"Upgrading" to a charcoal cabinet?

[orthodoc]

I have 2 Yoder pellet grills (need the space for large gatherings) and I love them but would like to get more authentic with real fire. I am not sure that I want to spend the time tending a stick burner offset, so I am looking into charcoal cabinet smokers- LSG or Meadow Creek.

Will one of these be a significant step up in smoke flavor?

Thanks

 

[realdocBBQ]

Yes, assuming you use some actual wood in it. If you run primarily charcoal just to be able to run stable, even temps, you're going to get charcoal flavor, which isn't exactly the same as wood flavor. You can throw wood chunks in there, for instance, doing something like the Minion method and interspersing wood chunks into the charcoal will give you more smoke and wood flavor.

However, something I've noticed when cooking with charcoal and wood chunks, or propane with wood chunks - you may get smoke flavor, but not always the same complexity of flavor that you would get when you're burning primarily wood for heat and smoke. I did side by side comparisons with my propane smoker with wood chunks (a Camp Chef Smoke Vault 24) and my Yoder pellet, and while the CC did seem to have more smoke flavor, the food from the Yoder was picked unanimously by my family for the complexity of the flavors. I attribute this to burning wood vs propane for actual BTUs and not just adding smoke. I have since also been using Weber kettles and a Super 55 drum smoker - with similar results. Still very good, don't get me wrong - but it's charcoal flavor with additional smoke, not the same as cooking on a wood fire, like on my offsets.

The offset just cooking with wood is always king when it comes to flavor and bark. Nothing else can touch it.

Hope this helps a little.

- Danny

 

[orthodoc]

Yes, assuming you use some actual wood in it. If you run primarily charcoal just to be able to run stable, even temps, you're going to get charcoal flavor, which isn't exactly the same as wood flavor. You can throw wood chunks in there, for instance, doing something like the Minion method and interspersing wood chunks into the charcoal will give you more smoke and wood flavor.

However, something I've noticed when cooking with charcoal and wood chunks, or propane with wood chunks - you may get smoke flavor, but not always the same complexity of flavor that you would get when you're burning primarily wood for heat and smoke. I did side by side comparisons with my propane smoker with wood chunks (a Camp Chef Smoke Vault 24) and my Yoder pellet, and while the CC did seem to have more smoke flavor, the food from the Yoder was picked unanimously by my family for the complexity of the flavors. I attribute this to burning wood vs propane for actual BTUs and not just adding smoke. I have since also been using Weber kettles and a Super 55 drum smoker - with similar results. Still very good, don't get me wrong - but it's charcoal flavor with additional smoke, not the same as cooking on a wood fire, like on my offsets.

The offset just cooking with wood is always king when it comes to flavor and bark. Nothing else can touch it.

Hope this helps a little.

- Danny

Thanks. I assume my new large cabinet smoker, which was just delivered this AM, can be run on wood splits in place of charcoal??

 

[realdocBBQ]

Ahhh yes, you can probably also start with a bed of coals and then do wood splits, yes. Most of them can do this.

Where's the pics, man???

 

[normanaj]

We like pics here!

 

[Elf@shore]

I have 2 Yoder pellet grills (need the space for large gatherings) and I love them but would like to get more authentic with real fire. I am not sure that I want to spend the time tending a stick burner offset, so I am looking into charcoal cabinet smokers- LSG or Meadow Creek.

Will one of these be a significant step up in smoke flavor?

Thanks

HI!
Charcoal Box ?
From what I see on the internet ?
They burn slower,can add wood for Smoke.
Very curious what you bought?
Seen alot of good stuff with Meadow Creek ?
YES? Im Bias, just to what is available here in NJ ? LOL