Hi guys. First time poster here; discovered this excellent site about two months ago and it's been my grilling bible since then. I'm entirely new to grilling, having bought my first one this summer, a natural gas Weber Spirit E310.
I've tried pork shoulder twice now using Meathead's pulled pork recipe, both times with wood chips, and neither result has, in my opinion, had any noticeable element of smokiness. For me the smokier the better, so this has been disappointing.
First try: started with a 6.75 lb shoulder (smallest I could find). Water pan under the meat, single leftmost burner on low to maintain 225, with applewood chips in a Charcoal Companion V-shaped smoker box next to it. I put about 4oz of dry chips in every 30 minutes for the first 2 hours and then stopped. 13 hours in, at 10 PM (yeah, I started entirely too late), I was still only at about 170 on the meat and I was aiming for Meathead's recommended 203. As I had a group of friends to feed, I had to crank up the grill to about 290 to push the meat to 193 over the next hour. The meat was fine and everybody enjoyed, but I was frustrated by both the extremely long cook time (I'd been expecting no more than 12 hours) and what seemed to me to be a total lack of smokiness in the flavor.
Second try: got up at 5:30 AM
and had the meat on by 6. Same setup, meat size about 6.8, this time tried hickory chips and I just kept feeding in new chips every 30 minutes for the first 4 hours, then hourly for the next 4. I noticed they seemed to smoke less than the applewood chips. Again it took forever: 14 hours in, I was still around 180. Again cranked up the grill to 290, and got to 194 a while later, for a total cook time of almost 15 hours this time. And again, no smokiness at all.
So what gives? Is a setup like mine just incapable of infusing much smokiness? Is the low cook temp maybe not burning the wood chips enough? I feel like I only ever see a few little wisps of smoke coming out of the box, as opposed to the steady stream of smoke that I expected to see.
And why taking so long, any ideas? I realize the recipe says 8-12 hours for 5-6 lbs, but 14-15 hours for 6.7 lbs seems high, no? Especially considering that it would likely have been much longer had I not turned up the grill?
I've tried pork shoulder twice now using Meathead's pulled pork recipe, both times with wood chips, and neither result has, in my opinion, had any noticeable element of smokiness. For me the smokier the better, so this has been disappointing.
First try: started with a 6.75 lb shoulder (smallest I could find). Water pan under the meat, single leftmost burner on low to maintain 225, with applewood chips in a Charcoal Companion V-shaped smoker box next to it. I put about 4oz of dry chips in every 30 minutes for the first 2 hours and then stopped. 13 hours in, at 10 PM (yeah, I started entirely too late), I was still only at about 170 on the meat and I was aiming for Meathead's recommended 203. As I had a group of friends to feed, I had to crank up the grill to about 290 to push the meat to 193 over the next hour. The meat was fine and everybody enjoyed, but I was frustrated by both the extremely long cook time (I'd been expecting no more than 12 hours) and what seemed to me to be a total lack of smokiness in the flavor.
Second try: got up at 5:30 AM

So what gives? Is a setup like mine just incapable of infusing much smokiness? Is the low cook temp maybe not burning the wood chips enough? I feel like I only ever see a few little wisps of smoke coming out of the box, as opposed to the steady stream of smoke that I expected to see.
And why taking so long, any ideas? I realize the recipe says 8-12 hours for 5-6 lbs, but 14-15 hours for 6.7 lbs seems high, no? Especially considering that it would likely have been much longer had I not turned up the grill?
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