Hello, ...just purchased a digital 4 rack that I have been wanting for a while. Looking forward to trying it out and moving into a larger and better controlled smoker than my well-worn old Big Chief!
Hey, welcome from the lower mainland!
Hope you enjoy your new smoker, be sure to look around for recipes and tips on how to get the most out of it. ( Hot water in the puck bowl, pre-heat to hotter than where you want to cook at, and keep your vent open!) :)
Be sure to check out the recipe site as well at http://www.susanminor.org/forums/ (http://www.susanminor.org/forums/)
Well, Thanks for that. I have already been looking around at all the scrumptious recipes,the recippe areas are easy to find and well organized ....but the tips seem a bit more scattered around. I think the mention of hot water in the puck bowl is something I noticed in another thread, ....but hadn't seen anything about preheating. Is there a best place to look for those kinds of ideas.
Welcome from N E Minnesota
Welcome to the forum. You will get lots of great tips just by asking for tips. Like get a couple of bricks from Home Depot and wrap them with tin foil. Heat them up in the oven or just in the smoker as you preheat and they will act as a heat sink to help recover the temp after you open it up for whatever reason(checking temps, saucing, rotating racks). Place them on the bottom rack if you are not using it and you are good to go. Oh yeah and be sure to keep the vent open. I keep mine half to full open all the time. Give him your favorite tip guys, we'll get him up to speed.
plan on extra time low and slow FTC will save you if it finishes early. you can't rush the meat it's done when it's done.
welcome aboard
Careful smoking can and will be addictive .... Have a hoot !
Hello and welcome from Beautiful British Columbia !!
Don't be afraid to run your puck burner if you need a little more heat. Some forum members continue to run their puck burner after the smoking is done as a matter of course. They report that this practice doesn't seem to affect the life expectancy of the puck burner.
if you do run the puck burner (smoke generator or SG for short, lol) for extra heat (I do ;)), make sure to clear off the last pucks from the burner if you do not have the *"bubba pucks"... I push the one on the burner and the one next to it into the water bowl, and leave the third one where it is and re-use it later as a "pusher" puck
It would be helpful if there was a "sticky" post at the top of one of the sections somewhere ( "new members/before you post" sub-forum maybe?) so that the usual assortment of helpful tips could all be found in one place. Maybe the acronyms could be included in there as well! (FTC, SG, CYM, EVOO, SRG, etc etc... ;D)
I am not sure who be the one to put such a thing in place, probably a moderator?
* bubba pucks are aluminum pucks that you can buy so you don't have to waste the last few Bradley pucks at then end of the smoke... Usually you get at least two, often three.
I think they have them for sale at yard and pool, but they are somewhat harder to find here in Canada