I thought I’d get your attention with this title! It certainly beats “Theory of the Kamadoâ€Â, right? But at the end of the day, every single kamado is nothing more than a chimney, just like the fireplace you have at home.
The kamado has been around for about 4 millennia and goes back to ancient China and India. Kamados came to be known in America and the rest of the world after WW II when servicemen brought them home from their tours in Japan. Now for the theory and basic operation of the kamado. We need to know why and how any BBQ cooker and kamados in particular work if we’re to understand their behavior.
Now kamados come in many brands, but irrespective of brand every kamado operates in the same basic way. I don’t care if you’re cooking on the Char Griller Akorn or any of the top of the line Komodo Kamados, every kamado operates the same. They are all nothing more than chimneys. They all burn air and the rate of the burn, and hence heat produced manifested as temperature, is controlled by controlling the amount of air available for being converted to CO2.
You need 3 things for a fire: fuel, heat, and oxygen. If any one of those 3 is absent, there is no fire. Period. End of conversation. So let’s look at each one turn.
Fuel. Fire requires something that will sustain the fire. Fire needs to have something to consume. That something is fuel. In kamados that fuel is some form of carbon. Carbon can take to form of wood, lump charcoal, or briquettes for our purposes. Carbon is, in the presence of heat and Oxygen, converted to CO2 and heat. It is that heat that cooks our food in the kamado.
Heat. Heat is required to sustain the chemical reaction that converts carbon and oxygen to CO2. Thus heat is a necessary component to burning anything and it is a by product of any conversion of carbon and oxygen to CO2. Think about this for a moment: charcoal is in contact with air all the time, but without heat, nothing is going to happen. Charcoal will sit on your patio in a bag forever in the presence of air and absolutely nothing is going to happen.
Oxygen. Oxygen is the most important component of the air we breathe. No oxygen, no life as we know it! Oxygen compromises about 21% of air, nitrogen about 78% and the remainder are other gases. It is the oxygen in air that reacts with carbon in the presence of heat that produces more heat that we need for cooking. Control the airflow into your kamado and you control the temperature.
Okay, chemistry class is over. So basically what do we know at this point? Kamados are chemical reactors converting carbon and oxygen to CO2 and throwing off heat. That heat helps maintain the reaction of carbon and oxygen. The amount of heat produced is manifested as temperature.
Now I told you the kamado, irrespective of brand, is nothing more than a chimney and they all operate . Here’s what I mean: the chimney in your house draws air in at the bottom, air comes in contact with burning logs and in a reaction, the oxygen combines with the carbon in the logs, produces heat and CO2, and the CO2 exits out the top of the chimney. So too with your kamado albeit in a little more sophisticated way! Air is drawn into the kamado through the bottom vent, that air contacts burning lump and the oxygen in the air reacts with the burning lump producing heat and CO2. The CO2 exits the kamado out the top vent. See? Your Akorns, Big Green Eggs, Komodo Kamados, and every other brand of kamado are nothing more than chimneys.
So I hope you understand that know just a little theory yields great dividends. Every single kamado ever made over the last 4,000 years works exactly as every other kamado and they are all chimneys. Knowing just a little theory can be very profitable. I told a buddy who just loved my pulled pork and ribs that I cooked on my Primo Oval XL that it wasn’t the cooker, it was the cook. He bet me $1000 i couldn’t cook as well on a cheaper kamado. To prove my point and win the bet, I made a kamado out of 2 large ceramic pots, expanded metal, and with my Dremel cut out openings for a top and bottom vent. I cooked a pork butt and some ribs in that contraption and it was the hit of the party watching him pay up. I donated that money to a local charity! Theory isn't something abstract but can actually be quite profitable!
Questions? Comments? Thoughts?
The kamado has been around for about 4 millennia and goes back to ancient China and India. Kamados came to be known in America and the rest of the world after WW II when servicemen brought them home from their tours in Japan. Now for the theory and basic operation of the kamado. We need to know why and how any BBQ cooker and kamados in particular work if we’re to understand their behavior.
Now kamados come in many brands, but irrespective of brand every kamado operates in the same basic way. I don’t care if you’re cooking on the Char Griller Akorn or any of the top of the line Komodo Kamados, every kamado operates the same. They are all nothing more than chimneys. They all burn air and the rate of the burn, and hence heat produced manifested as temperature, is controlled by controlling the amount of air available for being converted to CO2.
You need 3 things for a fire: fuel, heat, and oxygen. If any one of those 3 is absent, there is no fire. Period. End of conversation. So let’s look at each one turn.
Fuel. Fire requires something that will sustain the fire. Fire needs to have something to consume. That something is fuel. In kamados that fuel is some form of carbon. Carbon can take to form of wood, lump charcoal, or briquettes for our purposes. Carbon is, in the presence of heat and Oxygen, converted to CO2 and heat. It is that heat that cooks our food in the kamado.
Heat. Heat is required to sustain the chemical reaction that converts carbon and oxygen to CO2. Thus heat is a necessary component to burning anything and it is a by product of any conversion of carbon and oxygen to CO2. Think about this for a moment: charcoal is in contact with air all the time, but without heat, nothing is going to happen. Charcoal will sit on your patio in a bag forever in the presence of air and absolutely nothing is going to happen.
Oxygen. Oxygen is the most important component of the air we breathe. No oxygen, no life as we know it! Oxygen compromises about 21% of air, nitrogen about 78% and the remainder are other gases. It is the oxygen in air that reacts with carbon in the presence of heat that produces more heat that we need for cooking. Control the airflow into your kamado and you control the temperature.
Okay, chemistry class is over. So basically what do we know at this point? Kamados are chemical reactors converting carbon and oxygen to CO2 and throwing off heat. That heat helps maintain the reaction of carbon and oxygen. The amount of heat produced is manifested as temperature.
Now I told you the kamado, irrespective of brand, is nothing more than a chimney and they all operate . Here’s what I mean: the chimney in your house draws air in at the bottom, air comes in contact with burning logs and in a reaction, the oxygen combines with the carbon in the logs, produces heat and CO2, and the CO2 exits out the top of the chimney. So too with your kamado albeit in a little more sophisticated way! Air is drawn into the kamado through the bottom vent, that air contacts burning lump and the oxygen in the air reacts with the burning lump producing heat and CO2. The CO2 exits the kamado out the top vent. See? Your Akorns, Big Green Eggs, Komodo Kamados, and every other brand of kamado are nothing more than chimneys.
So I hope you understand that know just a little theory yields great dividends. Every single kamado ever made over the last 4,000 years works exactly as every other kamado and they are all chimneys. Knowing just a little theory can be very profitable. I told a buddy who just loved my pulled pork and ribs that I cooked on my Primo Oval XL that it wasn’t the cooker, it was the cook. He bet me $1000 i couldn’t cook as well on a cheaper kamado. To prove my point and win the bet, I made a kamado out of 2 large ceramic pots, expanded metal, and with my Dremel cut out openings for a top and bottom vent. I cooked a pork butt and some ribs in that contraption and it was the hit of the party watching him pay up. I donated that money to a local charity! Theory isn't something abstract but can actually be quite profitable!
Questions? Comments? Thoughts?
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