Kentish Man

https://truebarbecue.com/recipes/beef-brisket/

I've got a thermopro https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B01GE77QT0/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o04_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 Inkbird seems to be well recommended on here too

The method I used was as follows: Pre-heated to c180c Grill rack on top of the deflector holder (but with no deflector) - i.e. grill at felt level Spatchcocked bird on grill bone side down Didn't open the lid again until the thermometer was reading 72c Flipped the chicken and opened up the daisy wheel for a quick blast to crisp the skin The chicken took about 1 hour to cook, maybe a little more.

Exactly the same as yours for low and slow I owe you one for posting that, I wouldn’t have thought to shut the vents down to that extent.

Ive used mine 4 times in the 10 days I’ve had it. 2x spatchcock chickens (direct heat, skin up until the end then flipped for a couple of mins) a lamb shoulder (beautifully cooked, bit too much fat, my error not trimming it sufficiently). a pork shoulder (best I’ve done, very pleased with it) overall, I’m chuffed with the Kamado. Very easy to get good results, with more practice I’ll get great results! The efficiency of this thing is astonishing. I did a low and slow on the lamb shoulder, lit a full bowl of lumpwood at 9am and smothered it at 5pm. Next day took a look and not much had burned, fire bowl still full, so gave it a stir and made sure air holes were clear of ash, then lit it again and ran it from 9:30am to 7pm on the same charcoal to do the pork. Astounding!

Wow - I would have assumed those vent settings would smother the fire and put it out altogether. Did it continue to hold its temperature? Interesting to see this as I’m planning a low and slow small lamb shoulder. Nothing like the size of meat you were cooking, expecting a 4 - 6 hour cook time if I can keep the temps down How long were you anticipating a 10lb pork shoulder would take?

Strange - seems like it should be enough to get hotter than that. The approach in the youtube clip looks good though! Maybe give that a go next time. I haven't tried to take mine up to a high temp yet, will report back when I do

When lighting it for a hot burn, did you light in more than one place? What did the charcoal look like post use, had it burned evenly?

Awesome thank you. I hadn’t thought about the order of what to put in and when, my approach the other day when doing a trial run was to get the fire established (a couple of mins) and then put the heat deflector and racks in, closed the lid with the vents open. I choked down as the temp got up towards what I was after. Sounds like this is what you’d recommend? Good shout to aim for 100C and then adjust on the top vent. Does that mean you’d have the daisy wheel almost closed, stabilise at 100 and then open the daisy wheel a little to go higher?

I've got a half lamb shoulder in the freezer that I'm going to stick on the kamado later this week. I forget it's exact weight, but it's around 1kg, so relatively small, and bone in. I thought this would be a good one to test my skills at keeping the temp down on the Kamado given I'm new to it, and given the weight, I guess should only take 4 - 6 hours or so? The advice i'm after is as follows......(but all advice welcome): 1) How long should I allow for the meat to cook? It'll be for the family dinner, so 6pm ish. Stick it on mid-morning to give plenty of time? Better to have extra resting time than it not hit temp in time? 2) I've seen on various websites the technique of wrapping the meat in foil after a set period of time to avoid the meat drying out. Is that something I should do? Any basting required, or just stick it in and leave it?! 3) I'm planning to go for around 110c - 120c depending on my ability to control the temp!! Does that sound about right? I'll place the meat on the rack with a drip tray below on the heat deflector. Aiming for an internal temp of 95c. I know there's going to be plenty of lessons along the way as I learn how to get the best out of the Kamado, and I'm looking forward to them, but want to make sure I'm at least starting with a technique that is capable of delivering a decent feed even if I can't execute it first time of asking! Thanks in advance Simon (Kentish Man)

