Thank you all for helping me make up my mind of purchasing the 22.5 wsm. My first cook was about 2 weeks ago now- sorry for the late report but I wanted to post pics and had to get up to speed on that.
I studied the site hard, learned about identifying the 2014 model- contacted Amazon to better my chances of getting an ’14. All went as planned and Amazon came through. They didn’t guarantee a ‘14 but, they did say they would exchange me if I got the ’13! Took the forums advise and got that captured in a chat transcript.
Luckily, I got the ’14 as I wanted on the first shot.
Unfortunately, my lid came with a blemish from the manufacturing process. Looked like a backward L near the thermometer and it had been coated over but, some of the enamel was chipping off the exterior. I first considered living with it and naming it “scar face” or something similar but, finally decided it irritated me enough to give weber a call. To my amazement- they kindly asked for a photo and shipped me a new one out overnight! Best of all, they said I didn’t have to put off my 1st cook. Just to use the bad one until the new one arrived to switch over the hardware! AWESOME customer service!
So here she is in the line up:
Supposed to run hot on the first couple of cooks per ya’all so I decided to embrace that. 1st cook will be some chicken breasts and pork loin. Went no water in the pan and planned to target 300F.
The night before I put some kickin’ chicken on the breasts and tried some A1 rub on the loin. No getting fancy makin’ the rub for the first one. (I was dead tired from work that day.) Threw them in the vacuum sealer and then in the fridge. Next afternoon we were ready to go!
I only needed fuel for a short cook so I followed the instruction manual. 150 briquettes…. Really? So only one lit chimney of kingsford blue went in. I actually let them burn a bit too long in the chimney and lost some I’m sure. In goes the meat. Loin on the bottom.
Breasts on top.
To my surprise, the temps were SO easy to control from 200F to 250F. However, 300F was NOT happening! Knowing I only had a short amount of time before the chicken would be done I panicked and shoveled about a full chimney of unlit royal oak lump in there.
I did this as I didn’t want to lose time waiting for a chimney to ignite, and since I had zero cooks ever with unlit fuel getting ignited by lit fuel while food was in the chamber, I decided if it did smoke bad perhaps lump would be better than briquettes.
It smoked bad. I think because I had all the vents open trying to get the temps up. At least only for about 15 mins until it was all ignited. I don’t really wanna talk about that…….. wasn’t happy at that point. However- I did achieve and hold 300F as I wanted.
Pulled the chicken after 2 hours from start. The loin roast was pulled at 145F and was left to rest.
As it is done here: your plate….
The left over chicken gets cut up
– then packaged and frozen to be used for future lunches to take to work. Makes for some mean chicken salads my friends!
Thanks for the help along the way so far and for the help to come!
I studied the site hard, learned about identifying the 2014 model- contacted Amazon to better my chances of getting an ’14. All went as planned and Amazon came through. They didn’t guarantee a ‘14 but, they did say they would exchange me if I got the ’13! Took the forums advise and got that captured in a chat transcript.
Luckily, I got the ’14 as I wanted on the first shot. Unfortunately, my lid came with a blemish from the manufacturing process. Looked like a backward L near the thermometer and it had been coated over but, some of the enamel was chipping off the exterior. I first considered living with it and naming it “scar face” or something similar but, finally decided it irritated me enough to give weber a call. To my amazement- they kindly asked for a photo and shipped me a new one out overnight! Best of all, they said I didn’t have to put off my 1st cook. Just to use the bad one until the new one arrived to switch over the hardware! AWESOME customer service!
So here she is in the line up:
Supposed to run hot on the first couple of cooks per ya’all so I decided to embrace that. 1st cook will be some chicken breasts and pork loin. Went no water in the pan and planned to target 300F.
The night before I put some kickin’ chicken on the breasts and tried some A1 rub on the loin. No getting fancy makin’ the rub for the first one. (I was dead tired from work that day.) Threw them in the vacuum sealer and then in the fridge. Next afternoon we were ready to go!
I only needed fuel for a short cook so I followed the instruction manual. 150 briquettes…. Really? So only one lit chimney of kingsford blue went in. I actually let them burn a bit too long in the chimney and lost some I’m sure. In goes the meat. Loin on the bottom.
Breasts on top.
To my surprise, the temps were SO easy to control from 200F to 250F. However, 300F was NOT happening! Knowing I only had a short amount of time before the chicken would be done I panicked and shoveled about a full chimney of unlit royal oak lump in there.
I did this as I didn’t want to lose time waiting for a chimney to ignite, and since I had zero cooks ever with unlit fuel getting ignited by lit fuel while food was in the chamber, I decided if it did smoke bad perhaps lump would be better than briquettes.
It smoked bad. I think because I had all the vents open trying to get the temps up. At least only for about 15 mins until it was all ignited. I don’t really wanna talk about that…….. wasn’t happy at that point. However- I did achieve and hold 300F as I wanted.
Pulled the chicken after 2 hours from start. The loin roast was pulled at 145F and was left to rest.
As it is done here: your plate….
The left over chicken gets cut up
– then packaged and frozen to be used for future lunches to take to work. Makes for some mean chicken salads my friends!
Thanks for the help along the way so far and for the help to come!
