Brown Residue Inside Smoker


 
M

Mark Wilkerson

New member
The other day I was smoking ribs. Late in the cooking process I tossed a few small wood chunks on the coals below. My thought was that it would give the meat a little extra kiss of flavor & it did. I noticed a couple of days later when I went to clean the grill that there was a baked on brown residue that coated the entire inside of the smoker. It looked liked dried brown paint. I used a garden hose with soap & water to clean it but it was stubborn. I've been smoking for years & have never experienced this occurrence before. Was the wood chips late in the cooking process that possibly caused this?
 
I get that residue every time I cook, and I always add smoke wood at the beginning. Not sure why you've never experienced it before. It's quite common. When it begins to get flaky, I wash it off, otherwise I leave it.

Regards,
Chris
 
Thanks Chris. I am new to cooking on the WSM & wanted clarification to determine if I had done something incorrect. This had not occurred on any of the previous cooks. Moving forward I will not be concerned about the build up.
 
Yup, what Chris said. My guess is you just never noticed it before. I've not ever washed the inside of my WSM, just knock on the outside of it when the cook is over and it's still hot, to knock of any real loose particles. Same with the lid, when it's hot, I just bonk it on the ground a couple times to knock of any undesirables.
 
Hit the underside of yer lid every two or three cooks with balled up foil to knock off flakes and keep them from building up! I almost never clean the rest of my WSM with the exception being the grates of course.
 
I've noticed the residue, but it hadn't gotten bad until I smoked some bacon tonight. What are the flakes and are they hazardous to eat? Some fell on my bacon. I'll know to clean them off in the future, but after a year and a half of using the WSM whatever it is has finally built up enough to be a nuisance. If they're hazardous I'll rinse the bacon, but I hate to do that.
 
It's hard to notice that stuff in the dome lid, especially with the limited daylight this time of year, but I get it in all my grills. Grab a plastic putty knife the next time you're in a hardware store and you can knock it off without hurting the enamel.
 
dean said:
Hit the underside of yer lid every two or three cooks with balled up foil to knock off flakes and keep them from building up! I almost never clean the rest of my WSM with the exception being the grates of course.
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exactly what I do........works great!!! :wsm:
 
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