Smoker recommendations
- Thread starter CJ Beat Hard
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The WSM works great as a grill for chicken. The distance between the top great and the coals is perfect - especially for marinated meat. Perfect for jerk chicken or pollo a La brasa
One word of warning for those considering a Traeger or similar pellet smoker is that my controls are on the fritz. I can eventually get it set, but it does weird shit when I turn the dial for the temperature and try to set it. I think I bought it around 2020, for a point of reference. With that being said, on the BGE, I have had to replace the gasket, daisy wheel, and fire box, and fire grate. Also, the wood handle has rotted off. Collectively, not cheap. I believe I bought it around 2015, for a point of reference.
I have a Pitboss and added the WSM this year. I’ll keep the Pb but I barely use it anymore because the WSM is superior and very simple to use. Look on FB marketplace for a cheaper one and mod it out as you see fit
The big one (1050) is far better built than the smaller version. My only issues so far have been with the door sensors but I figured a way to bypass those. I'm 2 years in on it and everything is holding up really well.
I got mine around 2019-2020 and it's been decent so far. I do need to replace the hot rod.
Fun story. I've had the relevant sitting on my work bench for a few weeks. Forgot about it. Decided somewhat spur of the moment to do a brisket Sunday night. Realized I hadn't fixed it yet and had to start some pellets with a propane torch and add them to the fire box to get it going.
For you WSM owners, one of you mentioned using the water pan. I never use water. I used to pull the water pan out and let the fat drippings hit the charcoal fire like a Pit Barrell Cooker. It works and adds a different flavor profile. You can easily operate a WSM just like a PBC if you want that's why I would always recommend a WSM over a PBC. You can mod a WSM with a rib hanger and turn it into a PBC. Versatility.
Rib Hanger
Now my setup is to foil the water pan so that it catches the drippings. Makes clean up easier and the bowl acts as a heat deflector between the meat and the coals. Setup is minion method with 10 lit coals dumped on the basket, top vent set to 50%, two bottom vents fully closed, third vent open about 40%. I then set the charcoal chimney in front of that vent to prevent any direct wind blowing from that direction. Set it and forget it. Churns along at 235 for 10 hours+ easily.
Now, you want to talk about easy. Buy a Weber Kettle and set it up for 2 zone cooking like Meathead instructs at the link below. I set my bottom vent at 33% and my top vent at 50%. I used to keep the top vent wide open but found it was more efficient at 50%. Use these principles and find what works for you based on the elevation of your location (it matters). Learn to control the fuel and oxygen via vent control, get your Weber dialed in, and it is the easiest smoker you will ever find.
Kettle Setup
Rib Hanger
Now my setup is to foil the water pan so that it catches the drippings. Makes clean up easier and the bowl acts as a heat deflector between the meat and the coals. Setup is minion method with 10 lit coals dumped on the basket, top vent set to 50%, two bottom vents fully closed, third vent open about 40%. I then set the charcoal chimney in front of that vent to prevent any direct wind blowing from that direction. Set it and forget it. Churns along at 235 for 10 hours+ easily.
Now, you want to talk about easy. Buy a Weber Kettle and set it up for 2 zone cooking like Meathead instructs at the link below. I set my bottom vent at 33% and my top vent at 50%. I used to keep the top vent wide open but found it was more efficient at 50%. Use these principles and find what works for you based on the elevation of your location (it matters). Learn to control the fuel and oxygen via vent control, get your Weber dialed in, and it is the easiest smoker you will ever find.
Kettle Setup
Does anyone have any feedback on the pro series pit boss vs the competition series? Seems the pro series is only at Lowe’s but it’s sold out and has been for a while.
Dude, get an offset stick burner. Food tastes way better cooked with wood, plus it 's fun. Should the need arise to do something overnight (which would be seldom, if ever, and you don't want to babysit) get the IT of your meat to 140° then finish it in the oven
I had the older generation of the pro series and it worked great. I had it for around 6 years or so and never had an issue. The only difference is probably the bells and whistles of the pellet smoker but if it takes pellets and burns them then you will probably get the same result. You can always buy certain shit on Amazon that do the same thing as the bells and whistles for cheaper overall
I have a Camp Chef Woodwind and a Traeger Pro 34. I've had a lot of issues with the Woodwind, mostly quality and build related. I'm about to get rid of both and get a Rec Teq
My BIL had the same issues with his Camp Chef and got a higher end Pit Boss rig. He's been happy with it.
My BIL had the same issues with his Camp Chef and got a higher end Pit Boss rig. He's been happy with it.
As someone that used to have to babysit their Weber quite a bit as far as temperature, I've gotten to the point I stop fantasizing about buying any kind of automatic temperature control devices/smokers. The key for me has been:
1) the first and easiest mod you should do with a weber is just put a strip of gasket like this around the lid for a good seal. This is important for smoking, but even just for grilling, it makes a huge difference in snuffing out the fire to reuse the coals.
Gasket
2) I bought the Slow and Sear charcoal holder. It's really expensive for what it appears to be, and I resisted it for a long time. There's no apparent reason it should be better than a million other ways to bank your coal on one side, including just piling it there. But it is. Fill it up, light about 10 briquettes in the chimney and dump it in the corner, and it's just way, way more stable than any other solution. I never fill the water reservoir, but it just burns steady.
