Boy what a fun filled day! Started the WSM at 12 noon for 2 racks of spares. 5 1/2 hours later out come 2 great racks of ribs. I used Real flavor lump and some oak chips. Average Temp was 225. I can not wait to sauce these ribs!
I have done some research and discovered that perhaps This Treager need some adjustment. I feel it is running too cold in the smoke mode and will not reach temps over 350 in high. In the medium mode temp is 290. Thats only a 60 degree difference between med and high. Seem too close for me. This being said I started The ribs at 3 in medium and they finished at 7. I have no idea what the temps in the ribs were, both sets (WSM & Treager) had pulled down the bone and passed the tear test. I used my rib racks in the WSM (Thanks to this site I decided on Charbroil racks for right now) and simply laid the full racks bone side down on the Treager. There was a little overlap but I was sure That would change as the racks cooked. Again they looked great, but I feel they would be better at a lower temp. I would absolutly get the added temp control for myself.
The quality of the Q coming from both the WSM and the Treager is far better than anything I have seen for the home user. Both are easy to use. I gotta tell ya, loading the hopper and pushing the ON switch sure makes life easy.
The WSM is more portable, fire it up in the park or beach and you are on your way. The fact that it puts out high quality Q for such a low price speaks of its great design. The least expensive Treager has a MSRP $599 before you start adding goodies.
Treager says on its web site it has improved its outer surface for 2004. This was one thing that bothered me. I realize the unit I am using has a lot of cooking hours on it but for $599 I would expect outside rust to never be a problem. So far on this web site the only part of the WSM that I have read about rusting are the charcoal bowl grill and the cooking grills after a while. The warranty provided by Weber shows how much faith they have in their product. Fewer moving parts in the WSM means more good Q for less repair money over the long haul. I would also suggest NEVER use the Treager in the rain, eletricity and water are not a good combo.
If I had to choose between a Treager and a high end Gasser IMHO I would want the Treager. Produces much better flavor than gas. I wish this one would go to a higher temp, I would like to see what kind of grill marks it makes. Any thoughts out there?
