Butt Grilling Aftermath

[Cy Robinson]

Fired up the grill for the first time since Sunday's pork butt, which was great by the way, so I could brown some already cooked chicken breasts.

Anyway, lit the gas for direct heating and thought I would use the same side as the pork butt was cooked on since it seemed to be already greased. Lit the burner and closed the lid to warm the grill and when I opened it a few minutes later the whole deflector plate was on fire.

Turned the flame out on that side and lit the other side to brown the chicken.

There was no damage done, that I have found anyway, but it gave me a shock since I wasn't expecting a forest fire.

Does this kind of thing happen in a WSM also?

 

[Guest]

Just an opionion, but "greased" seems to be a key word. Sounds like some drippings got down into the flame area and flared up. Nothing too uncommon about that, just have to watch it.

Am I to assume you cooked a pork butt on a gas grill? That must have been interesting...how'd it go?

 

[Kevin Taylor]

Cy...

What you experienced is "pork fat aflame"! The reason is....pork butt renders about half of its weight, much in the form of fat. So you had a large pool of fat laying somewhere in your gasser.

Next time, you need to put your drip/water pan UNDERNEATH the pork butt. I failed to make that clear in my set-up instructions..very sorry.

There should be some way to clean out your drippings pan.

 

[gary merrill (merrill)]

Hi Cy, Most flare ups on a gas grill are caused by a build up of grease on the bottom of your grill. When you grill a pork butt you should use a drip pan to collect the grease. If your still having problems with flare ups,take eveything out of your grill and turn your grill on for about 10 minutes.Then clean out the bottom of the grill.Put everything back in the grill and your ready to cook. HAPPY BBQ

 

[Mike Chavez]

In the WSM you have a pan between the cooking grate and the coals. So I can't see anything like that happening with the WSM. Never happened to me anyway. Now I have herd of it happening with a BGE. /infopop/emoticons/icon_rolleyes.gif

 

[Rob B.]

No flare-ups with a WSM due to the design. Also, your gas grill shouldn't be damaged, it's made for the heat.

 

[Cy Robinson]

Thanks to all who responded to my self imposed problem.
Yes, Gary F, I did and it was. Temps ranged from 300*+ to 199*. The average was 259* so that wasn't too bad. The resulting pulled pork was fantastic. May not have won the Royal but I was impressed, since this was my 1st attempt. Took 11 hours for the cook. Butt weight was 6.7 lbs.

Stogie, don't be sorry. I should have figured it out for myself. Problem is that the heat deflector plate is shaped like a roof. In the center, running left to right over both burners, is the peak which is probably less than an inch below the grates. When I make a drip pan out of foil it gets crunched in the middle and slopes down on both front and back. T /infopop/emoticons/icon_rolleyes.gif hey are rarely deep enough to hold the drippings. I did have the factory drip pan in place underneath the cooking chamber but evidently the grease just soaked into whatever is underneath the burners.

Thanks to you, Gary Merrill. The deflectoer plate is held in by two screws with a funny opening for a tool. Thought it was an allen wrench but it isn't. Need to go to a Coleman dealer and see if I can get the right tool. Then I will remove everything from the inside and clean it out completely.

Thanks to Mike and Rob B. for releaving my mind about the WSM.

Had another interesting episode with my auto-flame broil grill. Last evening I was making a salad for dinner and needed to roast a red bell pepper. So I went out and fired up both sides of the grill, put the pepper in and closed the lid. Went back in the house and a little while later noticed clouds of black smoke pouring out of the grill. Sure enough the whole grease side was on fire again. PTL I didn't have steaks on to cook because the pepper was covered with black soot. Took the pepper out and lit the side burner and roasted the pepper out side of the enclosed grill. Looks like I'm going to have to get it apart for a cleaning before I can cook on it.

Think I'll wait for my WSM before I do another pork butt. /infopop/emoticons/icon_smile.gif

 

[gary merrill (merrill)]

Hi Cy.Just a little helpfull hint on your gas grill to help prevent flare ups.Preheat your grill
for atleast 5-10minutes befor grilling. When you are done grilling leave your grill on 5-10 minutes. This will help burn off someof the grease.HAPPY BBQ