let the heat hit the meat!

 

[Bounce]

Or you could use the [redacted]. It's bestest thing evah invented!

 

[Knifemaker]

Well, the instructions say the operating temperature is from 100 to 300 degrees. I'd guess the smoke coming out of the smokestack on an offset would fall into that range.

As far as the smoke leaving as fast as the air coming in....not 100% sure on that, but then I don't have the capability of measuring that.

Hot air rises. Then the device likely isn't going to totally cover the exhaust, once you get near your target temperature, it's just going to restrict the opening until the temperature goes down. Air moving though a smaller space down a tube can in fact move faster (the venturi effect) so if your cooker is totally airtight it could pull air in faster through the vent in the firebox.

But I'm all for experimentation. Theories need to be tested, and I'm sure you're the man for the job.

Dave, was that your first pork butt on the OKJ? ... there are likely other variables. I assume you use a grate level temp gauge and cooked both butts at around the same temperature? It could just have been a tougher hunk of meat to begin with?

I'm with Fred on the water pan. Does your pit have any kind of heat diffuser? What were your cooking temperatures? Did you preheat the OKJ? Did you use the same fuel?

 

[08FJR4ME]

Dave, was that your first pork butt on the OKJ? ... there are likely other variables. I assume you use a grate level temp gauge and cooked both butts at around the same temperature? It could just have been a tougher hunk of meat to begin with?I'm with Fred on the water pan. Does your pit have any kind of heat diffuser? What were your cooking temperatures? Did you preheat the OKJ? Did you use the same fuel?

I believe it was the second time with slightly better results than the first. I used almost a hole bag of apple charcoal with apple wood from the orchard. I let the fire burn a 1/2 hour before putting on the meat. It was about 285 when I put it on but I cut down on the air intake until it reached 225/230 degrees. It stayed pretty much even for about 10 hours then started to lesson. I had to add some more wood to finish off the next couple of hours and it came back up to temp. It was 160 degrees internal when I took it off. I put in the oven for an hour at 375 to finish it off. I have no diffuser setup like Fred has. Pretty much as it came out of the box. Maybe if I could get it to 16 hours next time around it would make a difference. It was still tasty and the smoke penetrated quite deep. Well at least the red coloring into the meat. I will try again and plan better next time so I don't have to stay up so late. I think putting it on at 10:00PM would work the best next time around.

Dave

 

[Bounce]

I'm also with Fred about water bowls. Not a fan.

I do use a diffuser (in my case it looks like a triple-thick pizza stone with tabs where it rests in the acorn "ledges".