Brinkman

Bought a ProCook 10 inch Ham/Salmon/Beef knife, a couple of weeks ago for slicing a ham I was going to be smoking and thought it was going to be rubbish compared to my previous Mercer, see picture, which had become more like a Stiletto than a carver! Anyway I'm here to say that having used it for the first time, in anger, today I have been very pleasantly surprised indeed. For a very reasonable £12.00 pounds, no not a joke, it has, without doubt, proven to be, as good as my way more expensive Mercer! OK maybe it wont last as long but hey, I'm not as young as I once was so not a major issue. The other item was a boning knife from Lidl, yes who'd have thought it! This little beauty cost me just £2.48 on sale and is proving to be a superb buy! Yes I know what you are thinking but for £2.48 if I have to sharpen it every time I use it then it was still worth the money.?

I'm with you! Any fish, with bones, just doesn't do it for me, I think it was my dad's love of kippers that put me off! Bones, tiny thin ones that became enormous once you put that bit of fish in your mouth! That stalwart of the East Coast, Rock Eel or any of the other names it swims under is fine by me, just one central back bone and its meaty as hell, even Salmon and Trout are OK when smoked but as for Bass, Bream, Plaice, Dover Sole or Mackerel! Don't even get me started on Herrings and Pilchards.?

I just bought a bunch of spare probes for my Maverick ET-733 units from this company via Amazon https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B073QP2LYD/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1 They have just gone up in price, I wonder if that was my fault for ordering six at one time? Anyway for anybody needing spare probes for Maverick - Ivation - iGrill - Grilleye and Cappec units I thought these were very good value at £9.99 incl p&p and are still good at the new price of £11.99 Unless you know a better price!?

No problem, I've been using them for some time and found most of the stuff available very good price wise. I'm not one for ready made rubs and don't care overly for wet rubs either so have no idea if theirs are good or otherwise! But some of their recipes have been of real interest and with a few tweaks here and there have proven to be very tasty. As an 'offset' fan it would be good if we could find equipment easily as well as food items but that seems impossible at a reasonable cost! However, I've found I've had to become adept at working around things like cost, and after the DIY fire box, I went for DIY tuning plates which have been a roaring, no pun intended, success, giving me an overall temp difference within the cooking chamber of 5 degree's as opposed to the original 30 degree's across the cooking chamber when I first used it! Combine with some 'Lavarock Gasket' around the chamber door and I'm moving towards being happy with the unit as opposed to being very very disappointed with my purchase!?

I'm a big fan of chipotle flakes in place of the basic chilli powder and there is nothing wrong with a bit of ground coriander in any way shape or form. When doing beef I've recently started adding a little coco powder to my rub which seems to add a real depth of flavour that I never thought I needed! But you know, its horses for courses and its not for everyone! As I type I'm doing a rack of St Louis Ribs and I'm using a Dundee Marmalade with a touch of Bourbon as the final glaze! Orange seems to go with pork, well to my palate it does! Not sure about anybody else though.?

A 1/4 cup paprika. Use Hot if not using chilli powder or Sweet if preferred. Two tablespoons of demerara sugar Two tablespoons coarse sea salt Two tablespoons of garlic powder One tablespoon fresh ground black pepper One tablespoon of chilli powder Or less if you wanna keep your lips! One or two tablespoons of beetroot powder. Which adds a really nice colour when smoking I've found it works well as a general Pork Rub for most diners who like it 'spicey' but if they don't, then leave out the chilli as the pepper and paprika will give it a gentle heat anyway.

Is the @twitter address not of use as a chat room of sorts? Its live and anything of a more private nature would be DM'd ?

Fantastic. Well the beads are on order, the meat is in the freezer and I have nothing but time and patience so 15 minutes extra to prepare the briquettes is not going to be an issue, hell, the ones I've been using have been burning away within that time frame! Thanks for all the info, much appreciated.

