Wood smoke flavor: Can you tell the difference?

[DaveD]

Hey folks, something I've been ruminating about lately... I see plenty of commentary and product descriptions for smoking wood that ascribe various features to the wood's flavor profile - sweetness for fruit-tree woods and the like.

Here's my dirty little secret: I can't tell one kind of wood smoke from another. It all just tastes like "smoke" to me. The only kind of wood flavor I can definitely pick out of a lineup is mesquite. Pecan, apple, oak, hickory - I couldn't tell them apart if my life depended on it. I recall that there is at least one passage in Meathead's book about there being so many other things going on as a cut of meat is smoked that the difference in wood flavor gets lost, and that tracks with my experience.

I'm aware of the notion that the smoke clinging to one's clothing and hair from working over the cooker can affect the perception of the meal, but it's never realistic for me to take the time to shower and change clothes, I got dinner to serve...!

And of course, trying to do some kind of systematic experiment to isolate that variable isn't something I can do with my single cooker (SnS kettle), and even if I had twin kettles, as we all know every fire is its own thing.

So who can confidently distinguish wood smoke types? What's your secret?

[Mosca]

I have a couple answers.

First, and right to the point: No, probably not. I like to think that I can tell the difference, but in a blind taste test I probably wouldn’t even be able to say if the wood used was the same or different.

Second: That doesn’t mean it isn’t important. Part of the fun is feeling like I’m making a difference, feeling like I’m influencing the final result. The choices I make, and I’ll even say the more trivial choices I make, are integral to the feelings that I’m trying to share with loved ones. The more choices I make, the more I’m saying, “I care.”

I only use apple or hickory. Sometimes I can find post oak, but I don’t even imagine that I can tell the difference between that and hickory. I know that I can’t.

[Lynn Dollar]

Somewhere, I've also heard Meathead say that the difference in flavor is not distinguishable. And that's my experience.

With aroma, the only wood I can definitely identify is cherry. The rest of it, if it has a good aroma, I'm good with it.

And I'm also in the school of losing my taste for smoke after tending to a smoker for hours. Reason for that, I get the smoke flavor when I reheat meats the next day or there after. I think breathing the smoke dulls the senses in the nose and taste. Especially if I'm cooking on my stickburner.

[Murdy]

Outside of mesquite and possibly hickory, I probably can't tell, but continue to think I can.

[realdocBBQ]

Outside of mesquite and possibly hickory, I probably can't tell, but continue to think I can.

Mesquite is pretty pungeant. Some woods are 'stronger' than others.

After... ooohhhhh 15 years and about every kind of cooker you can think of, this is about the extent of what I can tell. Now... sometimes there can be a bit more color difference - for whatever reason, I think cherry does tend to lend a bit more of a reddish color to the bark up to a certain point. But once it darkens up more, like in a stickburner at the end of a brisket cook, no, not so much.

Flavor profile? Nope. By the time I add a heavy layer of S&P (and maybe garlic) on a brisket, or a homemade or commercial rub on pork, etc., no, I don't think I can really differentiate much beyond some woods being 'stronger' than others.

Honestly, most of what I use is pecan and cherry, though. I think I'd like to pick up some hickory and give that a try (pecan is a sub-species of hickory, BTW, for those who may not be aware) and I would like to try some real, actual post oak sometime just to see how it goes.

Mesquite - yes, most of the time, but I use it QUITE sparingly. Anything else - meh.




For realz, though - I like smoking with pecan because I love how it smells when it's burning, and it's good and consistent. Mesquite, I also love how it smells burning, but don't want to use it as my primary or only source of fuel.

[Huskee]

Over the years I've done a lot of direct side by side tests with different woods to test this very thing. 2 kettles, 2 batches of chicken legs with salt only. 1 chunk of this wood on this one, that wood on that one. Cook the same temp, pull at same time. Taste one then the other. I can definitely tell that one is different, and sometimes think this one's better than that one, but tomorrow do you think I could tell you if your chicken was grilled with oak vs maple vs apple? It would be a guess at best for me.

Except peach. Peach, to me, is so unique that I can often tell it was used. Not saying it's my favorite just unique to me.

They do tend to smell different while they're smoking, at least to me. Cherry and peach are both unique, like incense to me. Apple is a notch down but still pleasant. Oak and ash have the quintessential "bonfire" smell, not bad but not special. All are great on meat once on the plate but rarely can I decipher.

The charts you see online, or at places that sell wood or pellets, crack me up- alder for fish, apple for pork, oak or pecan for beef. Lol, ok.They all work for everything if you do it right. Saying apple gives a "sweeter" smoke drive me nuts. It's burnt wood, nothing sweet about it. Perhaps your sugary rub and sweet sauce makes you think the wood smoke too was "sweet"? Nonsense. My opinion, nothing more.

[dpearce]

You gotta think, "someone's getting paid to write this". So there's that! With the brown sugar and white sugar in a lot of the chicken and pork rubs, well, yeah, sure it's got a "sweetness" to it! Apple wood just smells slightly "Appley" to me. Not sweet. Same with Cherry.

[dpearce]

I keep meaning to pick up some peach wood. Just to try it out.

[realdocBBQ]

I think apple somewhat has a sorta sweet smell - maple? Definitely. The smell of it burning, yes. On the food? Can't tell.

For me, a lot of it is about the smell when burning, because I'm feeding that fire for many hours and I ENJOY the smell of certain types of wood and it feels like an accomplishment. Probably pretty shallow, yeah. But hey, I'm just me, not anyone special.

