No smoke flavor....what the heck? HELP

[westexasmoker]

Hi bbqj!

Sounds like to me your doing everything right, I will say IMO the smoke of the BS compared to an offset is much more subtle.

C

[3rensho]

Quick question - are you a smoker of cigarettes/cigars??  As an ex-smoker I know that stupid addiction really had my taster messed up until I quit.  Nasal polyps can also wreck havoc with ones sense of taste.  Just a thought since it seems like you're doing everything else right it seems. 

[bbqjourney]

Quick question - are you a smoker of cigarettes/cigars??  As an ex-smoker I know that stupid addiction really had my taster messed up until I quit.  Nasal polyps can also wreck havoc with ones sense of taste.  Just a thought since it seems like you're doing everything else right it seems. 

No fortunately I'm not a smoker myself.  I've passed the brisket around the neighborhood and work and asked what people thought.  Always get "great texture" and "perfect appearance".  When I ask about the smoke flavor I either get "what smoke flavor" or "I guess there's a little".  This thing appears to be no better than a $600 over-sized toaster oven.  Very disappointing to say the least.   I have to conclude it has something to do with the discs.  The neighborhood is filled with smoke and smoke scent when it's running, but it must be the type of wood or texture of the discs that isn't producing the type of smoke which will cling to the meat surface.  Bit of a farce if you ask me.  I can accept that the discs are expensive and the process could not be easier compared to maintaining a fire box, but to call this a smoker just might be pushing the definition too far.  It creates lots o' smoke, but doesn't seem to impart the flavor in the meat.  Live and learn, it seemed too good to be true.  $600 mistake  >:(

[KyNola]

bbqjourney,
I am so very sorry you are unhappy with your BDS.  I can't think of anything you can do differently and more importantly you have had the most experienced members of this community assisting you with solutions to your dilemma.

I noticed in your original post that you smoked salmon.  Any smoke flavor there?  Have you ever tried pork or poultry in your BDS?

From your posts you appear to be a Texan or have a good knowledge of Texas brisket.  Any chance you're remembering what you thought Texas style brisket smoked over a pile of mesquite tasted like as I read that you're now located in Denver?

Denver...fellow forum members, is it possible that at that elevation that the air is thin enough to have an impact on the smokiness?  Thought of that as I was responding.

bbqjourney, we're not finished with your issue yet.  Don't give up on us or your BDS quite yet.

KyNola

[HawkeyeSmokes]

What do the bisquettes look like when they are in the water bowl? How much smoke is coming out of the vent during the smoking period?

The bisquettes should has shrunk in size but retained their shape. If you break them open they should be charred all the way through. If they are not like that, then either your generator is dumping the bisquettes quicker then 20 minutes, or your heating pad is not getting hot enough.

They're charred all the way through.  As I mentioned the smoke is literally pouring out the entire 6 hours.  You can smell it 2 houses down no problem.  I'm wondering if I'm getting up to the temperature that the brisket wont take the smoke anymore, too fast.  I'm running at 220 degrees (no preheat on the temp only preheat for the smoke unit and brisket is straight out of the fridge), and hitting an IT of above 140 degrees in about 3 hours.  Can I safely run it at a lower temperature (say 190 degrees) for the 6 hours of smoke and then kick it up to 230 to complete in time?

I notice you take the brisket right from the fridge, I like to let it set on the counter at least an hour to come to room temp. Cold meat will sweat and not take smoke to well.

[bbqjourney]

bbqjourney,
I am so very sorry you are unhappy with your BDS.  I can't think of anything you can do differently and more importantly you have had the most experienced members of this community assisting you with solutions to your dilemma.

I noticed in your original post that you smoked salmon.  Any smoke flavor there?  Have you ever tried pork or poultry in your BDS?

From your posts you appear to be a Texan or have a good knowledge of Texas brisket.  Any chance you're remembering what you thought Texas style brisket smoked over a pile of mesquite tasted like as I read that you're now located in Denver?

