Lesson learned- check those vents

[Guest]

I tryed the sugar rubbed salmon recipe for my fourth smoke with an empty water pan. I thought I was getting pretty good at temperature control but the temperature was running 50 degrees hotter than I expected. This was with all the bottom vents closed (I thought) The salmon was done in an hour(internal temp 160) rather then the 2 hours I anticipated. The next day when I was cleaning out the cooker I found one of the bottom vents was half opened! The salmon was still wonderful since it didn't depend on the additional time for tenderness. Just the right amount of smoke, nice outer texture and moist inside. Two things I learned
1) the WSM is a very tolerent cooer
2) Double check those vent settings- in some situations it could make the difference beteen exceptional and ordinary.

 

[Randy Parr]

Harry,

I've had the opposite problem. Went to open the vent, the temp kept going down, later found that the ashes had been blocking the vent openings...

 

[Dennis Fraley]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Randy Parr:
[qb] Harry,

I've had the opposite problem. Went to open the vent, the temp kept going down, later found that the ashes had been blocking the vent openings... [/qb] <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>WOW, You must have had a lot of ashes in there to get high enough to clog the vents!