j biesinger
TVWBB Platinum Member
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Once a meat starts to sweat and the "pores" open it allows a migration path for your rub or mop or sauce or whatever to be absorbed into the meat. Liquid doesn't always go one way, It's usually a two way street and yes water can run uphill, that's how it goes up between the lip of a container and the lid you thought was water proof and gets the interior wet or if you are into white water canoeing think of eddies in the rapids. They flow upstream all the time. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
this was posted by Kevin and is relevant to this discussion:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> Smoke is made up of particulates of various sizes and volatile gasses. The particulates are easily adsorbed, i.e., they stick to things fairly easily. Particulates do not absorb very easily into fairly dense objects (like meat) - especially when the heating of the object (like meat) is pushing moisture out. This is simple physics.
I recall some well known barbecue guy or another making the case for smoke absorption many years ago on one of the cbbqa pages - replete with diagrams and whatnot - about how cells (like those in meat) in the presence of various things (gasses, particulates, whatever) will 'seek' balance, as it were, i.e., the gasses surrounding the meat in the presence of the meat will seek penetration - to balance things out, sort of like how brining works. Though it sounds plausible prima facie, it does not make sense, not in the scenarios in which the vast majority of barbecuers cook. Unlike cooking in a vacuum (like sous vide), or immersion (like brining), barbecuing (grilling, etc.) is cooking in a draft. Volatiles - being, well, volatile - zip up and out with the draft forthwith. With nothing to contain them - to 'hold' them around the meat, there is no opportunity nor need for 'balance'. Physics. This dynamic may be different in some situations that most of us would not create: for example, slow smoking a country ham, say, in a very low draft, low temp smoking house, for a significant period of time (like many days), might set up a scenario where actual absorption of volatiles is possible (but not, likely, particulates) because of the contained nature of the space and the relatively copious amount of smoke.
</div></BLOCKQUOTE>
from the same thread, also posted by Kevin.
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> quote:
We generally accept that spice flavors can be pulled into meat right?
Um, no we don't. Not if you're talking rubbing ahead of time, or just rubbing in general. What flavors might get 'pulled' into meat are fairly immaterial. Now, flavor-brining, that's a different scenario. But it takes time to be very effective.
What people say about ground meat, etc., I'm not concerned with. People say a lot of things, Jerry's point for this thread in the first place.
Sure, it's due to surface area. Smoke flavor is made up of hundreds of different chemical combinations and particulates. Volatilization of smoke along with tiny particulates carry the smoke hither and yon and it sticks to various things (including inside your nose, which is why many Qers talk about the differences between smoking then eating the meat immediately vs. eating it the next day, when smoke has been more removed from the body, clothing, etc.). The aroma (or odor, as the case may be) is so permeating that concentration and source are virtually indistinguishable to the human nose. And smoke concentrated on a surface of food makes in impossible to tell that it's only on the food's surface. Smoke aroma/odor continues to volatilize for some time.
That the smoke seems to be right in the meat/cheese/whatever doesn't mean it is. Again, given enough time - plenty of time - and given the necessary porosity, and given the needed more closed environment, it's possible that some elements of smoke penetrate meat. But we generally do not smoke very long (even butts) and the environmental conditions do not support claims of 'penetration'. It's possible that traces of this and that in smoke might get pulled into the meat during the post-cook resting/cooling phase, but this would be fairly negligible and in no way near the elements on the surface and those that volatilize in the air.
</div></BLOCKQUOTE>
HTH
this was posted by Kevin and is relevant to this discussion:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> Smoke is made up of particulates of various sizes and volatile gasses. The particulates are easily adsorbed, i.e., they stick to things fairly easily. Particulates do not absorb very easily into fairly dense objects (like meat) - especially when the heating of the object (like meat) is pushing moisture out. This is simple physics.
I recall some well known barbecue guy or another making the case for smoke absorption many years ago on one of the cbbqa pages - replete with diagrams and whatnot - about how cells (like those in meat) in the presence of various things (gasses, particulates, whatever) will 'seek' balance, as it were, i.e., the gasses surrounding the meat in the presence of the meat will seek penetration - to balance things out, sort of like how brining works. Though it sounds plausible prima facie, it does not make sense, not in the scenarios in which the vast majority of barbecuers cook. Unlike cooking in a vacuum (like sous vide), or immersion (like brining), barbecuing (grilling, etc.) is cooking in a draft. Volatiles - being, well, volatile - zip up and out with the draft forthwith. With nothing to contain them - to 'hold' them around the meat, there is no opportunity nor need for 'balance'. Physics. This dynamic may be different in some situations that most of us would not create: for example, slow smoking a country ham, say, in a very low draft, low temp smoking house, for a significant period of time (like many days), might set up a scenario where actual absorption of volatiles is possible (but not, likely, particulates) because of the contained nature of the space and the relatively copious amount of smoke.
</div></BLOCKQUOTE>
from the same thread, also posted by Kevin.
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> quote:
We generally accept that spice flavors can be pulled into meat right?
Um, no we don't. Not if you're talking rubbing ahead of time, or just rubbing in general. What flavors might get 'pulled' into meat are fairly immaterial. Now, flavor-brining, that's a different scenario. But it takes time to be very effective.
What people say about ground meat, etc., I'm not concerned with. People say a lot of things, Jerry's point for this thread in the first place.
Sure, it's due to surface area. Smoke flavor is made up of hundreds of different chemical combinations and particulates. Volatilization of smoke along with tiny particulates carry the smoke hither and yon and it sticks to various things (including inside your nose, which is why many Qers talk about the differences between smoking then eating the meat immediately vs. eating it the next day, when smoke has been more removed from the body, clothing, etc.). The aroma (or odor, as the case may be) is so permeating that concentration and source are virtually indistinguishable to the human nose. And smoke concentrated on a surface of food makes in impossible to tell that it's only on the food's surface. Smoke aroma/odor continues to volatilize for some time.
That the smoke seems to be right in the meat/cheese/whatever doesn't mean it is. Again, given enough time - plenty of time - and given the necessary porosity, and given the needed more closed environment, it's possible that some elements of smoke penetrate meat. But we generally do not smoke very long (even butts) and the environmental conditions do not support claims of 'penetration'. It's possible that traces of this and that in smoke might get pulled into the meat during the post-cook resting/cooling phase, but this would be fairly negligible and in no way near the elements on the surface and those that volatilize in the air.
</div></BLOCKQUOTE>
HTH
