Maiden Voyage


 
B

B Williams

TVWBB Member
I ordered a Weber Smokey Mountain smoker last week. It arrived today. I knew it was coming, so I was anxious to get off work all day...then I remembered, dentist appointment.

That got me home about 1 1/2 hours later than I had anticipated....but I would not be deterred. It was a snap to assemble, 14 nuts and screws later, I have my very own black R2D2. I fired it w/ 10# of charcoal and 1/2 full charcoal chimney. Once it hit 190, I choked off 1 of 3 vents. 220, #2 got closed down. Once it hit 250, I've been tweaking down #3 looking for the sweet spot.

I'm just cooking a few chickens, so I don't mind if it starts to run a little hot, won't hurt the chickens any. For the first time, I put the squabs in a brine, so I am cooking them naked with some cherry wood. We'll see how they taste.

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All our home charcoal cookers...
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a Brinkmann Smoke'n Pit, the WSM, a Thermos brand grill and on the end our old Kettle.
 
The bird turned out great Jim.

by "a few birds" really meant 1 whole bird and 6 chicken quarters. Everything turned out very tasty for being 'naked.'

I must say I love how it cooks. Once I havd it settled in at 250, I didn't have to muck with it at all...it just worked. I can't wait to do some butts and chuckies.

Here's my lone whole chicken (I was pretty hungry and many of the quarters didn't make it to picture time)
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Looks great. I had a Brinkmann like yours, it's a HUGE difference in fuel consumption and tending compared to the WSM.
 
No kidding. I cooked for about 4 hours and when I shut it down, it still had a good bed of coals left in the chamber. On .the S'nP, the 10#'s I started with would have been enough to get it heated up. Well, not quite that bad, but close.

I built a small smoker for my lake cabin out of an old compressor and LP tank. It works so well and heats so evenly, I started finding running the S'nP to be a chore.
 
B, Welcome and great post. Your homemade looks good to me. It's rare that we get to see such a clean and shinny WSM, course that won't last long.

Many happy smokin' days to ya.

Mark
 
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