3) Stop messing around with lump charcoal. Lump charcoal just has too many variations in size, density, etc from piece to piece, and it burns hotter so your job is tougher from the jump. Yes, I get that in a $1200 perfectly maintained BGE and a $30-50 bag of charcoal, it works because the airflow can be so perfectly restricted and the thickness of the egg prevents interaction with the outdoor temperature. But it's nothing but a headache with anything less. I use Kingsford competition briquettes for like $10 bag from Costco, but wouldn't hesitate to use regular Kingsford. But the absolute reliability and repeatability of high quality briquettes makes a huge difference. The coals it's burning 4 hours into the cook will burn identically to the coals you light to start.
4) Stop trying to smoke at 225. It can be done on a Weber, but the ability to get it dialed in and run for hours and hours between 220-230 on a Weber (or really anything other than a premium Kamado) is approximately 50x more challenging than getting it dialed in to stay between 245-255. It's very hard to hold 225 without a minion setup, which has its own challenges. If you're ok with being 250-260, you can just dump the charcoal and start a minion.
When I started this game years ago, it was always 225, 225, 225. I guess that was part of the challenge of it when smoking was more of a dedicated niche hobby, rather than just something weekend warriors want to do for the actual food on their table. Hell, for pork butts, I don't think 99% of people could tell the difference between one smoked for 20 hours at 215, or cut in two and smoked for 6-7 hours at 325. Just make sure the rub isn't so high in sugar so it burns too much, and you're golden. I don't think I've done a pork but under 300 in years, and ribs are fine as long as I'm anywhere under 300. So if it settles at 260, fine, if it settles at 290 fine.
The worst is when the fire locks in at like 270, and then you have to try to bring it down and get it dialed at 225, it's just a overwhelming amount of time, and if you aren't in a major competition, ain't nobody going to taste it.
The exception might be brisket, which I make the effort to make sure doesn't run much more than 250, but otherwise, in my opinion getting it locked in at any point and staying there for hours is way more valuable than trying to reduce it 10 degrees, and as such spending an hour or two with the temperature all over the place.
There's a new gadget on the market that has my interest. FlameTechGrills Smoke and Sizzle. Only 16 reviews on Amazon so far, and this is the only YouTube review from an unbiased source so far, but it's interesting....
I had one of those. They are nice for the price, but mine didn't last very long before it rusted through, 2-3 years maybe? I'm sure it could last much longer, but I've never been the most assiduous about making sure the grill got covered and ashes emptied. But it was great for me to discover I'm not really a Kamado guy, so I'm glad that I could realize that on a $300 Akorn rather than a $1200 BGE.
That is pretty cool. Love all the stuff they come up with for Webers.
I think for slow smoking, I can't really see a downside.
However, there are a few reasons I wouldn't trade it for my Slow N Sear, and that's mainly for the Sear part. If I want to do offset grilling, and sear on the other side, I often want the hot side as hot as hell, especially for steaks. A huge advantage of the Slow N Sear compared to this is that it's a barrier between the charcoal and the wall of the kettle. So if you want to try to get the hot part up to 600-700, and it's banked on one side directly against the kettle, you can definitely (by experience), bubble the enamel on the outside of the kettle. When I'm cooking like that, I don't even set the SNS directly against the wall of the kettle, I give it about an inch air gap, and then have zero concerns how hot I get it.
Also, occasionally I move the SNS to the middle of the grill. If I did it all the time I would get a vortex or something round, but I don't do it that often, mainly to put a cast iron above it for smashburgers. The built in tray means you could never move it to the middle if you wanted it to.
Finally, for people who already have a Slow N Sear, you could duplicate the sizzle part by buying a half moon shaped griddle, which are fairly common, or just by cutting a small pizza pan in half.
Yeah. The electric smoker I had for years was so easy to use. Unfortunately the handle had busted and was barely keeping the door shut, so I had been using packing tape to seal it when I smoked meat. Wife got the Akorn for me as a Father’s Day gift out of the blue. I’m pretty good about keeping the cover on and cleaning.
SNS sells drip pan inserts. There's a cast iron one ($65) and a stainless one ($95) and that one includes a rack that can be set inside the pan.
With the Slow 'N Sear original ringing up at $80 and the "deluxe" version charging $115, this new gadget is very attractive at $75 (on sale for $60 right now at Amazon). I actually stumbled across it looking for the SNS pan.
Mine likes to run at about 275° so that’s what do everything on and stuff always turns out great!
I have a traeger, I would hope they don’t add bad things to the pellets, but who knows.
The minion method is the GOAT of all smoking techniques. I can keep the WSM dialed in around 225-250 for 15 hours easy. Also I disagree with the Lump Charcoal comment. I use jealous Devil:
Jealous Devil All Natural Hardwood Lump Charcoal - 35LB https://a.co/d/93vM8SI
They are very consistent with good chunks of Lump Charcoal And then I fill in the spaces with regular Kingsford Charcoal. I also put 8 wood chunks at the bottom (Harry Soo FTW). I found that Bear mountain Wood chunks are very uniform for the minion method.