Had no idea what I had been doing was called the minion method! See, I learn something every single hour never mind each day. Would this work with heatbeads? I've read that they can be difficult to light? Is that the case? If it is, then how would that work in relation to keeping a constant temperature over a long cook? Would I need to place wood chunks every now and then within the line and would the heat created from the chunk be sufficient to ignite the next heatbead in the line? Or would you stack them say two or three deep to ensure enough heat to ensure constant combustion? Or am I over complicating things?

You know she is not a massive fan of Pork or ribs, no matter how well cooked, and they tend to illicit, at best, 'yeah their ok'. Beef! Well I've only done one joint and that ended up in the mincer to be added to, what turned out to be, a very nice chilli! Now if I do a butterflied leg of Lamb on the other hand! Then I'm a bit of a hero and any fish grilled and to a lesser degree smoked, is always a winner. The other week I happened to be in Tesco when their chiller went down due to the hot weather and they had to get rid of all their chickens! They were selling three large fresh chickens for a fiver!! How can you say no to that? So I bought twelve and she came in to find me smoking the lot! Well why not I said? She decided I had gone too far and stormed off, but when they all then got broken down and vacuum packed so she could have em in salads and sarnies! Then my friend, I was not viewed as so daft!! But hey, its my hobby not hers, she just suffers, sometimes in silence but mainly she just tolerates my madness.?

Not too loud please, she may hear you...

Absolutely have the fire basket on a grate, grate is turned around so its a little higher than normal to allow for ash to drop down into the ash pan. Have learnt to use much less wood and many more briquettes over the great weather we have been enjoying and I recently decided to try soaking the chosen wood for a couple of hours prior to use so that on the longer cooks they take way longer to burn and thus give off smoke over a longer period. The wife thought I was completely mad the other week when she walked out to find a mini fan sitting blowing air into the firebox to try and combat a very strong blow back due to cross winds? I truly believe she would prefer to see me down the pub instead of staring at a fire!?

It was a case of have to rather than wanted to I'm afraid! Never welded anything in my life before but having been quoted outrageous amounts to buy and ship from the States decided to borrow the welding gear from a relative who gave me a few lessons before attempting it. Made a few errors on the first attempt but who the hell is gonna climb into the fire to check for them! Angle grinders can hide a multitude of sins right! Anyway I've since worked out a way of doing the same thing without the need to weld at all and it works out at just a fraction of the price so if you are interested in a rough and ready version that does the same job it'll be perfect, just not as pretty.?

Oklahoma Joe Highland. I made a box to hold the coal/logs out of 6mm expanded steel 24x24 inches. I found that unless I used a box, logs, coal and or ash fell in front of the air inlet damper and choked the fire! Bit of a design fault in my opinion! Or maybe I'm just overloading or loading it wrong! Anyway it now seems to work ok but I will try the heat beads, as and when they arrive, with and without the box to see what difference, if any, the box makes. If they produce way less ash residue then that would solve one issue and if the box is not needed it will make a nice log store!?

HotSmoked.co.uk currently selling 2x10kg for £32.00 inc p&p

Just used HotSmoked.co.uk for two 10kg bags. Total costing of £32.00 inc P&P

?Terrific. Confirms what I thought was the case, tends to be cut and sold as steaks. All I need to do now is convince my supplier to sell it to me as a big joint and not a 14oz steak! Though less profit in it for him I imagine so it wont be easy. Thanks for the info..

Thanks Wade great information. I've found, from my short amount of experience, that it can be hit and miss with supermarket charcoal and as for some of the suppliers I've used for 'restaurant grade' lump wood! Well least said soonest mended. At the moment I've got a medium brisket, 6lb, to cook so dependent on weather conditions and so on expect to be cooking that low & slow for a minimum of 7hrs at 225f ish. Heatbeads seem to be the way to go and I've found a company, HotSmoked.co.uk doing a 10kg bag at £17.75 with free PP on a £30 spend so going to go for two bags and give them a try. One other question, can I assume that you need to use a chimney to preheat new coal when the initial beads have burnt low? I've read they are difficult to light or will they catch just by adding them a couple at a time to the firebox? I appreciate that the temp will dip if I do it that way but its worth asking. Think that covers everything! Oh I'm cooking on a European Oklahoma Joe Highland. All the very best Chris

Two trucks, overtaking each other on a hill! It sounds just like the A14 anywhere between the M1 and M11?

