How much wood to use for smoking


 
E

Ed Williams

New member
I am going to be smoking 1 whole chicken, a 5lb eye of round roast beef, and a 4lb Butterball turkey breast for cold cuts to be served on Super Bowl Sunday. My question is how much wood should I use to smoke?

I have a 22.5 WSM, and have used it twice. It seems like I use too much smoke. I will be using apple and hickory wood for the smoke. Any help that you can provide would be great. Thanks
 
How much were you using the first 2 times? Chunks or chips? I buy those small bags of chunks or chips and they last me for quite a few smokes. Also, make sure your exhaust on the WSM is wide open.
 
I'd use no more than 3 small wood chunks. Apple or some other mild wood. Poultry is easy to oversmoke
 
Hmm.... It's difficult to say as wood is a seasoning and everyone's taste is different. BUT personally, I find wood smoke on chicken to be disgusting, I like moderate smoke flavor on turkey and heavy smoke on pork and beef (so I normally don't
Mix different meats on a smoke).

But, I would suggest wood chunks and 4oz or less if you've found that you didn't like he flavor in he past. Be careful with wood flavor, too much can turn people off in a hurry.
 
I call it the ashtray effect = too much smoke. We've all done it...especially early on. I thought if the cooker wasn't smokin I needed to add more wood. That was then. Now, for poultry I use one MAYBE two chunk(s) of apple. For beef I use three or four chunks of hickory or oak. Less is more in my mind.
 
Hi Ed and welcome to the forum - While you will get a lot of discussion on this subject, your best bet is to stick with the old phrase "Less is more". That applies to seasoning as well as smoke wood. Go light the first few times and you can increase your wood later to suit your taste. In most cases you will find that a fist sized, small to medium chunk will be sufficient. Too much wood smoke will make your meat bitter. Good luck. Bob
 
People can suggest all they want, but you have to find out for your taste and those that you are cooking for. I heard people use none other than the lump, and some load up as that is the taste they are looking for. I always suggest start with a couple chunks and keep a BBQ journal and then next time use one more chunk and so forth.
 
How do the competition cooks that use the stick fired cookers control their smoke? Wouldn't that be smoke the entire time? Just curious as I've seen that and often wondered.
 
I wish back in the day when I starteed smoking meat I knew about this forum. Yeap...Less is more and I figured this out the hard way. I like fruit wood for poultry and hickory for Beef. I never use Mesquite and I'm in Mesquite country. Suggest you add a lot less wood then you think you will need. Good luck and most of all, enjoy!
 
I have no problems using 5-6 chunks of wood (fruit: cherry, apple OR maple) for a cook. If I'm cooking a bird, I use 3-4 chunks. If I'm using oak or hickory, I go at little bit lighter with the wood.

When I cook beef or pork shoulder, I give it all of the wood it can handle (usually 6 chunks). I pre-burn my wood in the charcoal chimney before I add everything to the WSM. That way, I get a really clean burn and good flavor out of the wood(s). I don't like adding chunks to my fire because the smoke is very thick and gray (even with seasoned wood). That is the reason I light them up beforehand.
 
Bill Farmer said:
People can suggest all they want, but you have to find out for your taste and those that you are cooking for. I heard people use none other than the lump, and some load up as that is the taste they are looking for. I always suggest start with a couple chunks and keep a BBQ journal and then next time use one more chunk and so forth.
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This^^^^^. I happened to like smoke chicken breasts over fairly heavy smoke for about
2 hours on the wsm. Ribs, I think, seem to lose some of the smoke flavor from the foiling in the
3-2-1 methods. I typically use three tennis ball (oak & hickory) sizes for a rib cook with the top of the wood just peaking up from the unlit charcoal with 2-3 small pieces of apple and cherry on top before the lit is placed on top. I never add any more but next cook I will add some on ribs for the last hour glaze to test it out......................d
 
Let the newbie smokers know the difference between chunks and chips in the responses since chips are more of what they may see a grocery store.
 
Thats true Carlos...My chunks are like a fist..then split in 2 and i still refer them as a chunk. For fatty fish i use more then on other meats(cooking time wise) if i use chips witch i do sometimes since i have a few bags of em,i grab a fist for any chunk i would use.(if that makes sense)
 
I have been pleasantly surprised by the wood chunks selection at Walmart and menards They are both starting to stock for spring and both have had a huge selection of wood chunks and chips.
 
Matt Gard said:
I have been pleasantly surprised by the wood chunks selection at Walmart and menards They are both starting to stock for spring and both have had a huge selection of wood chunks and chips.
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Thanks for the tip I never would have even considered looking at Walmart for wood. I'll have to check it out this weekend and see what the got.
 
I just got bags of cherry and oak and hickory chunks. They also had mesquite chunks as well as several bags of different types of chips at Walmart.
 
I use apple and hickory as well.

I think for that smoke I'd probably throw in 2-3 chunks of apple with all the meat, then when you pull out the poultry throw in a chunk or two of hickory to get a stronger smoke on the beef. Or alternately, start the smoke with the hickory and only the beef in the smoker, then when the smoke stops put the poultry in and toss on the apple.
 
Less is more. When I cook wings or a whole bird I just add some Hickory Chips sprinkled along the top of the charcoal in the baskets for indirect heat. They normally last for about a half hour which me and my wife find to be just right. But as everyone has said before it is all personal preference.
 
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