Yep, I've never used a WSM, but I'm sure as a dedicated tried and true smoker, its going to handle lump better than a setting up a weber kettle with the offset setup.
Part of the reason I think it works less consistently for me in a weber kettle is the setup of the charcoal on one side, in a half moon or a bank, usually in some kind of charcoal holder, so you're dealing with the shapes of lump and the shape of our charcoal area. It would probably work better if I used a deflector setup where the entire base is filled with lump, with a deflector in between. That's how you do a WSM or a kamado. I actually have a setup to do that, but I don't like being able to see and access the charcoal if I need to throw another piece of wood on it, or just want and idea of how much time I've got left, so I just go with this method so it's easy to get to the charcoal.
I can't remember if I used lump when I did use the method with the deflector and the full base charcoal, and if it was easier to dial in. But setting up as the diagram, the briquettes are just so perfectly consistent, touch each other perfectly to keep the fire steady, etc. I just have a lot fewer spikes. I mean, people still do lump in their kettle for smoking, I just found that briquettes are way less volatile if you want to go hours without much change.
I do love your idea of mixing in briquettes to fill in the gaps of lump...that's a great idea that eliminates some of the variability.
You really don't get a couple of pounds of unusable dust in a bag of Jealous Devil?
And no big pieces of lumber instead of lumps?
In my experience it is the most consistent and have the least amount of dust. There have been a couple bigger pieces of lumber but that doesn’t bother me at all tbh.
I actually agree with you on the lump in the Weber Kettle grill compared to the WSM. I never use lump in mine. I enjoyed doing longer smokes in mine but ever since the WSM it has been easy peasy with the smoking and controlling the temp plus better product imo. But both are 2 of the best cooking inventions ever lol. I Love doing normal grilling on my kettle.Yep, I've never used a WSM, but I'm sure as a dedicated tried and true smoker, its going to handle lump better than a setting up a weber kettle with the offset setup.
Part of the reason I think it works less consistently for me in a weber kettle is the setup of the charcoal on one side, in a half moon or a bank, usually in some kind of charcoal holder, so you're dealing with the shapes of lump and the shape of our charcoal area. It would probably work better if I used a deflector setup where the entire base is filled with lump, with a deflector in between. That's how you do a WSM or a kamado. I actually have a setup to do that, but I don't like being able to see and access the charcoal if I need to throw another piece of wood on it, or just want and idea of how much time I've got left, so I just go with this method so it's easy to get to the charcoal.
I can't remember if I used lump when I did use the method with the deflector and the full base charcoal, and if it was easier to dial in. But setting up as the diagram, the briquettes are just so perfectly consistent, touch each other perfectly to keep the fire steady, etc. I just have a lot fewer spikes. I mean, people still do lump in their kettle for smoking, I just found that briquettes are way less volatile if you want to go hours without much change.
I do love your idea of mixing in briquettes to fill in the gaps of lump...that's a great idea that eliminates some of the variability.
Speaking of how great Weber is, The Algo has been pumping my feeds with their Kamado smoker and man that thing looks sweet. Not sure if it would be worth it since I have a WSM but I’m tempted
I have a Camp Chef Smoke Vault 18” vertical smoker, propane powered and I’ve been very pleased with the results although I’m only 3 smoker sessions in (pork shoulder, baby back pork ribs and a pork belly). The proteins have been good but pork belly is too fatty for my liking. Probably my favorite item every time is smoked baked beans loaded with bacon of course.
Originally I wanted an electric model but the Camp Chef was a free gift to my wife but the more I talk to folks who are experienced smokers there is definitely some strong criticisms about electric versions most of it in regards to the difficulty in holding steady temperatures during colder weather sessions. I believe the Camp Chef model I use is ~$350 on Amazon but if I were buying it myself I’d pay the extra $50 and get the bigger 24” version.
Originally I wanted an electric model but the Camp Chef was a free gift to my wife but the more I talk to folks who are experienced smokers there is definitely some strong criticisms about electric versions most of it in regards to the difficulty in holding steady temperatures during colder weather sessions. I believe the Camp Chef model I use is ~$350 on Amazon but if I were buying it myself I’d pay the extra $50 and get the bigger 24” version.
Check out the WW Pro. Build quality is nicer and it has the smoke box.
I have an offset in my side yard. Anyone who wants it can stop by and pick it up.
I enjoy my traeger, but their pellets are shit. Cookingpellets, knotty wood, lumberjack all make far superior pellets. And the latter is available at fareway and some Hy-Vees for half the price of traeger pellets.
Can you guys honestly tell the difference in pellet brands? They all kind of taste the same to me. When using the green egg, same for general lump. I can taste different finishing woods added like cherry and mesquite, but not the base woods or pellets.
Anybody else ever find any questionable stuff in your lump? Shit that looks like a piece of a pallet? Rocks?
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I can. Traeger pellets add almost no flavor. The others listed are much better. Lumberjack 100% hickory is my go to. The other brands I listed are also good but about 2-3x as expensive and have to be ordered online.
