Minion method question


 
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DeeC.

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Hi everyone,

I will be using my WSM tonight to cook four pork butts for a large crowd tomorrow. I'm planning to use the Minion method to do these. This will be my first time ever to use the Minion method, so I would like to ask some folks experienced with this some questions.

With a full load of charcoal, how long of a burn time can I expect to get with this method? Low temp tonight where I live is about 30 degrees with light winds expected. I'm sure this will be a factor.

I noticed on TVWB site it says to use 30 to 40 lit briquettes for colder weather conditions. I thought I would split the difference and use 35.

Also, does the water pan affect burn times with this method? I have the original water pan and also a Brinkman replacement pan. Which pan would be best to use and would it be best to use it with water or without? The panless Minion method area of TVWB had me asking these questions.

Thanks for any help.
 
hiya DeeC , last week i did three large butts and went with and empty waterpan because of the outside temps and winds . you should get at least a 6-8 hr cook depending on the winds . the butts i did were for slicing not pulled so my cook was only aprox 14 hrs . hope everything goes well for you . reg
 
If you block the wind you can get 14 to 18 hours of cook time, I suggest using water in the waterpan since this is your first time trying this cook. Don't worry if you have to add charcoal it is not a badge of shame. /infopop/emoticons/icon_wink.gif
Use the brinkman pan that gives you more time for sleep, make sure it full when you go to bed and check it first thing when you get up.
You may need to lightly stir the coals in the morning to get back up to the temp you want.
Have a good time
Jim
 
Thanks for the advice. I'll post tommorow and give my results. /infopop/emoticons/icon_smile.gif
 
Hi everyone,

I used the Minion method for the first time Saturday night and cooked four butts. Here are the results:

I loaded the charcoal ring of the WSM at 5:15 p.m. with Kingsford charcoal. I fired up 35 briquettes in my Weber charcoal chimney and scattered them on the unlit charcoal after about 25 minutes. Added smoke wood and assembled the cooker.

I then filled my Brinkman water pan just a little too much (I think) because I had a little water dripping off of the foil onto the coals in one spot.

I put the meat on straight out of the fridge(mistake number 2?) because I wanted to get a better smoke ring. I put one polder on top rack beside meat thru a potato. I put another polder in meat for internal temp (I know this was early, I just like to see how fast temps rise in all aspects).

The temp at rack slowly climbed to 190-195 and stayed there. All vents were open and no wind whatsoever. After about an hour and a half of this I propped open the access door with my charcoal chimney and temp finally came up to 230 after about 20 minutes.

Finally got everything cooking along smoothly. At 12:30 a.m., I filled the water pan and went to bed. Woke up at 3:00a.m., cooker temp was at 230 and everything was lovely. I went back to bed and woke up at 6:15 and checked again. Temp of cooker was at 210, so I gently stirred coals and added about half a chimney of raw charcoal, one piece at a time with tongs, so as not to stir up ash.

Temps then came up to 240-250. I left higher temps so I might get a little better bark on meat.
Pulled meat off at 9:15 a.m. with internal temps of all butts between 195-200 degrees.

My observations: The bbq was very good. It did seem to have more of a charcoal taste. Any ideas about this?

Also, there seemed to be a sort of creosote on the meat. Could that have been caused by the water getting on a little of the charcoal when I filled the pan? Or maybe the raw charcoal at 6:15?

The convenience of this method is VERY nice for these overnight cooks. I just feel like I did something wrong.

I don't mean to sound completely negative. All of my guests loved the food. They kept raving about how good it was.

I'm just trying to perfect my technique. Thanks, everyone, for your help.
 
I also had a problem with water leaking when using foil in the water pan. I guess the location of where I use the WSM isn't perfectly flat and has a very slight angle. So, the water would almost act like it was being siphoned through one of the seams where the pieces of foil were overlapping....and keep dripping steadily onto the coals. I quickly removed all the racks and the water pan, dumped out the water, ripped off the foil from around the pan and filled it back up with water and repalced the racks. I did have the water pretty full in the pan, but it wasn't even touching the top of the rim. But, somehow the angle was causing the water to flow through the seam in the foil and flow almost like a steady drip onto the coals like there was a hole in the pan.

This wasn't really a big deal because as soon as I am done with my smokers each time, I just soak the racks and water pan in a metal washtub with degreaser and hot water. Using a scouring pad, the crusty stuff come right off without much effort after they have been soaking for a couple hours.

