Initial thoughts on my new Smokin'-it 2

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magicshoes

Newbie
Original poster
Mar 14, 2012
8
10
Western NY
I received my Smokin-it 2 last Monday and was very impressed. Arrived in 3 days via fedex and was double boxed, not a scratch on it. As others have said, this thing is built like a tank! A note from the owner was also a nice touch. After unboxing and setting it on my homemade cart, I fired it up for a 4 hr. seasoning smoke per the instructions. Made a short list of what I observed:

- set the temp @ 225 and added 2 golf ball size pieces of hickory at 4:00PM

- after 1/2 hour I was getting fairly heavy smoke and IT was @ 160

- the IT fluctuated between 215 and 250. Probably looked at the temp 100x (hey it's new!) and would say it was split pretty even: 1/3 around 215, 1/3 around 225 and 1/3 around 250.

- outside of unit was very cool to the touch

- still had light smoke at 6:00PM

- shut unit off @ 8:00 and still had small pieces of wood smoldering in wood tray.

Here are a few pics of the smoker on my homemade cart:

9204f3f0_IMAG0207.jpg


ab70a065_IMAG0213.jpg


If you're wondering why the cart is burgundy in color, it's left over from painting my golf cart!

5985ce55_IMAG0035.jpg


If you're thinking of buying the smokin-it 2, I would not hesitate. Can't wait to post more pics of the food this thing will crank out with the help of everyone here!

-Scott
 
Nice looking rig's.... My thinking is with electric's, the heating element gets really hot (hence the high of 250`). Then it turns off, cools down to the 215` or so and the turns back on... so here we go back up to 250` again... get what i'm saying ? For that reason I like charcoal... although I have been looking at propane,,,,
 
Congrats on the new smoker - My first suggestion is to pick up an AMNPS from Todd and make your smokes a whole lot easier 
 
AMNPS will not work in smokin-it. Moist from the food and luck of air flow. I just went trough it last week or so. To get rid of a wide temperature swings I use Auber controller. It keeps swings down to plus minus 5 degrees. Also helps you to get an idea about inside temperature. 

You have to remember that even though it says it can hold 30lb of meat it takes very long to heat this amount of food. I was cooking two 8lb shoulders and it took more than 12 hours to complete. One trick that Dave from smokin-it told me is to cover half of exhaust hole with something to hold higher temperature inside the box. 700w element had a hard time to heat up the box above 215F. As soon as I removed one shoulder temperature jumped to 230. So amount of meat should be well managed. I would say no more than 10-12lb at the time for a normal smoking process.

With all this cons this unit is truly set-it and forget it. Food came out moist and with a nice smoky bark I never had in MES40. I am thinking of getting model 3 and transfer model 2 to my summer cabin.

I ordered cold smoke plate and will experiment with it today.

My paranoid first smoke was recorded here

http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/t/119117/smokin-it-model-2
 
Last edited:
Nice looking rig's.... My thinking is with electric's, the heating element gets really hot (hence the high of 250`). Then it turns off, cools down to the 215` or so and the turns back on... so here we go back up to 250` again... get what i'm saying ? For that reason I like charcoal... although I have been looking at propane,,,,


You're probably right on with the temp swings on the electric. I still own a smoky mtn. charcoal smoker, the only problem for me is in the cold months I had to constantly watch it and around here it seems like winter is 8 months long!
 
AMNPS will not work in smokin-it. Moist from the food and luck of air flow. I just went trough it last week or so. To get rid of a wide temperature swings I use Auber controller. It keeps swings down to plus minus 5 degrees. Also helps you to get an idea about inside temperature. 

I ordered cold smoke plate and will experiment with it today.

My paranoid first smoke was recorded here

http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/t/119117/smokin-it-model-2
I will check into the Auber controller, sounds like a lot of people use it. Going to check out your first smoke post now!
 
You have to remember that even though it says it can hold 30lb of meat it takes very long to heat this amount of food. I was cooking two 8lb shoulders and it took more than 12 hours to complete. One trick that Dave from smokin-it told me is to cover half of exhaust hole with something to hold higher temperature inside the box. 700w element had a hard time to heat up the box above 215F. As soon as I removed one shoulder temperature jumped to 230. So amount of meat should be well managed. I would say no more than 10-12lb at the time for a normal smoking process.
8 lb of pork butt takes approx. 90 minutes a pound as a general rule of thumb.   8 x 90 = 720 min / 60 = 12 hours...

The MES of the Smokin-it is NOT an oven, your oven you set the temp and walk away but you are not monitoring inside cooking temp.  700 watts in the small space of your Somkin-it is more than enough wattage to effectively smoke meat.  I have the MES 40 with 800 watt element, and it works just fine, the smokin-it is smaller less cubic inches so it should work just fine too with 700 watts.  When you put a load inside the smoker, heat is being absorbed by the cold meat, the larger the load the more heat that is absorbed, thus it will take longer to achieve set temp.

I would agree in such a small smoker load size would be a consideration that has to be considered, but as for heat there is plenty.  As long as your cooking at 220-225º that is good low n slow, just adjust your time, it might take an hour + to achieve that 220-225º but that happens as the meat surface starts to heat up and balance out with the inside cooking temp.
 
8 lb of pork butt takes approx. 90 minutes a pound as a general rule of thumb.   8 x 90 = 720 min / 60 = 12 hours...

The MES of the Smokin-it is NOT an oven, your oven you set the temp and walk away but you are not monitoring inside cooking temp.   700 watts in the small space of your Somkin-it is more than enough wattage to effectively smoke meat.  I have the MES 40 with 800 watt element, and it works just fine, the smokin-it is smaller less cubic inches so it should work just fine too with 700 watts.  When you put a load inside the smoker, heat is being absorbed by the cold meat, the larger the load the more heat that is absorbed, thus it will take longer to achieve set temp.

I would agree in such a small smoker load size would be a consideration that has to be considered, but as for heat there is plenty.  As long as your cooking at 220-225º that is good low n slow, just adjust your time, it might take an hour + to achieve that 220-225º but that happens as the meat surface starts to heat up and balance out with the inside cooking temp.
I would say they are exactly like an oven.  The heat will cycle 15-20 degrees above and below your set point.  You don't monitor inside cooking temperature because you assume it's holding to your set point which it does not do. Just an average.  An electric smoker is no different than an oven that you can add wood to.  Not that there is anything wrong with that
 
 
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