smoker grill

[Dozernut]

bmac
Thanks for the link! That is a neat site and I am going to check them out!

 

[BB_TX]

Moon - His is a <font color="blue"> New Braunfels </font> smoker. It is made of heavy guage steel, has the separate fire box, and does have a thermometer built in. Their web site does not indicate where you might get one. Looks like the closest Academy Sports to you is in Tennessee.

 

[wroughtn_harv]

I've made and repaired a couple different kinds of smokers.

I made a really good smoker for fish per a friend's instructions for him. We used an old refrigerator with a bottom motor compartment. We removed the motor etc and put in an electric skillet. We cut in a hole in the bottom of the fridge and put in a smokestack with flue at the top.

He'd put in wood chips soaked in water in the skillet. They'd smoke. The fish were placed on the racks.

Few things taste better than smoked fish done right. His was salmon and trout that had been soaked in a brine before smoking.

The New Braunfels type smokers I'm more familiar with. Mostly because they're common here in Texas and I get calls to repair them. The biggest problems with them is hot spots and rust out. I'm making one right now and using quarter inch wall pipe just because I know that it takes as much to repair grandpa's smoker as it would to replace it.

If you buy one of the commercial brands part of your routine for using should include wiping out any moisture when done and never allowing them to be in the weather where water can get inside and be allowed to sit. The papa acids in the smoke join mama rust and do nasty things where your food is being prepared.

The biggest mistake I see in the construction of these smokers is making the firebox too big for the size of the cooking unit. A big firebox encourages a big fire and a big fire will burn food at the firebox end in a minute.

If you want to improve your smoker consider putting water in the cooking chamber. Some of the old timers who used real heavy pipe liked to just have water sitting on the bottom. But the best system for getting moisture into the cooking chamber involved a vessel full of water over the firebox with a pipe running into the cooking chamber. Inside the cooking chamber the pipe had slits not unlike one would do for burning propane or natural gas. Steam comes out of the pipe and gets into the cooking process.

The biggest downside of this is the meat will fall off the bone. People know you've done the chicken right if when they grab a drumstick the meat finds their lap before it can get from the plate to their mouth.

And if you're going to only cook meat in your smoker it's like you only use your tractor for mowing while you have a FEL. Few things taste better than a big sweet onion wrapped in foil cooked in a smoker with butter and brown sugar in the onion. The same goes for cabbage.

 

[BB_TX]

<font color="blue"> A big firebox encourages a big fire </font>
I found that out pretty quickly. I had to keep the firebox damper completely closed to keep the temp around 200. The NB instructions say to start the fire, then wait 2 hrs before starting cooking so that you are cooking more with coals than from flames. But being in a hurry, I did not wait that long.
I did get 2 large aluminum foil roasting pans and put in the bottom of the cooking chamber and filled with water to keep the humidity level up and catch the drippings. Overall the results were very good and should improve with practice.

 

[Bird]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( Few things taste better than smoked fish done right )</font>

You sure got that right, Harv. I've lost the recipe I got from Alaska many years ago for a brine to soak the salmon in before smoking it, so I don't remember the measurements, but it was water, lots of salt, lemon juice, brown sugar, and worcestershire sauce. I've smoked quite a variety of fish including salmon, red drum, black drum, sheepshead, and shark, and while smoked salmon is hard to beat, and I liked them all, my favorite was shark steaks. I also used the same brine before smoking oysters laid out on aluminum foil with holes poked in it with a fork; mighty tasty snacks on crackers. And I just used an old Cookin' Cajun water smoker with charcoal and hickory chips.

 

[HickoryNut]

Catfish smokes up good too, I use a cup of kosher salt and a cup of brown sugar per gallon of water to brine with. Do not use iodized salt because the osmosis process will draw all the iodine into the meat and taste nasty. I also brine poultry before smoking. The chemical reaction that occurs with brining is quite technical but in a nutshell it helps keep anything you might smoke moist.

 

[BB_TX]

Bird - Is <font color="blue"> this one </font> any thing like it? Sounds good. I have never tried such but may have to.

Or <font color="blue"> this one </font> may be closer since you mentioned water.

 

[EastTexFrank]

I bought mine at the Texas State Fair over 10 years ago. It was made by a company called Chuckwaggon Cookers out of New Braunfels, Texas. It's a heavy, heavy booger. One good man (me) can roll it around on a hard flat surface but it takes a FEL or forklift to pick it up. It's too much trouble to roll out for just a couple of hamburgers but, man oh man, does it do a good job on smoking meat. I can't remember how much it cost but whatever it was, it was worth it. It's given my wife and I, as well as family and friends, a lot of pleasure over the years. We still fire it up 3 or 4 times a year and smoke about 50 pounds of meat in a session. My wife does all the preparation work, trimming, rubs and stuff. Me? ... I guard the fire with beer in hand and mop the meat occasionally. It's a great way to spend a day, especially with friends, and you have something great to eat at the end of it. Magic.

 

[Bird]

Bill, both of those recipes have a lot more ingredients in them that what I had, but the procedure described is the same.

 

[sassafraspete]

One of my "drool" catalogs is Cabelas, and I always take a gander at the electric smokers in there...like the cookshack and also they have one in there called a "bradley". I am wondering if anyone has tried the Bradley? It has a hopper for these pressed wood bisquettes and feeds one in every 20 minutes. Gimmick or cool? By bro-in-law has an older dome shaped electric smoker and I've been impressed with some of the hams and turkeys he has smoked. They are especially moist. I think these electric ones that you can do the long cool smoke on, with minimum intervention, really do have a place....even with the die hard wood fired smoker fans. I for one, would like to have one.

Now, with all the fish talk....making me hungry for smoked salmon.... I am wondering if anyone has done fish jerkey? Somehow, that just doesn't sound as good as the smoked salmon does. Not too many sharks in Indiana Bird. I'm a bluegill maniac myself....but never tried to smoke any. Does the fish have to be oily to do better?