Cold weather cooking

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scott s

Fire Starter
Original poster
Feb 2, 2014
32
20
Western tip of lake Erie
Hi folks

Ok I need to get my smoking jones fixed but the temps here haven't gotten out of the teens for a month and well below zero at night.

I have a cold weather smoker planned but that will take at least a week to build and more likely a month. Has anyone put an exhaust fan in the ceiling of their garage to get smoking indoors.

Any suggestions are helpful except going to Famous Dave's for overcooked mush.
 
If your smoker gets anywhere near an outside wall, you could get hood range, mount it and exhaust it with not that much trouble.  If looks good or not, who cares, as long as it it functional.  Besides, in the middle of summer, when you have you friends over, they will be kidding you on this, but once you tell them why it is there, they will shut up and say WOW.  If Space is an issue, you could mount it with a hinge, give it flexible tubing and swing it out of the way, you could attach a rope or chain, to hold it out of the way.  It would not be that hard to do.
 
Hadn't thought of it before but I would think an in wall dryer vent mounted above the smoker would work. I would check with some guru like Dave to see how high up to go to mount it to offset the 90 at the end of it, Dave is pretty well versed in engineering pits and smokers. But you are still going to have a lot of smoke released just from the door opening and closing.

OK, I like that smoke smell but family usually doesn't take to it like I would think. LOL

Back porch or balcony have always worked for me, I mean how long are you going to be needed at the pit when its smoking?
 
Another option would be to make a wind break around the smoker when smoking outside.  If you block the wind you will be surprised how well your smoker will function.

There are various techniques...Do a search on wind breaks and several options will appear.

I personally use a cardboard box from a kitchen range...blocks the wind really well

Good luck,  John
 
I'm with BC. I smoke in the Canadian Rockies and the lowest I have smoked in was -26 C (-16 F) and even my Bradley Smoker will get up to 230 F if I give it some wind protection. It is also the perfect time to cold smoke cheese or bacon.

Disco
 
I'm new to the smoking world and got my smoker in early January, so of course I have to play every weekend.  It's been cold and windy here so I learned the hard way about the effect of wind on temps.  I have mine on the back porch so I don't have to go far and put up a wind break to keep the air somewhat steady around the smoker and it has been serving me well.  I see maybe 5 degrees of fluctuation in either direction during the process, two weeks ago I did ribs, almost six hours at 225-235 and never had to tweak a thing.  I was happy!
 
 
I'm new to the smoking world and got my smoker in early January, so of course I have to play every weekend.  It's been cold and windy here so I learned the hard way about the effect of wind on temps.  I have mine on the back porch so I don't have to go far and put up a wind break to keep the air somewhat steady around the smoker and it has been serving me well.  I see maybe 5 degrees of fluctuation in either direction during the process, two weeks ago I did ribs, almost six hours at 225-235 and never had to tweak a thing.  I was happy!
See!
 
 
Sometimes its just too cold to smoke. Like here today its down below 50 degrees. The flames might even freeze in this cold.... heck I even put on my big boy long pants!
I always knew you southern gentlemen could stand severe weather.

Disco
 
 
Sometimes its just too cold to smoke. Like here today its down below 50 degrees. The flames might even freeze in this cold.... heck I even put on my big boy long pants!
Yikes!  Below 50 degrees...We here in the North East don't even consider our long big boy pants until Mid December...You know Christmas and all.
 
Sometimes its just too cold to smoke. Like here today its down below 50 degrees. The flames might even freeze in this cold.... heck I even put on my big boy long pants!

Below 50 !? Holy moley man , get indoors ! You Sound like my big brother. He moved to Texas in the early 70's and he now has " southern blood".
Here in massawhoozis , it has been stuck in the teens and twenties for a good week and I have to admit that is too cold for me to cook outside.
But I live vicariously thru the intrepid souls on this forum who ignore the cold and keep on smokin! I salute you all.
 
I always end up too hot.  I need to cut down my charcoal on my initial fire... It's 5 degrees out and I am running close to 400.  I have the lid open.
 
 
It will be OK!  I have the grill by the sliding door, so I don't actually go outside ;)
That is true redneck engineering there, for sure.  My smoker, about 40 feet out from my sliding, ground level doors.  And it gets to -10 to -20 F here quite bit this time of the year.


My smoker sits covered in the shed, and when using it, it comes out sits on a patio stone I keep clear, beside the BBQ that sits just left of the shed in the picture.  And yes, I keep it shoveled out, right to the doors of the shed.  On the left side of the shed in front of the BBQ is a 10 X 10 concrete deck.
 
My Kamado in the Screen Room, right off the kitchen and visible through double French doors (note snow outside):


The ceramic walls are thick enough to sit it right in the middle of a teak table, and I use a high velocity fan aimed at the exhaust stack to carry most of the smoke outside. I can even snuff it out at any time with the draft controls.

Here's my Horizontal Offset Firebox Smoker, my gas grill, and my Lodge Hibachi Style Grill completely under snow on the slate table (at least all of them have their covers on):

 
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