1st Smoke Finally

[Josh H]

Well after what seemed like an eternity (a week), I finally got my WSM on Friday. I was going to cook a brisket for my first cook, but I didn't get the brisket de-thawed in time. So I ran to the supermarket Saturday morning and got two 3.5-4.0 lbs chickens. I cooked one beer butt style, and the other butterflied. The prep and setup could not have been easier thanks to this site, btw.

After much anticipation and excitement (i.e. driving my wife crazy), I fired up the WSM using the standard method. I pretty much followed the cooking techniques listed on this site for "Chicken on a Throne" and "Chicken! Chicken!" as closely as possible (minus the marinating). The results were great. I cooked them for a total of four hours. Both were moist and had a great smokey flavor (used hickory and pecan). I think the butterflied chicken would have been more moist if I had brined/marinated it instead of just using rub, but I didn't receive any complaints.

The only real "issue" I had, was temp control. I was hoping to keep the temp around 240*. Instead, I was usually fighting it to keep it around 220*. My Weber Chimney is not coming in until today, so I bought a cheapo chimney starter to use in the meantime. I'm guessing a full lit chimney + 2/3s full must be significantly less than the equivalent of the Weber? Whenver the temp would start to drop fast, I noticed there wasn't very much charcoal left. (using Kingsford btw) At the two hour mark, I added another chimney full. This seemed to help a little, to at least finish the cook, but even then it was a struggle.

So would you all agree lack of fuel was probably my problem? How full should the WSM be for a 4 hour cook? Would it be safer to fill it all the way up, and use the Minion method, then try to salvage any unused charcoal after the cook? I am wanting to try that brisket, but am a little apprehensive of fighting temps for that much of an extended period of time.

Thanks in advance for any advice regarding this, and thanks for all the advice I've already received via this site and forum.

--Josh

 

[Jason M. Park]

A standard Weber chimney will hold about 6 lbs. of charcoal. I had one of those cheaper ones for YEARS, and as soon as I got a Weber I could tell right away that the Weber was A) quite a bit larger B) better designed C) lights the fuel faster and D) will last longer.

Chances are you didn't have enough fuel due to the smaller size of the chimney. The "standard method" for firing the WSM uses 12 lbs. of charcoal and should last long enough for chicken and ribs. Don't bother with the Minion Method unless you are planing on cooking something for 10+ hours like brisket or pork butt. After all, that's what it was intended for.

 

[Ken Nelson]

I've found it easier to load up with plenty of fuel at the start rather than to estimate how much will be needed and meter out only enough for that cook. My goal has never been to have the fuel supply exhasuted at the same time the food is finished.

For a relatively short cook, fill the ring half to two-thirds full and dump a chimney of hot coals over that. (The size of your chimney won't matter. Naturally, the more hot coals you begin with, the quicker the temperature will come up. With a smaller chimney, it will just take longer to get enough coals burning.) Assemble the bullet and open all the vents until the temperature approaches your target. Put the meat on and close the vents by about half. Monitor the temperature periodically, making small adjustments to the vents as neeeded. Be patient. It may take 5-10 minutes for a change in the vent settings to take effect. Once the temperature has stabilized, you can basically forget about making adjustments for a few hours. The coals are going to burn only as fast as the oxygen supply will allow.

When the cook is finished, close all the vents. The coals will be snuffed out within an hour or so and ready for the next cook after the dead ashes have been knocked off them.

Have fun and don't sweat that long cook for the brisket. With a full charge of fuel, the bullet will do most of the work for you.

Ken

 

[Guest]

Hmmm... I've never tried starting with less than 2 full chimneys so I just did a little test with no meat.

I've got my old Grill Care Chimney, filled it, dumped it, and counted - it holds about 75 Kingsford briquets. I don't have a Weber Chimney, yet, so I can't provide a briquet count for it. But, I'd be surprized if the Weber was more than 25% bigger.

I put the coals back in the chimney, started it, and when all coals were completely white, I dumped it into the center of the charcoal ring. I pulled back any scattered coals so it was all a nice little hill.

I then assembled the smoker and added 1 gallon of cool water. I setup my ET73 with the Smoker probe on the top grate. I set the lower vents at 50% and the dome vent full open. Outside temp was 74*F and with a nice breeze.

The internal temps quickly shot up to 277*F and then slowly settled down to around 250*F for about an hour. Then it gradually started down until, after about 2 hours total, it was about 204*F.

With your extra 2/3's of a chimney, you should have gotten a little longer burn, but, in general, it does seem that more fuel is needed for a 4 hour cook, starting with the Standard method.

Starting with at least 2 full chimney's of lit coals might do it but you may need to choke down the lower vents at first to get the temps under control.

 

[Doug D]

Have to agree with Ken to some degree-- I light one chimney and then add another of unlit on top and wait until they start to gray over. Two heaping Weber chimneys pretty much fill the WSM charcoal ring. You can always reign back too much charcoal by really dialing down the bottom vents. What you cannot do is make too little charcoal burn hotter than it will with the bottom vents 100% open-- and opening the access door to do so is only a temporary measure. The cost of charcoal compared to the frustration of dealing with too little charcoal burning is really a no-brainer-- you can always use leftovers next cook.

 

[Josh H]

Thanks for the replies everyone, and for doing the test Travis. I'm going to give some babybacks a shot this Saturday using the advice given. Assuming that goes well, I'll probably go ahead and give that brisket a shot on Sunday.

Thanks again,
Josh