When to Put The Meat ON


 
M

Matt-M

New member
How long after you start the fire by say the Minion method do you put your meat on. I have hard some say immediately and others say you wait until the temp has stabilized at your target. Is there nay disadvantage one way or the other? I typically put the meat on right after the hot coals are dumped on the fire ring.

Mals
 
Matt-M said:
How long after you start the fire by say the Minion method do you put your meat on. I have hard some say immediately and others say you wait until the temp has stabilized at your target. Is there nay disadvantage one way or the other? I typically put the meat on right after the hot coals are dumped on the fire ring.

Mals
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I’ve only done a handful of cooks so far since purchasing in May but what seems to work best for me for minion method is waiting until my temp is up around where I want it. For me that takes about 45 -60 minutes lighting 12 briquettes and seems to allow time for all the heavy white smoke to stop and get that thin blue smoke. Now if I’m doing chicken wings at high temps I throw it on immediately since I’m not using a much fuel in the chamber and don’t want to waste it heating up, plus standard method wide open heats up ridiculously fast regardless. I’m sure more experienced smokers may have something different to say.
 
I let the coals burn and heavily smoke in the chimney for a bit longer than usual -- maybe 20 minutes. I also put one wood chunk in the chimney to get that going from the outset as well.

Then I dump and put the meat on immediately. Figuring that most of the bad smoke has already gone up in the chimney.

My thinking is that I want the cooker stabilized as soon as possible. Adding many pounds of raw meat drags the temps down. So does heating up the water.

So the cooker won't really get to "stable" until after the meat has been on for a while and after the water (if you are using water) has heated up. So I just get on with it.
 
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Yea I also go immediately. Waiting for the temp to come up to whatever, quickly diminishes once you lift the lid and add a cold heat sink like a big ole cut of meat. Seems counterproductive to the Minion Method, no?
Now I have read some like a clean burning fire before they add meat, and that goes back to your choice of fuel and smokewood used.
Personally I do what works for me and you should to. Experiment, know your cooker and what you like, once you get the hang of it ,you'll figure it out.:)
 
I'm still a newbie, but I wait until the temps stabilize. I have been using water every cook (except one, and that was a bust) and it takes a bit to heat the water up, even if I start with warm/hot water.
 
I have always put the meat on as son as I dump my lit coals on the unlit. Thought being that if I wait to get up to temp, then open the smoker and add 7lb, 8lb,10lb of cold meat (depending on what you're smoking) it's just gonna throw the temp out of whack anyway. I'm a bit different as I like to use about 1/2 a chimney of lit coals to get the smoker up to temp, not 10 or 12 coals. I dump the lit coals on top of unlit and leave all 3 vents wide open until I'm about 20° below my target temp. At that point I close 2 of the 3 bottom vents all the way, and the 3rd vent I close about 90%. For me , on my smoker, this kills the rapid temp increase and levels the temp almost exactly where I want it. From the time I dump the lit coals, put my meat on the smoker, and get the smoker put together, to the time I hit my target temp of +\-265° it usually takes about 30 minutes....
Hope this helps,
Tim
 
Taken From one of my favorite BBQ Books and I quote: "When the thermometer reads 290 to 300 degrees at the lid-it will be about 20 degrees less than that at the grate- I load both grates with the meat I want to BBQ. Adding the meat will soon drop the cooking temperature another 30 to 40 degrees-which is why I want the initial temperature at the lid to be pushing 300 Degrees"End of quote.

I mostly use the top rack of my WSM, so, I modified the above instruction on placing the meat on the grill when the lid-temperature reads around 280F.

The above system works A-OK on my WSM 18" Classic that I bought new in the year 2008 which is the same year that I bought the above book. This book is now out-of-print.
 
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I see no point in waiting. Get the LIT and UNLIT charcoal in there as you want it to be, put the meat on the cooking grate, with temp probes, and close the WSM up. The meat will be fine as the cooker comes up to temp. No?

You won't need to open it again for quite some time - just watch your remote temp read-outs and monitor the intake and exhaust vents to maintain your desired temp.

Without water in the pan, and using lump charcoal, I can maintain about 325º for two hours in my WSM 14.5 and then will begin to drop in a bit of new fuel. This is, of course, when wanting to use a hot and fast approach.
 
I set up the smoker, while the initial coals are started in the chimney, once the coals stop smoking and are about 75% ashed over they go into the prepared "hole" of the charcoal base, over a chunk or branch and the smoker is assembled and the meat goes on....done....
 
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