Puff is fired up and going good now!! I got a new digital thermometer for my birthday and HAD to try it out. I have a 10 lb full packer, 2 slabs of ribs, 3 chickens, and 5 lb of hotlinks all ready for puff to breath delictible goodness into.
I started out burning a 25 lb bag of Charcoal to get every thing heated up and after an hour, I added 10 lb of lump charcoal and a couple of Oak and Pecan logs for another 30 minutes until the temps were where I wanted. Once I got my smoke chamber temps up to 225, I cracked her open and tossed in a nice 10lb full packer that I have had marinating in the fridge all day. I brought my temps back up to 215 or so and got some more logs ready to go in my small grill off to the side. After an hour, my smoke stack temps were down to 200, so I decided to toss in 3 more logs to bring it back up. After about 15 minutes I was back up to 220 and doing well!
Three hours in, aka 45 minutes ago, I tossed two slabs of ribs on an upper rack and closed her back up. Then I added 5 freshly burned logs from my small grill and I am sitting pretty! I have firebox temps of 450, Smoke chamber temps of 225, a nice almost translucent stream of smoke coming from the top, my brisket temp is up to 131 and there is a most intoxicating sizzle coming from inside as the fat drips down onto the diffuser plate.
I have a few friends coming by between noon and one, so hopefully the meat will cooperate! I will take some pics in the AM when there is some light outside and post them once they get developled. Somehow I don't think my flashlight will give off enough for things to turn out properly.
I started out burning a 25 lb bag of Charcoal to get every thing heated up and after an hour, I added 10 lb of lump charcoal and a couple of Oak and Pecan logs for another 30 minutes until the temps were where I wanted. Once I got my smoke chamber temps up to 225, I cracked her open and tossed in a nice 10lb full packer that I have had marinating in the fridge all day. I brought my temps back up to 215 or so and got some more logs ready to go in my small grill off to the side. After an hour, my smoke stack temps were down to 200, so I decided to toss in 3 more logs to bring it back up. After about 15 minutes I was back up to 220 and doing well!
Three hours in, aka 45 minutes ago, I tossed two slabs of ribs on an upper rack and closed her back up. Then I added 5 freshly burned logs from my small grill and I am sitting pretty! I have firebox temps of 450, Smoke chamber temps of 225, a nice almost translucent stream of smoke coming from the top, my brisket temp is up to 131 and there is a most intoxicating sizzle coming from inside as the fat drips down onto the diffuser plate.
I have a few friends coming by between noon and one, so hopefully the meat will cooperate! I will take some pics in the AM when there is some light outside and post them once they get developled. Somehow I don't think my flashlight will give off enough for things to turn out properly.