MES 30 inch Do you soak the wood chips?

[d1amond12]

I am new to smoking.  My first attempts have been pretty good with boston butt and ribs. 

But do you soak the wood chips?  

I will be trying pork loin today.

Thanks everyone.

 

[uncle_lar]

wet wood does not smoke.

if you soak your chips they have to dry out before they start to smoke.

 

[d1amond12]

Thank you so much. 

 

[smokinhusker]

I have an MES 40 and don't use chips unless I can't find pellets. If I use chips I do not soak them. 

 

[SmokinAl]

You may want to try a AMNPS pellet smoker. Most of the MES users use them.

http://www.amazenproducts.com/

 

[deltadude]

I am new to smoking.  My first attempts have been pretty good with boston butt and ribs. 

But do you soak the wood chips?  

I will be trying pork loin today.

Thanks everyone.

Hi welcome to SMF d1amond12, and welcome to the MES owner's club.

I have been using a 40" MES for about 5 years, and I always soak my chips.  When the smoking session starts, provided you follow the guide below, the chips will start to smoke in 3-5 minutes.  Again if you follow the guide you will have a nice bed of hot ash by the 2nd or 3rd dump.  BTW it doesn't matter if the chips are soaked 30 min or 3 hours they will smoke just fine.  Am I telling you to soak your chips?  NO!  I am telling you what I do, you can experiment to see what works best for you.  I feel I get a little longer smoke time on soaked chips, but have not done anything to prove this.

Below are some tips for new MES owners, these were collected over the coarse of a few years based on comments by regulars of this forum.  I know some current members might get bored that I post these, however the intent is to be a resource for MES newbies.

MES New Owner Tips:

Collected from input of many MES owners, some may seem a bit dated due to new MES with higher watt elements but work as a general rule.

• Season it. (Many spray the inside with PAM)
• No extension cords, unless it is 12 ga or heavier.
• Spray your racks with PAM prior to smoke (makes cleanup easier).
• For easier cleanup, use alum foil on the water pan and drain pan.
• Manual says preheating isn't necessary,  preheat, it will make getting up to initial set temp faster, and temp recovery when opening hatch faster.  (These instructions were for older MES units with lower wattage elements,  however the value of preheating applies to all units.) Preheat to 270º.  Cold ambient 45º and colder as long as 2 hours, 1 hour for warmer temps and as little as 30 min. in summer.   Preheating help establish a stable cooking platform without the dramatic temp swings in first hour of smoking. (Experiment with preheating and see if it helps.)
• Add boiling hot water to pan, this will allow you to get up to set temp faster.
• Start the smoke with a few wood chips. The manual says 1 cup max, you will find a hand full is almost too much. 1st chip dump just a few chips 8-10, 15 minutes  later a little more chips 10-12, another 15 minutes 12-15 chips.  This should produce a nice bed of hot ash with good chip combustion.  12-20 chips every 30 minutes should work from this point on. Your goal is TBS (thin blue smoke). When its right you can smell the sweet smoke, it won't smell bitter or be cloudy white. Dark smoke is nothing but awful.
• Do not adjust vent leave it wide open.  Unless using the AMNS, (follow AMNS instructions).
• Use external probe for sensing meat internal temp, you can run the probe cord through the exhaust vent. *You may want to run 2nd probe inserted into a wood block or potato with 2” to 3" tip exposed to verify the internal MES cooking temp.  (Newer MES models have the built in probes. verify they are +/- 5º accurate).
• Once your meat is loaded, avoid opening the hatch. New models can recover to set temp faster, but every time you open the door you extend the cooking time. Thus spritzing isn't really necessary in a MES due to the water pan keeping the smoking environment moist enough to not dry out the meat.
• If you do have to open your MES plan your moves so you can keep door open time to a minimum.  (I’ve decided to not stress and plan for open door times by adding 20 minutes per door opening, although best is to keep to absolute minimum).
• When your done cooking, the proper way to shut the MES down is to turn off the controller then unplug.  (Sounds simple but the controller has been known to get stuck if not shut down properly.)
• If your MES seems to struggle getting to either the preheat temp of 270º or is taking extraordinary long times to raise to cooking temps after meat is loaded try doing a RESET..
Proper RESET = cycle the MES off with the controller, unplug electrical cord, count to 10, re-plug electric cord, turn on MES with on/off, reset temps.
If you tried a reset, and 20-30 minutes later there is little change do the reset again.
• Cleanup is easy with a Brillo (or similar) pad to scrub the tough stuff, and throw grates, water & drain pan into dishwasher. Some have complained about the spot welds on the drain pan rusting, I hit those spots with a touch of PAM then store the cleaned stuff back in the MES.
You do not need to clean the inside cabinet, most experienced smokers consider that just seasoning. With a hot wet rag, wipe out the inside bottom and any excessive gunk on the walls. Again with hot damp cloth, wipe the door gasket, and the door frames (for better seal).

