Greetings from Denver Metro

[CoGuyXNYer]

Greetings All,
I am Kevin from the Denver Metropolitan area.  I’m just a few cooks in with my Bradley. I am a native NYer with cooking experience from a NY pizzeria and restaurant. I’m looking forward to learning from the community.


What’s the most important thing you recommend for beginners to learn?
For me, preparation.  After three successful, but flawed cooks, I learned preparation is everything. I was able to get things started early enough that allowed for the last minute setbacks early. 

[manfromplaid]

time management. low and slow means it is done when its done. always plan ahead and keep a journal of your cooks so you know what works and what went wrong. research what others do an don't and ask questions.

[CoGuyXNYer]

Thanks so much

[manfromplaid]

there are good people on this site who will answer questions whatever they may be. welcome to the forum.

[Edward176]

Hey CoGuyXNYer Welcome to the Forum!!!!

[Habanero Smoker]

Hi CoGuyXNYer;

Welcome to the forum. Being a New Yorker I love NYC Pizza, but being upstate there are few pizzerias in my area that serve it. You are going from one cooking extreme to another. Very hot and fast cooking to low and slow cooking methods.

I can't add anything to manfromplaid's reply other than patience  and have fun. Search the forum for recipes to practice on. I have a couple of examples of logs that members have designed especially for the Bradley; both in pdf and spreadsheet formats. I'll upload them and provide a link to access and download them. This may take me a couple of days to do this.

[Smoker John]

Welcome aboard

[Habanero Smoker]

I was able to find the logs and upload them. These logs were created by member Smoking Duck (Marc).

This link is to the PDF version.
Bradley Smoke Log

This is the spreadsheet (excel) version. It was uploaded as a self-extracting zip file, so the extension is exe. After downloading double click on the file, and it will be extracted into an .xlsx file. You may get a warning that the file is unsafe, but the file is safe and free of any malicious programs.
Bradley Smoke Log Excel

[manxman]

Welcome to the forum. 

The best single bit of advise I can give is listen to what Habs says, he has been the go to person for new members for longer than I can remember. Also ask questions if you need specific help. 

To my mind food smoking is perhaps more art than science, sometimes it is too easy to get tied up in the science and it is fun to just fly by the seat of your pants once you have a basic understanding of low and slow techniques. This should include relevant food safety knowledge and understanding given the lower temperatures involved whether hot or cold smoking.

Good luck.