Maiden smoke on new Royal Oak Heavy Duty.

richp692 · May 16, 2009

Well I went and did it. I bought the Royal Oak heavy duty smoker from Lowes last weekend. After putting it together and seasoning it last week. Today I'm doing a rather ambitious first smoke.

1. a beer can chicken
2. a pastrami
3. short ribs
4. spare ribs
5. Burnt ends.

So far so good. This thing holds it's temp well I just think I need to add a baffle by the opening to the fire box.

rickw · May 16, 2009

Congrats. Your pics didn't work.

richp692 · May 16, 2009

For some reason the insert picture button isn't working

rickw · May 16, 2009

Do you have your pics hosted on somewhere like Photobucket

richp692 · May 16, 2009

That is where I have them. I figured it out now. I just copy the img link and past it here.

bigsteve · May 16, 2009

Pics are coming through now.

Looks great. I see all this food you guys cook. Then I have to laugh at myself. Typical for me is A chuckie, a COUPLE of racks of St. Louis ribs, or ONE (maybe 2) beer butt chickens per cook. One Q=one meal around here.

No matter how carefully I freeze stuff, it just doesn't taste good to me re-heated.

billbo · May 16, 2009

Nice looking rig there Rich! Congrats on the new smoker.

coyote-1 · May 18, 2009

Great lookin' unit! And great lookin' food too.

I like to cook a lot at once in order to maximize each smoke. So I figured out how to use simple ziploc-type bags for vacuum sealing. Simply squeeze out most of the air while closing the bag most of the way. Then, using a straw, suck out the remaining air... and seal! I then put that bag in another ziploc bag and repeat the process. Certainly not as thorough as nirogen-based cmmercial vacuum sealing, but my stuff stays delicious in the freezer for well over a month.

bigsteve · May 18, 2009

Thanks for the tip. I think with my family, it's mostly the mental image. Something cooked, frozen, then reheated just sounds bad to us. But then, we happily eat frozen food from Schwan.

Don't try and figure it out. It's just one of our quirks.

elkhorn98 · May 20, 2009

What are the grates made of? And is there a baffle at all?

bigbaldbbq · May 20, 2009

Nice looking smoker. Always good to see a loaded smoker.

richp692 · May 20, 2009

The grates are made of porcelain coated steel. And like most offsets the fire box is pretty much open to the cooking chamber. I’m thinking of doing a mod like people have done on the chargillers to eliminate the hot spot next to the fire box. But first I am thinking about putting loaf pan full of water next to the opening to block the radiant heat from the firebox.

coyote-1 · May 20, 2009

That's what I do. It works well, provided the pan sits slightly higher than the opening. It helps stabilize temps, it blocks the hot spot, it distributes smoke, and it provides moiosture! A WIN all around.

richp692 · May 20, 2009

That's what I figured. And it will be allot easier than fabricating a baffle.
Now if I can just find decent lump here on Long Island I'll be set. All I can find around here is cowboy. I can swear there was a piece of plywood in my last bag.

coyote-1 · Jun 8, 2009

Many of my local supermarkets have received their summer stock of RoyalOak... Pathmark, King Kullen, TradeFair, and others all have it in stock right now.

richp692 · Jun 8, 2009

The only Royal Oak I find around here are the briquettes. I am going to try Frontier lump that I found at an ace hardware.

txbbqman · Jun 8, 2009

Nice looking rig and Q

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