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Foil the grease pan or not? nasty smoke...

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haeffnkr

haeffnkr

Fire Starter
Original poster
Feb 27, 2015
53
17
Hi,

I just got a cabelas pellet grill ( camp chef dlx ) and I like the unit.

The first few times I did not foil the grease pan and just scraped it off after/before each cook and especially if I cooked at 300 to 350 it would give off a burning grease smell vs a smoker smell.

Then I tried foil a few times and I did not get it smooth enough and the grease just sat in puddles and short of smoked and smelled also when I made some chicken and pork butt at 300.

So what do the majority of folks do? foil or not? 

And how do get a pellet smoker not to burn and smoke grease when you run them hot?   Burn them off first at 400?

thanks in advance 

haeffnkr
 
Foil.  It makes the cleanup easier between cooks.  I would either clean the metal as much as possible and do a "burn off" to get as much of the old grease off.  Then start foiling and change the foil between every smoke.  Foil is inexpensive and IMO and cleanup with it beats scraping any day.  The key is to start with a clean base under the foil though.   I can't help with the Camp Chef/Cabela's Pellet smoker though.  I don't have one.
 
Heavy Duty Foil is easier to smooth out. Change after each cook. Pre-heat, full blast, to burn off spatters and Baking Soda sprinkled on burning drips will kill greasy smelling smoke...Old School smoking dirty oven trick...JJ
 
Last edited:
I started off using foil but found that I can remove grease with a paint scraper much faster than refoiling the tray. Most folks that I know with pellet grills feel the same way. Also, foil can alter the amount of radiant heat coming off the tray. 

For high heat cooks, I scrape the grease off the tray and then run the grill until it stops smoking. 
 
Hi,

thanks for the replies thus far.

These pellet grills have been discussed like ovens and apparently they need to be cleaned like ovens also, they are not really a grill.

Some background.

I have had a cook 2 weeks ago where I went from pork steaks at 300 with drippings on the bare grease pan with no clean up to immediately 350 for cookies ( yes I said cookies) and the grill put out a nasty "burn off the grease smell" and some of it got in the cookies.

Also this past Saturday I foiled the pan and started cooking a pork butt at 300.  When after it reached 150 I wrapped it in foil and then took off the grill and took out the greasy foil and then put down more foil and then put on chicken thighs and legs and the wrapped butt.  The chicken dripped grease all over the not so nicely laid tin foil and the grease pooled up and burned some.

So if there was no foil this on it this past Saturday I would have had to scrape a smoking hot pan and get it all in the bucket or what is the best approach?

At the end of the day I want to smell good smoke and not burnt grease.

thanks again

haeffnkr
 
haeffnkr said:
 
Hi,

thanks for the replies thus far.

These pellet grills have been discussed like ovens and apparently they need to be cleaned like ovens also, they are not really a grill.

Some background.

I have had a cook 2 weeks ago where I went from pork steaks at 300 with drippings on the bare grease pan with no clean up to immediately 350 for cookies ( yes I said cookies) and the grill put out a nasty "burn off the grease smell" and some of it got in the cookies.

Also this past Saturday I foiled the pan and started cooking a pork butt at 300.  When after it reached 150 I wrapped it in foil and then took off the grill and took out the greasy foil and then put down more foil and then put on chicken thighs and legs and the wrapped butt.  The chicken dripped grease all over the not so nicely laid tin foil and the grease pooled up and burned some.

So if there was no foil this on it this past Saturday I would have had to scrape a smoking hot pan and get it all in the bucket or what is the best approach?

At the end of the day I want to smell good smoke and not burnt grease.

thanks again

haeffnkr
Click to expand...
Going from low cook to high is always going to be a problem with just about any pellet cooker because of the accumulation of grease from the low/slow time. Changing foil on a hot grill is no fun either.  That's one advantage that the FE PG500/1000 have over other grills with dedicated zones.

For chicken thighs, I just run at 450F for the entire cook. Whole chicken between 375-400:

http://pelletheads.com/index.php?topic=34651.msg295574#msg295574
 
I have a DLX and have found that 18" heavy duty aluminum foil works perfectly to line the grease pan on a DLX. 12" wide foil can't cover the whole tray leaving a seam the grease can run in to. Reynolds Grill Foil works very well.
 
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