How much charcoal


 

John Neuser

TVWBB Fan
Good morning. I'll be smoking about 10#s of bacon on Wednesday in my WSM 22". I intend to run the smoker no hotter that 170* until internal temp is around 150-155*. I'll be cutting the belly into quarters. My question is how much KBB charcoal should I light? I'm thinking 2 Weber chimneys full should do it. Of course, I can always add more if necessary. Any thoughts. Thank you.
 
Sure try it. If you light two Weber chimneys full you'll be at 600°.

Or perhaps you meant something different.

To go that low you're going to have to use a snake method or something if you don't have a controller I think.

Don't smoke your bacon to 150-155. That's too high. You will melt your bacon away.

First, it's already cured if it's bacon, there is no safety issue with needing to pasteurize it. Taking it to a high temperature is already not necessary.

Second, when you smoke at a low temperature your temperature increases slower and it will be pasteurized at a lower temperature. This is because pasteurization occurs as time and temperature. I usually stop by 135-140, but I start looking at time after I get higher than 130. 30 minutes after you hit 130 is sufficient to pasteurize your pork just look at the charts.

Here's some actual numbers

145 F for 3 minutes gives 5 log reduction
140 F for 9 minutes
137 F for 18 minutes
135 F for 36 minutes

This is why the current pork cook reccomendation by USDA is 145 f with a 3-minute rest. It used to be 150-155 instant , but that was too high and dried out your pork. At about 150 your muscle fibers shrink and expel liquid from the meat. Just cook slower.... Lower temperature... And to a lower temperature to have juicier meat.
 
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I use a modified Jaben Postal recipe and it hasn’t let me down.
I just tweaked it a bit to suit my taste.
Oh my bad, I now see that you said wsm.
I don’t think it makes a difference though.
Good luck on your cook.
 
I usually try to cook it to 140 internal, but Martin is right that you can stop even lower. Technically if it's cured you could flat out cold smoke it and not necessarily cook it, but pasteurizing it is playing it ultra safe. I usually use the snake method in my 22.5 WSM to smoke that low. I usually do a do a row of two side by side for maybe 10 briquettes and then stack to more on top of those for maybe another 10. Those will increase your temp to around 180. I've done this in addition to trying to use my Signals but the Signals isn't that helpful in all honesty at that temp or I always manage to screw something up with it and wind up tweaking the vents myself. My last cook the thing actually locked up on me for the first time.
 
Here's a thread I posted where I cooked some. This shows my snake method. It might need to be longer depending on the weather you have.

 
Thanks everybody. Snake method it is. Never used it. Looking forward to giving it a shot. I imagine that with the snake method I would not need to use my ATC. Just the meat probe.
 
Thanks everybody. Snake method it is. Never used it. Looking forward to giving it a shot. I imagine that with the snake method I would not need to use my ATC. Just the meat probe.
And with an ATC you don't need to use the snake method.

I just light about 1/4 -1/3 chimney, spread it out on top and let my controller handle it. I will run as low as 130 , bumping it up to 150 , 160, as the temperature rises to keep smoke time. I have a servo damper on my blower so I can shut off the air completely, and even control the air flow with only the damper if no blower is needed. Usually i limit blower speed and damper at the very low temperatures,
 
So here's the autopsy of my bacon cook. In my opinion, it turned out ok. In my wife's opinion, of turned out great. Who's arguing? Not me.

Next time I'll make a little more rub. Ran just a little short. Second, I'd add a little more salt to the rub. I hind sight, salt and pepper are cheap so if you make a little to much use it on something else or throw it out.

Snake method: wasn't happy with it. My bad. I used a line of double briquettes. Should have been three maybe even four. The problem, I think, is that the 22 is a big smoker and it takes a lot to get it up to temperature. I struggled with it until can added half a chimney of lit. Next time, I'll use a "fatter" snake or go back to a pile of charcoal and use the atc.

Thank for all of you comments and suggestions.
 
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So here's the autopsy of my bacon cook. In my opinion, it turned out ok. In my wife's opinion, of turned out great. Who's arguing? Not me.

Next time I'll make a little more rub. Ran just a little short. Second, I'd add a little more salt to the rub. I hind sight, salt and pepper are cheap so if you make a little to much use it on something else or throw it out.

Snake method: wasn't happy with it. My bad. I used a line of double briquettes. Should have been three maybe even four. The problem, I think, is that the 22 is a big smoker and it takes a lot to get it up to temperature. I struggled with it until can added half a chimney of lit. Next time, I'll use a "fatter" snake or go back to a pile of charcoal and use the atc.

Thank for all of you comments and suggestions.

The size of the snake kind of depends on the ambient temp. Last time I did that kind of cook it was pretty warm. I did have to double up on charcoal during cold weather. I apologize for not thinking about that. I've also got gaskets and a cajun bandit door. Since I do have an signals/billows I think I'm going to try that with minion method next, like MartinB suggested. He seems to have a heatermeter setup with a damper which may give him a lot more control.
 
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Thanks Dustin. Yeah, it's all good. Next time I'll use my Digi Q and more charcoal. I stress way to much on this but I've never smoked anything that wasn't at least pretty good. Some stuff outstanding. Rock on. Keep smoking.
 

 

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