Your first Meat affair?

[hogfan40]

Was just sitting here thinking about the first time i attempted to smoke my first piece of meat. I can remember it like it was yesterday, it was a complete deer backstrap off the first deer my wife had every shot, so i thought i would try and impress her, (we had just been married for about 3 months), so i go out and buy a brinkmann tube somker from wal-mart, because i have cooked on charcoal grills all my life, how hard could it be. Put it on the smoker with some water, and wood chips, and your ready to eat some smoked deer meat. YEAH RIGHT!!!!
I get it all back to the house, on cloud nine, fixing to show my wife how much of a bad !@# i am at cooking outdoors, i get the smoker, put it all together, set it up, get the charcoal, wood chips all ready, then i turn my attention to the meat. I open the spice drawer and start pulling out everything in it, some of it so crusty from not being used in so long, i start banging the spices on the counter top to free up the spices, and start combining what i thought might be good to the taste bud's of the wife, and then i found the cinnamon, and dump it in also. I now have the perfect rub for my smoked deer loin. I rub it on, and then some more, and then i wrapped it bacon, and let it set while i am starting the coals for the smoker, i get it going then bring out the meat, and put it on the smoker.
I got it all set up and going, pouring the chips to the fire, everything going good as i spray it with apple juice every 30 min or so. Now i smoked this to what looked to me to be done. I pull it off the smoker after about 4 hrs and head into the house, and wrapp it in the foil, while the other vittles are getting done. Now comes the time to impress the wife, i unwrap the deer loin from the foil, and a strong, potent, aroma of cinnamon enlopes the house, thinking o yea i have done it. I start slicing the loin and notice i am having to use brutal force to even cut the deer loin, the whole time the wife is watching and laughing, but i was going to show her i knew what i was doing, we set down at the table, and started to eat the perfect smoked deer loin, and take the first bite of it, and wow, the cinnamon about gagged me and here, then the fire started in our mouths, come to find out i had forgot i dried a load of habanero's a while back and put them in a unmarked spice container, well to say it was perfect smoked deer loin, after 3 beers and the wife's asthma attack, was a understatement, we couldn't eat no more than the first bite, so we only ate the baked potato's and baked beans for dinner that night. We threw it out back to see if the racoons would even eat it, 1 week later it was still laying in the woods.
4 years later, i can say i have improved my smokeing duties 10-fold, and the wife can even eat it now.

Just curious if any of you have had the same experience i had at the first time smoking meat.

 

[rbranstner]

Sounds like you had quite an experience your first time smoking. It makes for a good story that you and your wife can share and make fun of. I think the first thing I ever smoked was chicken legs. It is pretty hard to mess those up so I think over all my first smoke turned out ok. But I know for sure if I had not found this site I wouldn't be producing good Q like I am able to today. My wife and her parents just loved my smoked Q. My parents live further away so they don't ever get to taste it but that will change this summer when I bring up my UDS to their house.

 

[denver dave]

Had this brand new ECB still in the box because I had no idea what to do with it. My wife suggested I smoke a turkey for thanksgiving. I figured what the heck, I'll give it a try. It was not eatable. I new nothing about temp control or cooking times, fire went out a couple of times, Over seasons it something terrible and over cooked it. We could't eat the poor bird. My dog even turned her nose up and she would eat anything. (She ate the daughters crayolas and crapped in technicolor for a week.) There was some question if I would ever try to smoke something again. Luckily I did with much better results.

 

[brohnson]

LOL ;) Thats was a great story!

 

[ozark rt]

I remeber it was a butt that actually turned out pretty good. After coming on here an asking eleventy thousand questions these kind folks mentored me well.

 

[codymcgee]

country ribs on my unmodified charcoal ECB ...I'd rather not talk about it

 

[gregzee]

I remember my first smoke pretty well considering the amount of beer I consumed that day. (sorry if this is long)

On evening before halloween in 2003 i was in Walmart cruising through the grills and saw a sale that i couldnt say no to. I bought my first gas grill that night, i believe the brand was Feista, and in hind sight it was a POS.

