I was thinking... When we fire up a side burner with wood for a all night cook, and after about 3 or 4 hrs we switch over to lump charcoal and adjust to the correct smoking temp using an air controller, then after our knap we switch back over to wood without the air controller, on the usual way we use wood, do you all think this would produce a good piece of meat allowing us some sleep time?
was wondering something similar. though i would go further and wonder at that point why not just put it in an oven if the presumption is that the meat will not absorb smoke after the first few hours (assuming oven capacity is not an issue)
I see no reason to switch back over to wood. Especially if you run at least a couple hours on wood to begin with. But if you need an excuse to get out the house.......
Theoretically it should work. I would think that "switching over" would take some practice. If you are at home, why not just pull the meat and put it in the kitchen oven till nap time is over and then put it back in the smoker.
Well, even lump charcoal like Fogo still imparts some flavors. But I think it would burn cleaner compared to wood when it's choked down a bit to control temp.
If not cooking outdoors, I am cooking on the stovetop with my 14" carbon steel wok, 12" CI skillet, or in the oven with my two Lodge CI pizza pans, or two dutch ovens. I've also got a nifty Lodge carbon steel grill pan that rocks for veggies outdoors.
The issue I see with this is the switching over part. If you still have burning wood of any size, or a coal bed, unless you can rake it all into a corner, and have let the fire die down a bit, its going to be hard to add a bunch of charcoal and not have it all ignite and end up with higher temperatures than expected. And I'll be straight up - with my offset, even if I do a minion method setup in the firebox, I doubt I can get more than 3-4 hours out of a load of 10-12 pounds of charcoal. I'm certainly not going to sleep all night like I would with my kettle. You just have a lot more volume to heat, and more airflow, so it burns faster.
It could possibly work. But isn't the point of running an offset stick burner, cooking with wood? I have, when needed, been able to grab a series of 30 minute cat naps in between adding a stick of wood. Maybe do something like that. But I'm a really talented napper, so it may not be for everyone.
Yes I think that might be what I have to do. But maybe with a large brisket I can go to bed at 6pm and get up and started at 2am. We will see real soon I hope.
John "JR"
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I have found little difference in end product with going the ~230 or ~300 route, but I did have to add a lot more charcoal in my Weber to keep it at 300, so I usually went with the low side.
My stick burner is a lot easier to get up to 300, so I have done a number of cooks at that temp. Had several jaw droppingly awesome results for ribs and brisket at that temp ðŸ¤
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I've still never had to cook overnight on my stickburner. Only a few times have I done a long cook for lunch the next day, and in those cases I've used another cooker like the SnS/kettle
Joetee Many offsets run waaaay smoother at 275+. In fact, I've gotten feedback from offset manufacturers who say it's more difficult to run much lower than that. Ultimate tenderness comes from a good hold after the cook.
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