Advice charcoal vs pellet

[Newt Scamander]

I am new to this forum and hoping to get some feedback on which smoker to buy. My situation is that I have about 1000 to spend and I'm a fairly experienced cook but mostly new to smoking and grilling.


To make a long story short I am trying to decide between a Hunsaker Vortex drum smoker and a pellet grill. As I said I'm a fairly experienced cook but mostly new to cooking BBQ. This purchase would only be for my own family and just general experiments and fun smoking and grilling.

If I were to go with a pellet grill is there anything I'm missing out on by not getting a charcoal fueled set up like the Hunsaker? I definitely don't have time to babysit a stick burner but a UDS seems a decent compromise of ease of use and still not just turning a dial like a pellet grill.


Anyway if anyone has ideas or opinions on pros and cons or anything at all I would love to hear them.

PS the pellet grill I'm looking at is the grilla silverbac

 

[Newt Scamander]

I have never used a pellet grill but have a lot of experience on Big Green Egg kamado cookers. Your budget certainly makes BGE or other kamado style cookers within reach. They are very versatile. You can cook, bake, smoke, fry, grill, broil, boil, sauté', Dutch oven cook or anything you can do on a grill, smoker, stove top or oven you can do on the BGE.

Ceramic cookers are also very efficient. On a about a 7 pound charge of charcoal my BGE will burn for around 35 hours holding 225 degrees no matter what the weather is outside. Metal smokers/grill are harder to keep stable as wind, sun, clouds, rain, air temperature all effect in different ways.

Thank you!

Yes I have considered kamado style but my only concern is the 18 inch ones would not be quite big enough for a brisket or other larger type things. Grilla sells one that is 20 inches (grate size) and that's better but the 24 inch grate size kamados jump way up in price.

 

[Newt Scamander]

My BGE is a 18" and I've cooked full 16/18lb packers brisket with no problem. Simply scrunch them up a bit to fit inside (doesn't take much) and a few hours later once they shrunk down a bit it'll be less than 18 inches. You can also get inventive with smaller racks, all thread rod, nuts and washers and do 2 tier cooking.

Unless you are habitually cooking for 20 or 30 people an 18" cooking surface can get a lot of work done. I do cooks several time per year for 15 to 20 people and have brisket, pulled pork, stew, chicken skewers, burgers, sausages and do it all on the BGE. You have to stage the cooks. Brisket and pork started the night before. Then once they are done you can start the grilling.

Thanks for the input. The kamados definitely win on outright versatility. Plus Im not worried about portability so the weight isn't really an issue. So many options haha. One thing I really like is versatility. I like to mess around and try all types of stuff so that's a plus.