As soon as I did it I knew it was an error!! Just needed to trust that it was going to do what i knew it should....anyway, no harm done! One other observation, when I got it going, the temp went up very quickly, much quicker than the day before when I had the heat deflector in. It felt yesterday that I would have struggled to keep the temp down to 120c for a low and slow, but is that just because i didn’t have the deflector in so the probe was picking up direct heat rather than purely indirect? My concern was that (not that it mattered for the cook I was doing yesterday) that using a whole wood wool lighter had lit too much charcoal. im planning a low and slow lamb shoulder midweek, so just wondering if I should cut a lighter in half? Or if it will be ok with the deflector and early damping using the vents.... I suppose there’s no downside to using half a lighter. Might just take longer to get going, but better that way than too much charcoal lit and then there’s no way back. Sorry, this has turned into a bit of a ramble!

Cooked a spatchcock chicken on it yesterday afternoon - wasn’t sure how it was going to go, but came out great! Lit the bbq and gave it an hour to make sure I had temp under control (165c ish), then cooked the chicken with direct heat, skin up, and just left it while monitoring the temp using thermopro. I made one mistake, when I opened the grill to put the chicken in, the temp inside dropped, obviously, and I adjusted the settings to try and get back up to temp, presumably i should have just left it given I’d already stabilised the temp while pre heating? A bit of impatience while the temp slowly came back up. I’d recommend this as a first thing to cook while making sure you’ve got the hang of temp control 👍

On a big green egg forum, the suggestion was up to or just above the air holes in the firebox Fill up every time and shutdown after use to save fuel, a statement of the obvious, but kamado’s temp is set by air flow, not by amount of fuel

As it turned out, the felt tabs were a doddle! The bit that wasn’t so easy for me was the handle, the nuts were just not going on with the split washers also on, and i was nervous applying too much pressure as a slip of the spanner could have meant a crack or chip. In the end i just went without the split washers. Looking forward to a test burn today

Mine was delivered this morning before 9am, haven't had a chance to put it together yet, but have taken the packaging off the top and had a look. No issues with it at all, which is great! A few pock marks, but pin head size and under the glaze, so no concerns with that - that's part of having a ceramic product. I'll be back with further updates as my kamado journey progresses! Starting later today with putting it together and an initial burn (if I get time!). I'm looking forward to trying to peel the backing off the felt.....hopefully given I've been warned by others, it won't be as bad as I'm expecting!!

I received an email on Tuesday to say it had been dispatched. That has tracking details in it and when I looked at that this morning, it had updated to say delivering tomorrow They gone in and out of stock all week. They showed as out of stock by mid morning on Sunday, and then came back in, and have been oscillating most of the week I think. I’m sure you’ll get your order! Hopefully you’ll get a dispatch email in the next day or so

I think it’s back in stock now

Whoop! Delivery status has been updated, it’s coming tomorrow 👍

That’s great - hopefully mine will arrive soon and will similarly be in good condition Good that the delivery guys were helpful. I’ll be asking them, to take it down the side of the house to my patio if possible! How long did it take you to build it?

That was quick! Did you get advanced warning it was coming?

AO are delivering it - hopefully 7.5 working days from yesterday to next weekend is enough for them to get it to me!

Hi everyone, I’m a new member, I live in West Kent (Tonbridge). I’ve got a Weber Spirit and an Aldi Kamado on order. I love the convenience of the gas grill, but looking to start doing some different things and the flexibility of a kamado sucked me in (I really liked the look of the Joe Classic II just wasn’t quite ready to drop £1k+, so the Aldi option it is while I earn my stripes...).

Mine was also despatched today - I’ll be pleased if I’ve got it ahead of next weekend

Thank you - I think I'll go for the Riverside deal, I need a couple of other bits so will get over £50 with those plus two bags. I'm guessing this type of offering from B&M is unlikely to be great quality? https://www.bmstores.co.uk/products/lumpwood-bbq-charcoal-5kg-299886 I ask as when I go shopping later, there is a B&M next door This place is also near me, bit of a long shot but anyone used their charcoal? https://www.logsdirecthadlow.com/products

Any recommendations for lump wood deals available now?