Denver...fellow forum members, is it possible that at that elevation that the air is thin enough to have an impact on the smokiness?  Thought of that as I was responding.

bbqjourney, we're not finished with your issue yet.  Don't give up on us or your BDS quite yet.

KyNola

This could be a good point (altitude), I'd love to hear from others in the Denver area and their experiences!

I don't eat Salmon, but my wife says "it kinda' has smoke", it cooks up real nice I must say. 

I tried a Boston Butt as well, put the smoke on for 9 hours (I know it's longer than most recommend, but I wanted to take the amount of time out of the equation) and it maaaaaybe had a hint of smoke in the crust, but not much if any really.  I was trying hard to taste some, nothing really there.

[bbqjourney]

What do the bisquettes look like when they are in the water bowl? How much smoke is coming out of the vent during the smoking period?

The bisquettes should has shrunk in size but retained their shape. If you break them open they should be charred all the way through. If they are not like that, then either your generator is dumping the bisquettes quicker then 20 minutes, or your heating pad is not getting hot enough.

They're charred all the way through.  As I mentioned the smoke is literally pouring out the entire 6 hours.  You can smell it 2 houses down no problem.  I'm wondering if I'm getting up to the temperature that the brisket wont take the smoke anymore, too fast.  I'm running at 220 degrees (no preheat on the temp only preheat for the smoke unit and brisket is straight out of the fridge), and hitting an IT of above 140 degrees in about 3 hours.  Can I safely run it at a lower temperature (say 190 degrees) for the 6 hours of smoke and then kick it up to 230 to complete in time?

I notice you take the brisket right from the fridge, I like to let it set on the counter at least an hour to come to room temp. Cold meat will sweat and not take smoke to well.

Thanks for the comment.  I originally tried the brisket by letting it sit out and preheating the smoker.  This didn't work, so I tried the opposite, put it in the smoker (smoke rolling!) and cold and the brisket cold, and then firing up the smoker temperature to 220, assuming it would then provide the meat more contact with the smoke before reaching the 140 degrees (generally accepted number but I won't argue it, I really don't know) and it stops taking on smoke flavor.  This was a case of trying two extremes, neither working.  I also took out the mustard and piled on the salt on another brisket to take those issues off the table. 

[mikecorn.1]

Mind boggling  ???. I put 2 hours of pecan on some chicken legs and they came out great; lots of smoke flavor. I did the same thing with apple and could not realy get much smoke flavor out of it. It was just a hint of smoke. Good luck.

[bbqjourney]

Mind boggling  ???. I put 2 hours of pecan on some chicken legs and they came out great; lots of smoke flavor. I did the same thing with apple and could not realy get much smoke flavor out of it. It was just a hint of smoke. Good luck.

I did invest in a box of Pecan as someone else suggested earlier, they came this week and I'm going to try and squeeze in another brisket this weekend with hours and hours of Pecan to give it a try.  I've tried the Mesquite, Special Blend and the Jim Beam discs each to no avail.  I'd be absolutely thrilled to get smoke flavor out of the Pecan <<Crosses fingers>>!! 

[Gamefish]

Mind boggling  ???. I put 2 hours of pecan on some chicken legs and they came out great; lots of smoke flavor. I did the same thing with apple and could not realy get much smoke flavor out of it. It was just a hint of smoke. Good luck.

I did invest in a box of Pecan as someone else suggested earlier, they came this week and I'm going to try and squeeze in another brisket this weekend with hours and hours of Pecan to give it a try.  I've tried the Mesquite, Special Blend and the Jim Beam discs each to no avail.  I'd be absolutely thrilled to get smoke flavor out of the Pecan <<Crosses fingers>>!! 

