BFletcher
TVWBB Platinum Member
Over Easter weekend I did a ham and turkey on the SF. It was a frustrating cook; my third party thermo reported the grate temp was dropping and never recovered. So I employed human intervention and made matters worse. A flameout occurred because I was fiddling and then the patio looked like a locomotive was taking off and I couldn't see to pull-off the food for several minutes.
Days later I fired-up the SF again and the thermo was still reporting a low temp by a huge delta. At that point, I started with the basics and placed that probe and another in boiling water and discovered the probe was faulty.
The next weekend I did another smoke and--Gosh darn--I had another flameout. This time the pellets in the hopper looked odd (most of you may have rightfully stopped reading this by now). I tapped on the hopper and a huge pile of pellets sank toward the bottom near the auger entry. I wasn't relieved because I have a guard on my grilling table, so I didn't know where to go from there in terms of a remedy. Short story long, that guard was from the original SF that I returned; I never removed the guard from this second unit. So then I was encouraged again
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Now to the reason for this thread. Shelley was oot over the weekend for a rabbit show, so I took a half day vacation on Friday and started with a Ribeye for a late lunch. I've always done steaks on a high heat grill but wanted to experience smoking one as low as I could go for a couple hours and then hit the Q 100 with for a sear. Here are those pics and I finally used the upper rack that Lew and Bruno talk about (though I only have the stock grate):
I prefer a more defined crust but a medium doneness took priority over crust (I was born and raised in a household where well done is good, so more well done must be better and my precious wife also lives by that thought):
I'm glad to have experienced smoking a steak and it was good but I don't think I need future steaks to have that smoky taste in the future. For my taste buds a nice char broil fits perfectly.
On Saturday I did some St. Louis ribs. I bought a rack that was coated with a chipotle sauce because they were on sale. I smoked it right but wish I had added Montgomery Inn Sauce and they were also too salty. But I love Brussel sprouts, so at least those were tasty. And looking at the pic I see that I added a dab of mashed potatoes to my pepper:
Then Sunday evening the wife was home so I threw-on a couple Tri-tips. Here they are on the Q for the sear after smoking on the SF:
And pulled. Once again, I didn't get the crust that I prefer but they were good and came from Wild Fork:
So this weekend on the SF it worked without any issues (and apparently the only prior issue was pellet bridging). But while troubleshooting it I placed two probes on the grate and so now I know the left side runs relatively significantly hotter than the right side (at least at the point where my probes were placed) and it bugs me even though I've never had any negative cooking results when I didn't know about that, lol.
And one of Katie and me hanging out:
Thanks for enduring this short story!
Days later I fired-up the SF again and the thermo was still reporting a low temp by a huge delta. At that point, I started with the basics and placed that probe and another in boiling water and discovered the probe was faulty.
The next weekend I did another smoke and--Gosh darn--I had another flameout. This time the pellets in the hopper looked odd (most of you may have rightfully stopped reading this by now). I tapped on the hopper and a huge pile of pellets sank toward the bottom near the auger entry. I wasn't relieved because I have a guard on my grilling table, so I didn't know where to go from there in terms of a remedy. Short story long, that guard was from the original SF that I returned; I never removed the guard from this second unit. So then I was encouraged again
.Now to the reason for this thread. Shelley was oot over the weekend for a rabbit show, so I took a half day vacation on Friday and started with a Ribeye for a late lunch. I've always done steaks on a high heat grill but wanted to experience smoking one as low as I could go for a couple hours and then hit the Q 100 with for a sear. Here are those pics and I finally used the upper rack that Lew and Bruno talk about (though I only have the stock grate):
I prefer a more defined crust but a medium doneness took priority over crust (I was born and raised in a household where well done is good, so more well done must be better and my precious wife also lives by that thought):
I'm glad to have experienced smoking a steak and it was good but I don't think I need future steaks to have that smoky taste in the future. For my taste buds a nice char broil fits perfectly.
On Saturday I did some St. Louis ribs. I bought a rack that was coated with a chipotle sauce because they were on sale. I smoked it right but wish I had added Montgomery Inn Sauce and they were also too salty. But I love Brussel sprouts, so at least those were tasty. And looking at the pic I see that I added a dab of mashed potatoes to my pepper:
Then Sunday evening the wife was home so I threw-on a couple Tri-tips. Here they are on the Q for the sear after smoking on the SF:
And pulled. Once again, I didn't get the crust that I prefer but they were good and came from Wild Fork:
So this weekend on the SF it worked without any issues (and apparently the only prior issue was pellet bridging). But while troubleshooting it I placed two probes on the grate and so now I know the left side runs relatively significantly hotter than the right side (at least at the point where my probes were placed) and it bugs me even though I've never had any negative cooking results when I didn't know about that, lol.
And one of Katie and me hanging out:
Thanks for enduring this short story!