Well that confirms what I've seen and heard elsewhere so it'll be Heat Beads for me and no mistake. Could be just that I've been unlucky and got a bad batch of normal charcoal briquettes! As I say I'm using them only to ignite the lump wood now but will be ordering the Aussie stuff in time for doing a big brisket cook, overnight, how scary will that be? I did leave a message re meat suppliers on one of the other topics, hope the info is of some use. Have a good weekend.

My last pork butt was from 'Hook & Block' Not had any issues with their meat and price wise it was fair and delivery prompt, well I thought so. Just recently smoked some of their pork ribs, again very good and have a medium brisket and a leg of lamb sitting in the freezer also from them. If I want better quality, is it though? I tend to buy from 'Turner & George' at Smithfield! Again never had any issues with them and they tend to be able to supply TriTip! even if it is a little on the mean size, 14oz What is the equivalent to tri-tip in the UK? Any butchers out there tell me? I've a feeling we sell it as steaks of some kind! Maybe thats why some steaks tend to be tough? Profit over quality!

For sure its a steep learning curve and the disasters do tend to knock you back a little, but man alive, when you get a perfect smoke with a good bark and a nice smoke ring then suddenly its all worth it! Including the outrageous cost of the equipment and the meat? The first full rack of St Louis Ribs I did on this offset went better than I ever imagined and I thought ' hey this aint so hard' what are those Yanks going on about? The next cook I thought, lets do what is called a 'bottom rump' in the States and here? Well the closest I could get was a big slab of Silverside! Not exactly right but the best I could do. Many many hours later it was way to smokey, my fault, should have not used all wood and wrapped it, and bordering on bitter but it looked fantastic when cutting into it! Needless to say it went into the mincer and worked great as a mix with some minced pork for a chilli! Even though it was over a 100f that day? Once I'd got my head around the concept of 'is it tender' instead of 'is it cooked yet' things have settled down and as I say I'll either go with the Beads first and the Coconut briquettes after and see how they work out? If there is one thing I have its patience! I may run out of money first, but I do have patience.? Oh and a Maverick dual temp probe, more money, that helps big time with getting temps right! have a good day my man..

Been BBQing for ages but more a case of chicken, burgers and sausages and mainly on a gas unit! Decided to take a leap and try a proper offset smoker. Had a couple of good results with racks of ribs but seem to have picked up a really poor batch of charcoal and its making smoking harder than it needs to be so intend to try some Beads or Coconut briquettes PDQ but hey, its a learning curve just trying to sort the cuts of meat out in the UK let alone find the right gear to smoke it with! I'll take a look at the calendar and see if we cant sneak along for the September meet, it would be good to see what others are doing. The offset I bought is a European version of the Oklahoma Joe units and after a whole bunch of sealing and DIYing of a firebox grate and baffle plate system I've got it working fairly well with a good overall temp across the cooking chamber, maybe 5 degree's difference or so, all I've got to do now is sort those briquettes so I can get consistent heat long enough to do a medium sized brisket or pork butt!

Cheers Icefever Hoping to learn learn learn. This offset stuff is way more difficult than I thought, well if you want to get it right anyway!,

Hi New to both smoking and this forum so if this has been asked before I apologise. Are or would heat beads be ok to use in an offset or are they only for specific types of BBQ like ceramic? Having a nightmare at the moment with a batch of briquettes I bought from a high street store, they burn through within 20mins, so am using them just in a chimney to place on top of some lump wood which I wont be using again either, restaurant quality its not, well not unless they cook with semi dust lump wood!