Got my new 22" WSM on Tuesday, already smoked some chicken on it, and did some ribs today: 2 racks of loin back, and 2 sets of spare ribs.
I started with 3/4 of a charcoal chamber's worth of Kingsford, 3 chunks of apple, and 1 chunk of oak. The smoke was started by dumping on 30 lit coals from a chimney starter. For this smoke, I actually used water in the water pan - about 1/2 gallon.
Here are the readings from my thermometer:
Time Lid Top Bottom Vents
20 180 150 133 100
30 200 160 148 100
45 225 170 165 to 50
60 230 189 172 50
75 235 195 175 50
90 240 201 177 50
120 243 226 191 50
150 250 240 203 to 25
180 250 230 209 25
210 252 257 213 25
240 255 256 218 25
270 254 256 220 25
I used some wire to attach the temp probes directly to the grates, and so the readings were probably off some due to the cooler meat being on them.
Here is a pic of the ribs going on:
Smoker:
The ribs are done:
A couple of views of the finished product after being glazed with some BBQ sauce:
What happened is that the loin back ribs were REALLY thick - as a result, the spare ribs were overcooked. Not bad, but a valuable lesson was learned for the next time.
The trimmed pieces from the spare ribs were chopped up and added to the beans - that worked out really good.
Overall, I couldn't be happier with the smoker though. It help the temperature super steady, and that's all you can ask for. I've got all the vents shut down, and I'll try to post tomorrow how much unburnt charcoal is left.
I started with 3/4 of a charcoal chamber's worth of Kingsford, 3 chunks of apple, and 1 chunk of oak. The smoke was started by dumping on 30 lit coals from a chimney starter. For this smoke, I actually used water in the water pan - about 1/2 gallon.
Here are the readings from my thermometer:
Time Lid Top Bottom Vents
20 180 150 133 100
30 200 160 148 100
45 225 170 165 to 50
60 230 189 172 50
75 235 195 175 50
90 240 201 177 50
120 243 226 191 50
150 250 240 203 to 25
180 250 230 209 25
210 252 257 213 25
240 255 256 218 25
270 254 256 220 25
I used some wire to attach the temp probes directly to the grates, and so the readings were probably off some due to the cooler meat being on them.
Here is a pic of the ribs going on:
Smoker:
The ribs are done:
A couple of views of the finished product after being glazed with some BBQ sauce:
What happened is that the loin back ribs were REALLY thick - as a result, the spare ribs were overcooked. Not bad, but a valuable lesson was learned for the next time.
The trimmed pieces from the spare ribs were chopped up and added to the beans - that worked out really good.
Overall, I couldn't be happier with the smoker though. It help the temperature super steady, and that's all you can ask for. I've got all the vents shut down, and I'll try to post tomorrow how much unburnt charcoal is left.
