Advice needed on first low and slow on Kamado...

[Kentish Man]

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) 

[AdamG]

not done lamb myself yet so I look forward to the pics😋 

Preheat your racks and drip trays while you bring it upto temp to avoid chasing temps (I personally find it easier this way). I usually put my racks etc in once my dome thermometer needle gets to the minimum reading (mine is 150F).

(optional) Aim for around 100C and then raise it to your temps with the top vent. This is just to get used to using your kamado and reduces the chance of overshooting. Reducing temps can be difficult and a lengthy process due to the kamado's efficiency (big overshoots)🙂

Once it stops at your desired temp then leave it at least 30 mins (ideally 1 hour) so the temp is stable...it makes temp control easier later in the cook.

Once you put the lamb in and it reads about 80C just leave it alone....it will seem to use voodoo magic, raise the temp and then stop at your previous stable temp (usually bang on!)😉

Hopefully this is helpful👍

Edited May 5, 2020 by AdamG

[Kentish Man]

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?

[AdamG]

what you said in the 1st paragraph is pretty much it!👍

yes the top will be almost closed (surprising how little it can be without snuffing the fire out), if you need to adjust the bottom then try to adjust the top or bottom at once so you can see how much each adjustment makes🙂 

thats all based on my experience but i have only had mine for 10 months now so others may have better advice👍