Have a situation that happened to me today for the first time and trying to determine what went wrong.
I was (still am at the time this is being typed) cooking two racks of spare ribs today and about 45 minutes into the cook the wood chunks I had in the WSM literally became a fireball and my temperatures became unwieldy.
I follow the method of putting in 2 chunks (quite large, definitely fist size; maybe even a bit bigger) on top of leftover coals from previous cook, and then filling it with more on top of the wood chunks. I also throw one on the middle where I’m going to dump the lit coals for the minion method.
Well, I did that and lit about 18 coals which I then dumped in. I then gave it about 45 minutes to come up to temp, stabilize and blow off a bit of the white smoke (as is my usual method). 275 temp.
I proceeded to put the racks on and let it ride. It went from about 40 minutes when I noticed somewhat heavy white smoke and figured one of the chunks was getting hit and it would die down in 10 minutes or so like it usually does. Well today the smoke just kept getting worse and the temperate shot to 310, 320, 340...it was totally out of control.
I looked in and the chunks were literally a blaze. It was so bad I had to remove the Ribs and cook them in the oven for about 20 minutes while I played fireman and struggled to get the temperature down. I had to remove the 2 buried chunks that were a blaze.
These are very high quality chunks from Cattleman’s Grill and have used many times in the past.
Wondering if anyone has any ideas where I went wrong. The only thing I can think of is the wind. It is November in upstate NY, so it’s cold and the wind is coming in. I did try to control the wind with the bottom vents (closing down the one in the direct line, etc.).
Thanks all!
I was (still am at the time this is being typed) cooking two racks of spare ribs today and about 45 minutes into the cook the wood chunks I had in the WSM literally became a fireball and my temperatures became unwieldy.
I follow the method of putting in 2 chunks (quite large, definitely fist size; maybe even a bit bigger) on top of leftover coals from previous cook, and then filling it with more on top of the wood chunks. I also throw one on the middle where I’m going to dump the lit coals for the minion method.
Well, I did that and lit about 18 coals which I then dumped in. I then gave it about 45 minutes to come up to temp, stabilize and blow off a bit of the white smoke (as is my usual method). 275 temp.
I proceeded to put the racks on and let it ride. It went from about 40 minutes when I noticed somewhat heavy white smoke and figured one of the chunks was getting hit and it would die down in 10 minutes or so like it usually does. Well today the smoke just kept getting worse and the temperate shot to 310, 320, 340...it was totally out of control.
I looked in and the chunks were literally a blaze. It was so bad I had to remove the Ribs and cook them in the oven for about 20 minutes while I played fireman and struggled to get the temperature down. I had to remove the 2 buried chunks that were a blaze.
These are very high quality chunks from Cattleman’s Grill and have used many times in the past.
Wondering if anyone has any ideas where I went wrong. The only thing I can think of is the wind. It is November in upstate NY, so it’s cold and the wind is coming in. I did try to control the wind with the bottom vents (closing down the one in the direct line, etc.).
Thanks all!