BBQjourney

Just another thought like most have said, leave the meat on the bench for an hour or so to get to room temp and just run the generator with no oven temp for the first 3 hours with no seasoning or very little, after 3 hours raise the oven temp to suit
Cold smoking this way by only using the bisquette element will inject more smoke flavour when the meat is raw, also as you only run the generator, close the vent to quarter open, then open to full once you start cooking, during the cooking process, use no wood bisquettes but at the end of cooking smoke for additional hour, and try hickory wood as another alternative
I find this surprising as all products we have smoked come out sometimes to smokey

[KyNola]

With all respect,
I would not recommend Gamefish's idea.  Having the meat out for an hour and then into the smoker with only the smoke generator running for 3 hours and then bringing on the main heating element exposes the meat to being in the "danger zone" of temp for too long in my opinion.  Running the Bradley with the smoke generator running for 3 hours with the vent closed down to one quarter also may allow smoke and moisture to back up into the generator which will effectively destroy the generator.

Just my opinion.  No offense intended to anyone.

KyNola

[BC Smokin']

Just a thought here, but I noticed that my Apple bisquettes are somewhat less thick then other bisquettes that I bought,at the same time, also they have a darker color to them. I am thinking they are old stock. Do the bisquettes have a shelf life? Can they lose some of the flavor when they are old? I cannot taste much apple in my food, but I also used the apple and hickory in my smoke I did yesterday. Could you have old bisquettes?

[Quarlow]

My family has a tree topping business and as a young guy I worked with them a lot. We cut down fruit trees all the time. Apple wood is definatly a darker colour than others to the point of being kind of orangey red at times, so I don't think that is the problem. But I find apple to be a light flavour anyway. I use alder for salmon usually and you have to watch that you don't put too much smoke flavour to it. The last fish I did I used hickory and I thought it was good but would rather have used the alder for more smoke flavour.

[Gamefish]

With all respect,
I would not recommend Gamefish's idea.  Having the meat out for an hour and then into the smoker with only the smoke generator running for 3 hours and then bringing on the main heating element exposes the meat to being in the "danger zone" of temp for too long in my opinion.  Running the Bradley with the smoke generator running for 3 hours with the vent closed down to one quarter also may allow smoke and moisture to back up into the generator which will effectively destroy the generator.

Just my opinion.  No offense intended to anyone.

KyNola

KyNola, you may have misread a little as cold smoking is an effective way of adding more smoke flavour, why Bradley have introduced the cold smoke adaptor, but good point you have raised as we are working on winter temperatures down here 0c, i forgot you lot are in summer season ;)

BBQjourney, wood bisqettes don't go off to say the least, and the different woods are designed for different flavours, somehow i would not expect to taste apple flavour using apple wood, but would expect a milder flavour compared to others

Are you sure you and your town haven't be abducted buy aliens and your taste sensors altered  :o

Reading between the lines on your comments have you contacted Bradley with your cocerns or just like to vent on forums :-\

Quote from BBQ Journey
When I ask about the smoke flavor I either get "what smoke flavor" or "I guess there's a little".  This thing appears to be no better than a $600 over-sized toaster oven.  Very disappointing to say the least.   Bit of a farce if you ask me.  I can accept that the discs are expensive and the process could not be easier compared to maintaining a fire box, but to call this a smoker just might be pushing the definition too far.  It creates lots o' smoke, but doesn't seem to impart the flavor in the meat.  Live and learn, it seemed too good to be true.  $600 mistake  

[ArnieM]

Hi Gamefish,

First, I can't give you an answer so you can skip the rest of this post if you like. 

If this was solely your opinion, I'd say well ...

But as you said, you passed the food around to others who reported little or no smoke taste so you can't be entirely wrong.

What model smoker do you have?  What have you smoked on where you really got the stronger smoke taste that you like?  And what kind of wood and food did you previously smoke?

One of the benefits of the BS is that the smoke produced is more 'pure' - that is less acrid than smoking wood down to ashes.  Maybe that's what you're used to.  I don't know.  I've only used my OBS for three smokes:  split chicken breast with apple (1:40 smoke), ribs with hickory (3:00 hours smoke) and yesterday for brisket with oak (4:00 hours smoke).  My wife and friends loved 'em.  Yeah, I know that doesn't help you.

I don't understand how, when you put food in the smoker and fill it with smoke, it doesn't come out smokey.  What makes you think the Bradley is much different from an offset or direct heat smoker?  It may help if you expounded on your previous smoking experiences.

I hope we can help you here.