I know Jerrod frequently cooks with B&B Oak Briquettes. I was going to try them, but HEB (Texas based grocery store) had their own brand to compete with B&B, so I thought I'd give them a go. Their own brands are usually very good quality.
I had an 8lb bag, filled the PBC basket and lit using the lighter fluid method. Gave the coals about 15 - 20 minutes to get a good burn going.
First impressions - the briquettes were really friable. Lots of crumbling. They were largely whole, but far more crumbled and chipped than you would expect from, say, a bag of kingford blue. The briquettes were also quite fibrous, with small chunks of the wood fibers, which probably contributed to the friability.
Once lit - very strong smoke smell! It stuck to me like glue.
The Cook:
The first two hours showed almost perfect PBC temp graph. Peaked at very high three hundreds, then steady decline. I didn't crack the lid, I hung the meat and seated the lid.
The chicken was fully cooked at about 1hour 45 - but I wasn't in the house. So I took it off at the first spike in the graph - about two hours.
At that point, the cook looked perfect from a grill temp perspective. I had a couple of other test cuts of wild hog in there, so I left it cooking away. Checking periodically.
As you can see from the graph the temps just shot up after each check, and stayed there! The checks were quick - no more than 30 secons with the lid off - but resulted in a big changes in temp.
The briquettes burned to a very light ash, and imparted a really good smoke flavor. But for the PBC, unless you are cooking a single item, I'm guessing that temperature spike after lifting the lid is probably a problem.
I bet they are going to be great for a hot sear on the weber. Unsure if they are going to be good for the PBC.
Thoughts?
Matt
I had an 8lb bag, filled the PBC basket and lit using the lighter fluid method. Gave the coals about 15 - 20 minutes to get a good burn going.
First impressions - the briquettes were really friable. Lots of crumbling. They were largely whole, but far more crumbled and chipped than you would expect from, say, a bag of kingford blue. The briquettes were also quite fibrous, with small chunks of the wood fibers, which probably contributed to the friability.
Once lit - very strong smoke smell! It stuck to me like glue.
The Cook:
The first two hours showed almost perfect PBC temp graph. Peaked at very high three hundreds, then steady decline. I didn't crack the lid, I hung the meat and seated the lid.
The chicken was fully cooked at about 1hour 45 - but I wasn't in the house. So I took it off at the first spike in the graph - about two hours.
At that point, the cook looked perfect from a grill temp perspective. I had a couple of other test cuts of wild hog in there, so I left it cooking away. Checking periodically.
As you can see from the graph the temps just shot up after each check, and stayed there! The checks were quick - no more than 30 secons with the lid off - but resulted in a big changes in temp.
The briquettes burned to a very light ash, and imparted a really good smoke flavor. But for the PBC, unless you are cooking a single item, I'm guessing that temperature spike after lifting the lid is probably a problem.
I bet they are going to be great for a hot sear on the weber. Unsure if they are going to be good for the PBC.
Thoughts?
Matt
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