I had bought a bag of off-brand charcoal at Kroger's because it was on sale for something like $2.99 for a 15 lb bag. This was bought the same weekend my WSM 18.5" was delivered, but before I started reading about the differences in the quality and burn rate of charcoal brands. After doing the requisite reading on this board, I realized (as a "noob") I should be using Kingsford. But now I had this 15 lb bag of X-brand. What to do???
So I figured why waste it when it will work perfectly as "starter" briquettes in my chimney (Minion). Since the x-brand charcoal is basically the WSM equivalent of "kindling", I see no need to "waste" a pound or two of the expensive Kingsford just to get the heat/smoke going. Does anybody else do this? Is there any reason why I shouldn't? I've done four smokes so far and have not experienced any problems getting the heat up using the cheap stuff on top of KB. By the time the meat goes on, the cheap briquettes are nothing but ashes.
Is there any down-side to this?
So I figured why waste it when it will work perfectly as "starter" briquettes in my chimney (Minion). Since the x-brand charcoal is basically the WSM equivalent of "kindling", I see no need to "waste" a pound or two of the expensive Kingsford just to get the heat/smoke going. Does anybody else do this? Is there any reason why I shouldn't? I've done four smokes so far and have not experienced any problems getting the heat up using the cheap stuff on top of KB. By the time the meat goes on, the cheap briquettes are nothing but ashes.
Is there any down-side to this?
