Hello all! I am one of those unfortunate individuals that lives in a apartment that doesn't allow charcoal grills, so all my smoking is done on the trusty Weber Spirit E-310. I have had good results with a variety of meats, but I have run into some trouble with the actual "smoke" part of smoking. I use a stainless steel smoker box, and it seems like the smoke is way to heavy and hard to control. Sometimes it is belching like a Big Boy locomotive, and other times the chips will not light at all. My process is normally to preheat the grill with all burners on high with the empty smoker box inside. Once the grill is hot, I shut off all the burners except the one directly below the smoke box. I then load it up with one handful of woodchips and leave the burner on high until it starts smoking. I then turn the burner down to the desired level and add the meat. This sometimes works, but other times it doesn't. Any tips from other gas grill owners would be appreciated!
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Welcome seanmjensen Are you soaking the wood chips? If so, don't. Wet wood produces thick heavy nasty smoke. If not try wrapping the wood chips in foil and poking holes in it with a fork or knife. -
i have a gas smoker and what i have found for chips is 2 things (for me):
1) i wrap in foil and poke holes in it, as DW said. this limits the airflow going to the wood making them smolder and not necessarily light on fire.
2) i put my chips over a low flame and give it time to smoke. if i use a medium to hot flame they catch fire and last about 5 minutes. a low flame takes longer but it gets the chips there gradually and not catch fire which results in a longer period of consistent smoke. my pack is about 2 inches off the flame on top of a metal heat distributor thingy if that helpsComment
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Might try a "tube smoker". It decouples burner flame settitng and smoke generation. I have the 6" version and it will smoke for about 2 hours with a full load of pellets. The disadvantage is that it is designed to work with wood pellets and they are somewhat difficult to find in small quantities. Amazon has a pretty good selection of different wood flavors.
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I wouldn't overthink the wood chips thing. I just make a foil pouch (or 2 ... or 3) of (not soaked) chips, make a few small slits, and lay them (one at a time) over the flavorizer bars over the lit burner while the grill is heating. If you make the slits small enough, there won't be enough oxygen in the pouch to support combustion and you'll get nice, clean smoke. If you need more smoke, then as soon as one pouch dies out, swap it out for another one.Comment
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Thanks everyone. I will definitely give the foil pouch a try. I imagine that the smoker box is allowing too much oxygen to the wood.Comment
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I use those smoke pouches that meat head suggests. They work great for chips.Comment
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I stopped using the smoker box on my gasser long ago. The smoke concentrated on that side of the grill and happily (and quickly) wafted out the many openings.
I've put Mo's Pouch on the Flavorizer bars and it works pretty well. I've also lit small wood chunks (2) on the flavorizers. I like that because I can have the smoke source come from a couple of different places in the grill. I've got a larger gasser, though, with many more burners, so I can run a couple of them and still have room for the meat.
And as Potkettleblack says, the A-Maz-N tube works nicely, as long as you can light it well so it doesn't burn out. It takes a couple of trials, perhaps, just to get the hang of it. It's nice because you can locate it where you want it. I put alder pellets in it and hot smoke salmon. That gets a 10 thumbs up rating from my hubby.
KathrynComment
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For my best work, I've put the A-Maz-N tube on the flavorizer bars on the cool side of the grill, not directly under the food, so as to keep it drip free.
I've also heard of some who like to put it on the drip pan, under the burners.Comment
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