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Glitchy's MAK 2 Star First (cooking) Impressions

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  • T-bone
    replied
    Great write up. Very useful for a future 2 Star owner. Thanks and keep the lessons learned a comin'!

    Leave a comment:


  • bbqLuv
    commented on 's reply
    TX U glitchy

  • glitchy
    commented on 's reply
    The first few times I emptied it, I was taking the entire flame zone out, so I was cleaning it every time. I finally realized the fire pot could still be emptied with the FlameZone base in place making it a little easier at least. It’s not a big deal, but definitely a perk on some other grills.

    As far as the sear, it’s what I expected before buying but had to test it. Basically, I’m just trying to figure out the easiest solution when I can’t or don’t want to light charcoal.

  • GolfGeezer
    replied
    Glad to see you finally get to really exercise the MAK. Nice write-up as usual!

    I call mine "The Beast" - rock solid, well made, dependable, well supported by great people. The one cooking aspect I do not use the MAK for is searing or high heat cooking. It is just too easy to fire up the gasser's IR burner to sear, so smoking a tri-tip and then searing, or the other way around, is pretty much my preferred method.

    I do agree that I wish MAK had a more convenient way to empty the firepot. Having to remove the main grates, then the top of the Flamezone, then the small deflector plate is easy, but for a lazy a** like me, would bee nice to just slide a door open, reach in, slide the FP out and dump it. Just sayin'...

    Leave a comment:


  • ItsAllGoneToTheDogs
    commented on 's reply
    being in OR you can get a discount (I think it's just the shipping fee removed from the price, but maybe more) by driving down to MAK and buying it in person

  • willxfmr
    replied
    Thanks for the detailed write-up. Most of all, I'm glad it's finally giving you a chance to give it a proper workout.

    Leave a comment:


  • glitchy
    commented on 's reply
    If you do get to the point to seriously look at MAK but find the 2 Star too pricey, I don’t see any reason why the 1 Star would not perform exactly the same. You really just give up a warming box and some vertical space.

  • glitchy
    commented on 's reply
    You’re too kind.

  • bbqLuv
    replied
    I went ahead and read the whole review. The MAK 2 will do. I think I will give it a longer look.

    Leave a comment:


  • DavidNorcross
    replied
    Once again another great overview....and the journey begins. Thanks for sharing.

    Leave a comment:


  • glitchy
    commented on 's reply
    I have only used it once based on time. It was easy to setup. I’m still working with MAK on issues with my probes getting inaccurate readings. We shelved that concern while making sure the other issues were indeed the pellets. When we get the probes figured out I’ll probably try some more programs. I can definitely see a chuckie recipe to run on smoke an hour, jump to 275, then drop temp to 225 and cook another hour after they hit 205-207. I cook them manually this way all the time.

  • ItsAllGoneToTheDogs
    replied
    glitchy have you messed with the programming function yet? I was surprised how simple it is on the standard controller, it's only slightly easier on the wifi. But I used it last night for instance, last minute pulled pork. Smoke, 1hr > 245, until IT 198 > smoke (to give me time to wake up... woke up right when it hit 198 and took it to 204 at work in the oven). I generally only use it for overnight cooks, but wondering if you had thoughts on the usefulness of it having had pellet grills with apps.

    Leave a comment:


  • glitchy
    commented on 's reply
    Yeah, I was pretty happy with the cast iron reverse sear just like you described. Enough that I thought the griddle was worth a shot to see how close to CI it performs as it should be easier clean up, give me a little more room, and I can think of a lot of other fun uses for it since I don't have a stand alone griddle. Hard to say where I end up as the regular steak process, going to be hard to beat the WSCG grill with a front sear. Outside of steaks, the poor WSCG is likely going to be lonely.

  • ItsAllGoneToTheDogs
    replied
    FWIW I got rid of my grill grates. They are just too much of a pain to clean and slide around in the MAK. They worked great with it though for producing a solid proper sear.

    For anything other than steak I'm happy with the stock grates, but a CI pan works perfectly fine for doing reverse sear. I'll put the pan in during the smoke portion, crank the temp up to grill and put the steaks in the warming box at about 110-115 for medium rare. Go inside to get the table sorted, come out, plop the steaks in the CI pan and flip flip flip until proper internal temp.

    Glad you're finally getting some quality time with your MAK. BTW in my experience wind when it's below 60 out seems to affect the MAK more than sub freezing temps. My fluctuation on temp is usually 5 below set point year round.

    Leave a comment:


  • glitchy
    replied
    A few pics of the above mentioned cooks. The filet mignon was the steak reverse seared in cast iron on the MAK. Several of the photos were previously shown in SUWYC while compiling this data.
    Attached Files
    Last edited by glitchy; March 29, 2021, 03:26 PM.

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