I could have swore that the pan had a hole in it the way it was trickling onto the coals, just like a vacuum had formed and it was siphoning the water through the seam and down to the bottom of the pan under the foil, and then out onto the fire. Very peculiar indeed.
 
DeeC
Straight from the frig should not be a problem but keep in mind because of that the grate temp will measure low because of the temp of the meat.
As the meat temp rose the grate temp would have represented the true temp at the grate.
190-195? is on the low end of the BBQ range but it is in the range. By running the temp by opening the door in a way you defeated the purpose of taking the meat from the frig. You try to take 4 hours to get the internal to aprox 140?.
If you have a creosote flavor that would be from the wood rather than charcoal.
It maybe that you have less of a problem than you think you have. Living in Tenn I got to believe These folks have eat'n a little Q in their day, take their word for it, if they liked it they liked it. We can be too critical of ourself, we find a problem when others can't find one, but that's also how we get better. It sounds like it was a success, a few more of these cooks and you will be comfortable with the techinque.
Jim
 
On water dripping:

If any water runs under the foil covering the water the pan, the trapped steam will condense off the foil and run down the sides just like moisture dripping from the lid of a crock pot.

To cover large piece with foil, take two lengths of foil and place them on the counter, one on top of the other. Then, take one long edge and fold it several times, pressing flat with your finger. Now, unfold the two pieces of foil like the pages of a book and you will have a large double-wide piece of foil with an airtight seam down the middle.

On charcoal flavor:

To me, the smell of freshly lit charcoal briquet smoke is very distinctive and nasty. I don't know if it's some kind of additive in the outer layer of the briquets, but I really dislike the odor.

The couple of times I tried the Minion method, I noticed a faint hint of this same flavor in the cooked food. I really think that it comes from exposing the food to the smoke of just lit charcoal. I now sacrifice some burn time and make sure all my charcoal is fully lit before putting the food on.

Overuse of wood chips or chunks will also give it a "creosote-like" flavor -- particularly if you keep adding wood over many hours. I just use a little wood at the very beginning -- visible wood smoke for maybe 30 to 40 minutes -- and then stop.

On the Polder potato:

I haven't done any scientific tests so I may be wrong. But, I suspect this does not provide an accurate measurement for the first several hours. I think the exposure of half the probe to cold potato gives too low a reading until the potato is cooked totally through and stabilized at the cooker temperature. I know the probe is supposed to measure at the tip, but it is metal and the potato basically works like a very effective heat sink.
 
DeeC:
Charcoal taste;

I weigh in with Webb, my nose and throat tell me that I prefer not to cook this way. My perception also tells me that not everyone experiences this taste or smell. Which could explain the reason for you not thinking it was up to par, while your guests enjoyed the meal. This was the primary reason, I switched, and continue to use lump. One less thing to be concerned about.

Heating problems:

Since you increased the size of the water pan, from OEM, it will take some extra time and/or BTU to get the cooker up to running temp. I suggest you might try filling the pan up less than half-full, when first lighting the cooker off, then once up to speed, add hot water, to top it off. Just my thoughts, since I dont do overnighters, and have not changed my pan configuration.

Webb has some good thoughts on the polder/potato problem. I use a wine cork, through the probe. It seems to operate fine.
 
Thanks for the replies!

Rocky: You described exactly what happened with my water pan. Next time I will use with foil like Webb describes in the post above or not use any foil at all and scrub a little more after cooking.


Jim Minion: I never thought about the sheer coldness of four pork butts. I would have to agree that would have to make a thermometer inaccurate that is only a few inches away from a 35 degree piece of meat. Thanks for your help and kind words.

Webb: Thanks for the foil tip. I will definately use that one next time. I learn something here every day.

Jim Morrissey: Thanks also for your tip on the cork. I will give that a try too.

/infopop/emoticons/icon_smile.gif
 
Dee & Webb, what size foil are you using? Brian uses the wide foil in the WSM, no seams.
 
Raine, I use the standard width foil. I usually buy the double pack at Sam's Club. I've never been able to find find foil any wider. Where do you find the wide foil?
 
Brian uses the foil from SAM's Renyolds Wrap heavy duty, which should be fairly wide. You know at the grocery store there are the little short rolls, the the long rolls. The long/wider rolls is whatI am referring to. It is 18" wide as opposed to the 12".
Like the 37 1/2 foot roll.

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