New here, and new to smoking..

[JckDanls 07]

both are good.. I prefer pecan myself.. apple would be better than cherry

 

[westgateblvd]

Thanks.. I will cut up a few branches tomorrow.. The good and dead ones..

 

[mouth-waterin]

If you and your wife like chicken try smoking some wings or thighs. I tried a suggestion the other day on here on injecting wings with hot wing sauce and then smoking them. Turned out great and not as messy as your regular buffalo wings!

 

[westgateblvd]

Going to do the chops first. Then a chicken.. not sure if I am going to try chicken breasts or not yet though.. The thigh does sound pretty good.. Is that with the skin off or on?? I remember years back using Good seasons italian salad dressing mix, and olive oil over chicken and grilling it was real good.. I wonder how it would be smoked..

 

[shooterrick]

Welcome to SMF.  Thanks for adding your location to your profile.  Also If you have not done it drop in to Roll Call and introduce yourself.  Everyone will be glad to meet ya.  Happy Smokes

ShooterRick

Beef Mod.

 

[capntrip]

Hickory is my Fave!

 

[mouth-waterin]

Going to do the chops first. Then a chicken.. not sure if I am going to try chicken breasts or not yet though.. The thigh does sound pretty good.. Is that with the skin off or on?? I remember years back using Good seasons italian salad dressing mix, and olive oil over chicken and grilling it was real good.. I wonder how it would be smoked..

I like to take the skin off on mine.

 

[diesel]

Any fruit would be great!  Apple, Peach, Cherry. Start out slow and over time you can experiment.  That is the fun part and also how you make it your own.  In my opinion fresh cut wood is fine but I don't have the type of smoker you have.

Do you have a chop saw?  Just cut up small pieces of that apple and use it.  As for the pork chops.  I would suggest brine.  You will find many brine recipes here.

Good luck and good smoking!  Can't wait for some Qview.

 

[smokinhusker]

Welcome to SMF! I hope you got the MES repaired and it ruined your first smoke. 

There's just two of us here, but I do racks of ribs and then cut them down and vacuum seal for later. I also do this with pulled pork and in the vacuum sealed bags it reheats so well. Might give some thought to one. 

Anyway, brine the chops and if you decide on thighs or quarters, then you can smoke them. I like to leave the skin on as it helps with moisture retention on the chicken and then take it off when it's done. 

Here's a post to some chicken leg quarters I did http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/t/118547/chicken-leg-qtrs-with-q-view

 

[westgateblvd]

Maybe I will try chicken parts. How long do they smke?, and at what temp?

 

[chowderpants]

Please don't rely on the temperature gauge on the MES. Mine varies about 5 to 10 degrees and from what I've read, this is pretty good. At the very least, get a oven thermometer (remote probe like the Maverick ET-372 is better) that you can verify the temperature with (put the probe in some boiling water and make sure you get a reading of +- 212 degrees. With the MES, don't put more than a cup of chips in at a time. The loader will hold much more than that, but DON'T fill it up. You only want a tiny bit of thin blue smoke coming out of the vent, not thick white smoke. Depending on the wind, it might be hard to see the smoke, just figure that if you can smell the smoke, it is enough.

As far as times go with the chicken, most people on here do not smoke for a certain time, they smoke to a certain internal temperature. This is where something like the Maverick ET-732 comes in handy. You can keep tabs on the meats internal temperature without having to open the door. If you dont want to go that route, at the very least get yourself an instant read thermometer to get the temps quickly

 

[thsmormonsmokes]

I've also had good success by smoking chicken legs and thighs for an hour or two then I finish cooking them on a grill at max grill temps.  It gives you a really good blend of smoke and grill flavors.  And it cuts down cooking time, which is also good because by the time I get around to doing the chicken I'm usually getting impatient and ready to eat.

 

[kryinggame]

Hey man, I'm still somewhat new to smoking myself but I've learned a lot by doing tons of research and asking alot of questions. Unfortunately with questions, you'll get a variety of answers from different perspectives.

Go to Smoking-Meat.com and sign up for the free 5 day smoking course. It'll give you the basics that you need to know. Everyday for 5 days, you'll get an email explaining a different concept to you. I don't want to bore you with alot of talk here but you might want to also do the following:

1 - In my opinion, since you're new to smoking, you might want to stay away from beef. It's a difficult meat to cook and will dry up on you. Chicken is easy to do as well as a pork shoulder.

2 - Seems like you have a lot of questions on wood. There's no fun in every 30 minutes or so, feeding wood into your machine. By doing that you may ruin the meat by putting in to much wood. The majority of us here invested $40.00 and purchsed the AMNPS from A-Maze-N Products, LLC. Todd on this site sells this. It's a small smoke generator which burns pellets. All you do is full your favorite pellets into the contraption, light it with a torch, let it burn for a minimum of 10 minutes to get a good smoke going. Then, if you have the 30 inch MES smoker, just lay it on the bottom left side tray. There are three rows in the generator, each row will produce about 3 - 4 hours of smoke. I never use wood chips any more.

3 - You'll also need a good thermometer to judge the internal temperature of the meat. I use the Taylor 1470. It's simple to use and accurate. If you're going to smoke a whole chicken, just stick the metal part on the meatiest side and let it cook until you're happy with the temperature (personally, I like my chicken around 175 degrees). Also, I

Decide what you want to perfect and then keep practing. Chicken is good to practice on, because it's cheap, compared to the $17.00 beef you bought.

Good luck

 

[alelover]

 

[westgateblvd]

I have a MES 20071111. The one with the stainless steel, and window in the door. I have a Maverick ET-72 meat probe. I just checked that one, and it got to 210 in boiling water. I also have a Pyrex meat probe that also hit the 210 mark. If the water was still boiling they both would have hit the 212 mark. i didn't know that so few chips should have gone into the tray. I filled that tray that slids in. White smoke was pouring out.

I will try chicken pieces this time. Is there a set temp it should be at??, or how long, or what chip to use??