Hi,
My name is Matt and have recently purchased a Brinkmann upright charcoal smoker.
I'm hoping to do my first smoke in a few days. First question: how do I top up a smoker once the food is in? Does the charcoal have to be hot/grey?
Hi Matt - welcome to the forum
In order to try to answer your question we will need a bit more information. Do you know yet what you are expecting to smoke and how you want to smoke it.
There are really 3 kinds of smoking that you can try:
- Cold smoking - This is usually used for things like cheese, bacon, salmon etc. and is done with the smoker at room temperature or below.
- Low and slow - This is what most people do on here and the smoker is usually between 110 C (230 F) and 160 C (320 F), depending on what you are smoking. It is used for meats like ribs, pulled pork, brisket, salmon etc.
- Hot roasting - This is used for quickly cooking meats like smoke roasted beef/pork joints and beer-can chicken etc.
For your first few smokes you probably need to get used to the smoker itself and how to regulate the temperature. You should be able to make one load of charcoal last for several hours and it may not need to be topped up. If you do not regulate the burn of the charcoal the smoker will run much too hot for most smokes. A lot of people on here have great success with their Brinkman however out-of-the-box temperature control can be a challenge. Look on here for the common modifications that others have made to help with this.
While you are learning the particulars of your smoker I would suggest that you try your first smokes with something that is quite forgiving. Chicken quarters, sausages, pork joint, with the aim to make pulled pork - but if it cooks to quickly you can always slice it as a pork joint.
One other thing I would recommend you buy before your first smoke is a dual probe digital thermometer. With this you will be able to monitor what is going on both inside the smoking chamber and inside your meat. Do not rely solely on the built in lid thermometer.
The other important thing is to take lots of photos and post them up here
Specifically answering your question, You will start off with a mix of lit and unlit charcoal (Minion method) and you should only need to top up with unlit charcoal unless you have let it almost burn out.
cheers
Wade