I think they're talking about this gadget. But hopefully, if that's wrong, someone will correct us:
I haven't tried this. I've been using the
AMNPS, myself, directly in the smoker, but with some modifications to the smoker to get more air to the
AMNPS.
However, I will be building a mailbox setup, hopefully soon, so I can try that out with the
AMNPS. But really, for the price, this
Masterbuilt accessory seems like it would be convenient, too. I do like the idea of setting it some distance away from the smoker and connecting it through some length of aluminum duct to get some cooling of the smoke and perhaps condensation of heavier smoke constituents to "filter out" what might be harsher, creosote-like stuff before the smoke enters the smoker itself.
It does seem that one difference between an
AMNPS in a mailbox versus this
Masterbuilt accessory is that with the AMNPS in a mailbox, you're getting direct burning of the pellets, while with the
Masterbuilt accessory, you're using a heating element to "roast" the chips.
I've always felt that there should be differences in the qualities of the smoke based on the way the "smoke fuel" is burned/heated.
Oxygen available should make a difference.
Combustion temperature should make a difference.
The form of the wood (pellets, dust, chips, chunks) should make a difference.
To me, the goal would be to have a system that allows me to set/adjust the amount of smoke as well as the quality of the smoke, and have that match what and how I'm "cooking" the product in the smoker.
I might want one kind of smoke for cold-smoking, since I know the cold foods will tend to cause the smoke to condense on the food. Perhaps a lighter, lower-creosote smoke is necessary for cold smoking. But when I'm cooking the food in the smoker at a rather high temperature, it might tolerate heavier smoke because the higher temperature of the food would not condense as much smoke onto it. And of course, that also means that the qualities of the smoke might need to be adjusted throughout the cooking of foods because the surface temperature of the food will rise throughout the smoking/cooking process. Perhaps too much heavy smoke early-on needs to be avoided, but maybe adjusting the smoke to be thicker as the food temperature rises would be a good thing.
I have to think that the surface temperature and moisture of the food will have a large effect on how the surfaces "capture" the smoke, and perhaps what components of the smoke are captured. It's sort of like fractional distillation, where condensation temperatures are used to select the product you want to get.
So perhaps the smoke I'd want to deliver to the smoker chamber should be far different when I'm cold smoking cheese or the like versus the latter stages of cooking meat at a higher food-chamber temperature.
When I'm simply placing the AMNPS inside of my smoker, I have a hard time adjusting the smoke characteristics because the burning conditions are highly dependent on the food-chamber situation. When my smoker is hot, it draws well, sucking a lot of air in if I let it do so. That air allows my AMNPS to burn better and hotter. On the other hand, when I'm cold smoking something, the draft is lower, and I have a harder time getting enough air to the AMNPS. Now maybe that actually helps because it burns the pellets slower in a cold smoker than it does in a hot smoker, and maybe that's exactly what I want. Then again, maybe it's exactly the opposite of what I want!
I have had at least one time when cold smoking some cheese, when I felt that the mailbox and some cooling/condensing pipe between the AMNPS chamber and the smoker would have been a very good thing. It seemed that the smoldering pellets were giving off quite a bit of moisture (as one would expect, since any combustion produces CO2 and Water Vapor, of course). And it seemed to me that there was actually visible steam leaving the vent of the smoker. It was quite cold outside (around freezing). And it seemed to me that some of the water vapor as well as smoke was condensing onto the cheese due to the cold temperatures of it all.
Anyhow, there's a lot to all of this. I think we all have to experiment at our locations, in our weather, with our altitude, and in different cooking situations to come up with just the right kind and amount of smoke.
I have fantastic luck cooking pork butts at 225° here. I get good draft through the smoker, and with the AMNPS in the smoker itself, things seem to always go just great. And the same is true for a lot of "hot-smoked" foods. But where I think I need to do more work is with my cold smoking, and that's why I am going to experiment with a mailbox and also might have to consider getting one of these
Masterbuilt attachments to play with.
I've also considered building one of those smoke generators where you use an air pump to force air through a chamber full of pellets because it seems like I could then adjust the combustion easily regardless of the conditions in the food chamber. It seems like it would be nice to be able to adjust the air-flow through the food chamber independently of the combustion air over the wood. I might, for example, want to use a small fan to force air through the food chamber while cold-smoking. That way, moisture and temperature in the chamber could be regulated. Then, the smoke would be introduced into the incoming air-stream or directly into the food chamber from a separate smoke generator whose combustion conditions would be adjustable completely independent of the food chamber settings.
I would like to try a higher airflow through the food chamber while cold smoking, yet get a more leisurely air flow over the burning wood to get lighter smoke. That way, moisture would be swept out of the food chamber, keeping things cool and dry, yet I could set the smoke density to be whatever I want.