I barely got it in the car, and that night i stayed up way past my bedtime putting it together.

The next day I went to work for a couple of hours and took the rest of the day off. On my way home, i filled the propane up and went to the meat store. I couldnt decide what to buy, but wanted to cook all day. The meat guy told me that i should cook a brisket, therefore i put a 13# whole packer in my cart and procedded to buy some wood smoking pellets.

I had no idea how to cook this thing, but after a couple of minutes on the internet, I had some new words in my vocabulary. With the aid lots of Foil, i set up my brand new, never been used grill for indirect smoking. I even made a custom built foil water pan (i was very proud of that.)

After realizing that i had no temp gauge on the grill, i found my meat thermometer and stuck it in the side of the grill to monitor the temp.

Over the course of the day, i maintain billowing puffy white smoke as i drink many many beers and watched monster movies on Sci Fi channel though our apartments back patio door.

After 12 hour at some temp over 200. i pulled and consumed as much as possible. I thought it was heaven, but my wife thought it sucked. Apparently the beers had effected my taste buds, because the next day it tasted horible.

All in all, i was a very fun day of smoking and drinking that eventually got me into smoking with an actual smoker and doing it well enough to be consumable.

 

[downstatesmoker]

I tried to make beef jerky on a Brinkmann bullet smoker. Turned the been into little charcoal strips.

Dumped the batch and didn't go back to smoking for 10 years.

 

[fatback joe]

My first was a ham with hickory wood for the smoke........17 long years ago. Turned out pretty good considering my knowledge level at the time.......probably got lucky that it was even edible let alone pretty good.

Second smoke was fish, went out to check on them and all the meat had fallen off the bone.........there was about 6 skeletons sitting on the grate and all the meat was in the bottom of the cooker. LOL Still laugh about that one........and still have no idea wtf went wrong.

 

[hogfan40]

ROFLMAO!!!!! Classic moments, kept them coming!!!

 

[mgwerks]

I remember my first - it was a brisket, at least when it started. I didn't know nothin' about nothin' way back then, but I knew it needed smoke. So, after staying up all night tending this offset, I made sure I kept the smoke going with select oak chiunks and nice green wood.

That was the most bitter meat I ever tasted! I must have gotten really good penetration, though, because I couldn't trim enough off to find any meat that wasn't horrible.

Ewww....

 

[silverwolf636]

I started out with burgers. Somethin cheap. lol. I had a propane grill that I converted to charcoal and would start the smoke on one side and cookem on the other. After a few attempts I got it right.
--ray--
(0||||0)

 

[solaryellow]

Mine was a turkey about 5 years ago. We usually invite all of our friends who are either single or hate their families over for Thanksgiving. Every year prior my wife struggled with how to get the turkey and sides done with a single oven. We had an offset smoker that I used for a charcoal grill so I stepped up to the plate and volunteered to smoke the turkey. I scoured the internet looking for recipes and ideas. I then made a plan and got up nice and early to get the turkey going. As it smoked it looked better and better. Then it reached that point where it went from looking good to not so good. By the end of the smoke the skin of the turkey was as black as my toes that had been frostbitten when I was a kid. Our friends were gathered around to dig into what looked to me like a giant turd. Luckily, it was just the skin. The meat was a little on the dry side but it had such a wonderful taste. We haven't used the oven for a turkey since although the condition of the skin and the moistness of the turkey is much improved over that initial try.

 

[rio_grande]

I remember before I had a half a clue, I had a ECB that I used to use lighter fluid to keep it lit, Never could get the temps up enough to cook much. the food always tasted like lighter fluid..... About 2nd smoke I had sprayed some lighter fluid into the door opening. Temp had not increased and was starting to fall. So I got mad and decided to finish the food n the oven. I jerked the lid off and got a quick lesson in how fire works..... BOOM burnt my eyebrows and re-trimmed my hair... Looked sun burnt for a week.

LOL, I threw the CB out with the trash and still have not cooked on one since,,, but I have learned a few things since that day...