 

[wraunch]

Great post Delta! 

Do you use pellets in your MES wood tray? 

 

[nozzleman]

I use wood chunks instead of the chips and I don't soak them. They last longer than the chips. If you have a chunk that is to big hit it with an axe or sharp hatchet.

 

[jcurrado]

Thanks for all of those helpful tips!  I just purchased a new 30: MES Smoker and seasoned it yesterday and I am very new to smoking and always looking for ways to help achieve great smoking. Thanks again!  I will definitely utilize those tips.

Johnny

 

[deltadude]

Do you use pellets in your MES wood tray? 

No I don't use pellets in the MES wood tray, I use pellets in the AMNPS, and they work great there.

I use wood chunks instead of the chips and I don't soak them. They last longer than the chips. If you have a chunk that is to big hit it with an axe or sharp hatchet.

I have tried all kinds of chunks of various sizes, I have a band saw so I can cut them to any size I want.  Yes you get a little more time on the chunks, but it is hard to control TBS, sometimes the smoke gets real heavy using chunks other times it can be light, depends on a number of things.  I do not soak chunks.  One caution on using chunks, it is important to make sure after putting a chunk in you can close and open the dumper tube easily.  Frequently the either the size or irregular shape might cause the dumper to hang up, so I use long tongs to place the chunks in the tray with the dumper tube out, then put the dumper tube in, it I can get the dumper in fully I can easily move the chunks around until the dumper fits in nicely.

Fortunately, there is no right or wrong way to do this, soaking or not soaking, everyone has a preference, you just have to experiment until you find what works best for you and your preferred tastes.

 

[mcockrell]

this is a very informative post. thank you very much.

i think its mostly trial and error. some people like this while others swear by that. but this definitely gives a good starting point.

MC

 

[crazyfoool]

I'm also new and the manual for this smoker says to soak the chips. I have tried both and it seems like I get better results when I soak. Like I said, I'm new so I might be doing something else wrong. 

 

[dnalsi]

I just bought the MES 30  mod 20070312 from Mills Fleet Farm on Sat Nov 17th.

I've read the manual over and can't find any mention of soaking the chips.

The manual does say to never use more than 1 cup of chips, while a loose insert sheet about seasoning the unit clearly states to NEVER use more than 1/2 cup of chips at any time.

1/2 cup fills the tube chip loader anyway.

But no mention of soaking chips.

I seem to get good smoke with dry chips, but I will keep soaking in mind if needed.

I also just ordered a 6x6 A-Maze-N tray for cold smoking.

 

[whistlepig]

I'm also new and the manual for this smoker says to soak the chips. I have tried both and it seems like I get better results when I soak. Like I said, I'm new so I might be doing something else wrong. 

What results on the soaked chips verses the dry is better?

 

[deltadude]

What results on the soaked chips verses the dry is better?

There is NO difference in the smoke, the difference is how long it takes to get smoke.  If you follow the "New MES Owner tip guide"

• Start the smoke with a few wood chips. The manual says 1 cup max, you will find a hand full is almost too much. 1st chip dump just a few chips 8-10, 15 minutes  later a little more chips 10-12, another 15 minutes 12-15 chips.  This should produce a nice bed of hot ash with good chip combustion.  12-20 chips every 30 minutes should work from this point on. Your goal is TBS (thin blue smoke). When its right you can smell the sweet smoke, it won't smell bitter or be cloudy white. Dark smoke is nothing but awful.

Dry wood chips may start a couple of minutes sooner, in my 800 watt MES 40 the wet chips smoke in less than 5 minutes, dry chips will start smoking right away.  Using the MES chip loader system you are after TBS "thin blue smoke", if you are using a half cup of chips the smoke will either start out very very dark or heavy white, it will NOT be TBS.   I usually start with a dry load of about 8-10 wood chips, and then 15 minutes later a 2nd dry load, the result is a bed of hot ash, then I switch to soaked chips, I take out my 1st batch of wet chips during the 2nd dump and let them sit and drain for that 15+ minutes, and when the smoke starts to fade, add the wet chips.  You can hear them sizzle when the wet chips hit the ash, but that is ok, there is plenty of heat there to quickly cause them to ignite and smolder.

My preference when using chips is soaking, because I think it gets a few more minutes of smoke time, there is no other reason to do it.  I have used dry chips exclusively and the smoke flavor is the same.   As long as you are using the right quantity of chips wet or dry to produce TBS there will be no issues.