Second Smoke, things I tried, things I've learned

[Gregory]

I did my second smoke with my OBS on 8/22.  We had a party and I did 3 racks of St. Louis style ribs and some ABTs.

I ran into hardware trouble at the outset.  I did pulled pork and some ribs for my first smoke but made the mistake of running with the vent closed.  When I started the puck advance for my second smoke the pucks wouldn't move.  I could hear the puck advance mechanism, but the pucks just sat there.

It turns out that a lot of smoke and moisture had backed up into the smoke generator during my first smoke and made the puck advance and guide very sticky.  That combined with a little sawdust was jamming the puck advance and causing it to stick while only halfway withdrawn and then return to it's home position.  A quick cleaning followed by some graphite dry lube and a note to follow the Bradley forums advice to keep the vent at least half open and I was back in business.

I put a tea kettle on to get my water up to boiling before filling the water bowl, this made preheating so much easier.  I kept the kettle handy for refills later.  I also used some of the high temp jerky drying screens from Yard and Pool.  They worked out nicely and made cleanup easier.

I tried using a foil serving tray as a drip catcher on top of the drip tray, but I think it traps too much heat at the bottom of the smoker and just causes the water to evaporate faster.  The drip tray and water bowl came out cleaner, but if I try that again I'll put the tray on the lower wire rack to give the heat some room to circulate.

On to the food:

ABTs:
These were very basic, just jalapenos, cream cheese and bacon.  I used the whipped cream cheese and it worked well.
For easier prep my wife decided to split the jalapenos in half like jalapeno poppers.  This made bacon wrapping a little more difficult and I ended up using a whole slice of bacon per half jalapeno instead of half a slice as I had intended.  This left the bacon moister and a little chewier but still pretty good.  I also made some without bacon for the vegetarian at the party.  I was afraid the cream cheese would run all over the place but it stayed in it's little pepper boats.

Ribs:
I split 3 slabs of St. Louis style ribs in half and smoked them on two racks with store bought pork dry rub.  Because of other party prep and some time spent messing with the puck advance I got the ABTs in late and decided to just let the ribs get smoked longer.  They stayed in nearly 5 hours, then spent some time in the oven keeping warm until the guests arrived.  I didn't foil wrap them although that was my traditional practice with my old electric bullet smoker (4 hours smoke, foil for 2 hours or so).

My wife says the ribs were the best I've ever made; moist, tender and came clean of the bone.

I don't have any pics of the jalapenos but I have a couple crummy cell phone pictures of the ribs.  I'll try to post them soon.

Greg

[FLBentRider]

Sounds like you have it together.

Sorry you had to learn about the vent thing the hard way.

[mikecorn.1]

Glad you fixed your trouble there with the mechanism. Waiting on them pics.  ;D

[Hopefull Romantic]

Best way to learn, by trial and error.

HR

[KyNola]

Way to go Greg!

KyNola

[Tenpoint5]

Even the mistakes still taste good!! Congrat's

[pensrock]

Sounds like you are on the way.
I often wondered why Bradley does not install a stop to prevent the vent from closing fully.
pens