[dpearce]

I'm pretty sure tasting ability is like hearing ability, and smelling ability, and probably seeing ability too. After spending a decade in a recording studio paying close attention to sound quality, microphone placement, and mixing, I realized the old saying, "That person has a tin ear", is true sometimes. I'm sure people have tin tongues, tin noses, and tin eyes, as well. Hopefully not all on the same person.

Case in point, my sister-in-law can't hear anything above 16KHz, and normally females can hear higher frequencies than males. I used to (used to!) be able to hear up to 22KHz, maybe slightly higher, but that decade with headphones on, concerts, and running lawn mowers has lowered that ability. I should get out my frequency checker CD when the house is quiet and see how far I can go now. I'm probably around 19-20KHz now (I hope).

I know can taste "certain" things other people don't really notice, and I prefer more of certain spices and vice versa. I have a friend that can't stomach parmesan cheese. Thinks it smells and tastes like vomit. I know now, it's more common than I first knew, but I'm like how do you eat anything Italian without parmesan? And he likes Italian food!

I'm sure there's degrees of any human sensory recognition. I feel like I can tell a slight difference when using fruitwoods over hardwoods, but only on certain things and it's really slight. I can tell when mesquite is been used, since it's pretty strong, but I like the flavor on certain things so I keep it around, just for that stuff. Pecan, hickory, cherry, and apple wood are pretty much what I have and use. On occasion I'll mix them up, see what happens. Cherry is noticeable to me on chicken and fish, whereas apple on chicken, I don't really get the same vibe I do when I use it on pork. Pecan, I think doesn't impart a lot of smoke flavor, kinda subtle, but I like it.

My sister developed an intense reaction to wood and exhaust smoke about a decade or so ago (long story), can't stand to sit in traffic without the recirculatory setting on, and dislikes sitting by the firepit, so I'm sure if I was cooking something on the smoker, she'd be far away. Not sure what she thinks about smoked food on the plate. I should ask her. She does live in Shertz, TX so I'm pretty sure there's plenty of good BBQ joints nearby, not sure if she goes to any of them or not?

And ever since the "thing that shall not be named" happened, my nose does not work the same for certain fragrances. We drove by an industrial chicken farm a few days ago (near where I grew up, so I am very familiar with how it's "always" smelled. BAD), and it definitely smells "different" (not as bad, and very different) than it ever had. That's not the first time we drove that way, and not the first time I noticed the smell changed. It's hard to explain, best I can say is, there's a "peppery" finish to certain smells now.

Weird. Thankfully, my taste seems to be pretty normal.

Lynn Dollar I think you're spot on. Tending the smoker for long periods tends to dull my senses as well. Throw some bourbon and a cigar in there after dinner, and well, yeah. Heh.

[LA Pork Butt]

Well said! We acknowledge that no two people are alike, but it is hard to give up the expectation that they will be like me.

[eschmid2]

This exactly!! Fellow musician here also and can completely relate to this analogy.

[Draznnl]

I can definitely tell mesquite and can usually recognize hickory. Beyond that, it’s all from one big tree.

[Hulagn1971]

I can definitely taste the difference when using hickory or mesquite. I've only used mesquite maybe twice and I don't like it. Way too strong of a flavor for me. Cherry puts a nice color on the meat. I use hickory and cherry on pork butts, just cherry on ribs, post oak and/or hickory on brisket.

[RlsRls]

Definitely mesquite, not a fan! I stick to apple because they all taste like, burning wood! What a surprise!

[Oak Smoke]

I can’t hear it thunder but my nose still works just fine! I keep three woods now for use in the smoker. I’d have to give up my Texas citizenship card if I didn’t have post oak. I use the oak on brisket, dino ribs, and prime rib. I use apple for pork and chicken. I use mesquite in the smoker when I smoke a steak for a bit before searing it. I can tell the difference. I smoked a brisket with mesquite a couple of years ago. It was too much, almost bitter. I have a friend who’s a fabulous cook that smokes his chicken over grape vine wood, it’s wonderful. I treat wood as an ingredient. The difference can be very subtle or strong depending on which wood and how long you use it. I have a friend who uses smoke through the whole cook when doing ribs. I don’t care for them at all. I like some thin blue smoke for the first couple of hours then just let it cook. There are so many variables in getting the bbq YOU want. Which wood you use is just a small one.

[Hulagn1971]

I learned early that ribs are really easy to over-smoke. I swear there was a tutorial here on AR years ago that said to add a chunk of wood every hour. That's when I learned it was overkill. Now I just use a chunk of cherry and that's it.

[captainlee]

Pellet smoker Mesquite only. That's why I only buy Hickory now, life is much easier. I used to buy multiple varieties and finally figured out I couldn't tell the difference.

[zblongladder]

Also pellet smoker, still relatively new and messing around with wood varieties. I'm really looking forward to my shipment of Smokin Pecan getting here, since pecan shell seems like it might be more noticeable than pecan wood, but for the most part, I'm starting to think it's mostly going to come down to mesquite or not-mesquite. (Possibly with some cherry mixed in for color, and charcoal pellets for hotter burning when I need it.)

[snowswamp]

I cannot taste the difference between different wood smoke. Truthfully, I do not know if I could taste the difference between wood smoke and no wood smoke with the rubs and seasoning applied to cooks.

[Purc]

Mesquite only because it is very strong smoke. Once you put on various rubs, injections, spritz etc. I can't tell one wood smoke from another. Do I use different woods for different meats? ABSOLUTELY, rules are rules!

[mrteddyprincess]

My opinion is smoke with the wood that grows where you live. There's a whole industry out there that wants you to think that the type of wood matters. They are marketing to Midwesterners mesquite and marketing hickory to people in Arizona. BBQ should be local. Smoke with what you have!