Advice needed: Ribs using 22 Inch kettle plus charcoal baskets


 
JayHeyl said:
Considering I hit 200F with about four or five briquettes burning at a time, and temperatures well over 400F are readily attainable without huge charcoal loads, I still consider 300F a moderate temperature you may have trouble maintaining by air flow control alone. That's why I suggested a method of controlling the amount of fuel burning rather than using air flow to try to control the burn rate of the entire fuel load.
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Minion Minion Minion!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 8))
 
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Get your hands on a slow and sear. Get a deluxe if you can. Put it in the kettle. Put the reservoir in the SnS. Put a fire starter in the corner and light about 10 briquettes. Fill the reservoir. Fill the SnS with charcoal. Set the intake at approximately 1/3 and the exhaust at approximately half. This will get you 275°F or so. Increase your intake and exhaust to sneak up on 325-350°F.
 
B.A. Poole said:
Get your hands on a slow and sear. Get a deluxe if you can. Put it in the kettle. Put the reservoir in the SnS. Put a fire starter in the corner and light about 10 briquettes. Fill the reservoir. Fill the SnS with charcoal. Set the intake at approximately 1/3 and the exhaust at approximately half. This will get you 275°F or so. Increase your intake and exhaust to sneak up on 325-350°F.
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Delux and Sns????
 
I use my performer as a smoker.
It took a little practice but I can comfortably control the temp for all of my needs.
I like to stay at 225 to set the smoke and then go up to 250-275 later for like a pork butt more for ribs.
300-350 is easy too.
I use a slow n sear.
Before I got that I used the snake method.
I haven’t used the standard baskets for smoking.
They work fine for my grilling plate and other quick cooks though.

For me in my area I have to choke down the vents if the wind is up.
To get 225 I open both to 25% +/- depending.
To get into the 325 range I’m about at 40% open.
When starting a smoke my vents are wide open until I’m at 75% of the temp I need and then I choke it down to where I think I need to be and it creeps up to it.

I have made marks on my bottom vents to help dial it in.
On the top vent when I was learning it I used different sized long bolts to set the vent opening kinda like using a #2 pencil for a setback but I used different sized long bolts instead since the pencil size was a bit small for my needs.
I don’t use them now because I just kinda know the spots but it did help at first.

Hope this helps.
 
I smoke on the kettle all the time too, however I always run the top vent wide open.
Takes one thing out of the equation, but keeps you from running much below the 250 mark.
There is nothing in my eyes that needs to be smoked below 250, maybe pork belly burnt ends or something odd like that you don't eat all the time but standard meals don't need below 250.
So 250 is bottom vent just barely a crack open for myself where I live.
I also run the SNS basket, lots of room for many things still......if you are cooking 6 hours or less it will not need to be topped up at all during your cook unless you are going super hot.
I take a lot out of the cook and keep it simple........did some thighs last night, came out perfect.

Basically what is said in the post above goes a long ways, we all have our tricks we like to use but I would bet it always turns out good.

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Darryl - swazies said:
There is nothing in my eyes that needs to be smoked below 250, maybe pork belly burnt ends or something odd like that you don't eat all the time but standard meals don't need below 250.
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"Standard meals" is rather in the mouth of the consumer. I've cold smoked a number of items, such as cheese and pork loin Canadian bacon. The Canadian bacon I then go on to hot smoke but at a very low temperature, 200F last time I did it. I'll generally target 225F as a starting temp for Boston butt. I followed an award-winning brisket recipe one time that said to start at 175F for several hours.
 
Yeah I get the special stuff fellas, homemade bacon, jerky........stuff like that. I have made it but don't make these items much anymore. Most cuts of beef, pork and chicken for meal time was where I was going with that.
 
tjkoko said:
@JayHeyl and @TonyUK I 'm uncertain if there's a misunderstanding with my OP. I appreciate both your comments but my original post stated temperatures around 300-325F which imho isn't low and slow that I take to mean 200-250F.
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Two full baskets open vents down below half ways adjust top vent it can get your 300° I’ve done it
 
tjkoko said:
I'm experienced using the WSM but not the 22 inch Kettle and so here goes. I would like to cook a rack or two of pork ribs in the kettle using the charcoal baskets, at a temperature of about 300-325F so they're done in about 90 minutes (or maybe in a bit more time). What would be the method of using the charcoal baskets: all charcoals fully or partially lit. I get the feeling that the vents will be at least half closed. I am totally cornfused and in the dark here.

Or should I simply skip the baskets and instead spread out unlit briquettes on one side of the kettle topped with approx 30 lit briquettes as shown here ?????
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There is a guy on Youtube by the handle of "KettlePitmasterBBQ" He set up a site on using the vents to control temperature as well as the amounts of lit to unlit charcoal to achieve and maintain a given temperature for a set amount of time.

What I have done in the past is fill the baskets to just full, leaving one corner open. I then light about 20 briquets in the chimney and put 10 lit into each basket in those corners. With top and bottom vents open half way, I adjust up or down to get the temp I want, starting with the top vent and waiting 20 minutes to stabilize.

FYI my lid also has a gasket on it, so not sure if that would make a difference or not.
 
tjkoko said:
One corner open????????
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As in a pocket in the corner of the charcoal basket. Because they are shaped like a crescent, I usually pick one end of the baskets to drop the hot coals down into. Similar to the minion method but on a smaller scale for each individual basket. That way the unlit coals slowly light and work their way horizontally like the snake method instead of the ash falling down through, but at the same time more condensed and directed than the snake setup.

With the baskets I've had them choke themselves off when I piled the lit coals directly on top. Ive had better luck with this method. Did I explain it well enough this time around?

Edit: If need be I can try and get a picture to explain, though I have my porch tied up with a wood project right now.
 
Brock Gingery said:
As in a pocket in the corner of the charcoal basket. Because they are shaped like a crescent, I usually pick one end of the baskets to drop the hot coals down into. Similar to the minion method but on a smaller scale for each individual basket. That way the unlit coals slowly light and work their way horizontally like the snake method instead of the ash falling down through, but at the same time more condensed and directed than the snake setup.

With the baskets I've had them choke themselves off when I piled the lit coals directly on top. Ive had better luck with this method. Did I explain it well enough this time around?

Edit: If need be I can try and get a picture to explain, though I have my porch tied up with a wood project right now.
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Photo(s) would help greatly.
 
tjkoko said:
I'm patient.
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Here you go, I took a picture from two different angles so hopefully you can see what I am referring to by leaving a "Pocket" open in the corner. This is where I drop in the lit coals. Just enough room for 5 or 6 lit coals to be dropped in with some tongs.

Kind of like a "mini" minion.
 

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