re: What type of smoker do you prefer?

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So do pellet grills though. Not to mention being able to forget about it overnight for 8 hours or so with the auto feed.

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I cooked a pork butt overnight a few weeks ago in my BGE and it only dropped 8 degrees over the 7 hours I was asleep.

It was my first overnight cook on the thing and I was surprised to see it held that well.

gonna do a brisket in my primo xl with a heatermeater and rotodampener3 tomorrow. gonna be wonderful.

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Tiger Ryno

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shots fired

I have primo XLs and have really liked them. Left them for 18hr cooks without issue and could have gone longer. I have also had the temp drop or rise too much but thats becasue I walked away before it was set and chugging along.

I would like to get a pellet smoker one day to do large amounts of meat and more set and forget.

Still love the primos tho!

Does the Yoder have WiFi capability for its PID controller? I really like the idea of being able to watch and control the smoking process from my phone.

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Does the Yoder have WiFi capability for its PID controller? I really like the idea of being able to watch and control the smoking process from my phone.

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I guess it eventually gets old, but I can’t imagine cooking with a flameboss or Egg-genius to control the temp with my phone. Half the fun is drinking and honing in the temp, imo.

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They are pretty much all PID controlers at this point,

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Only the high-end ones.

You're not going to find a Traeger, Camp Chef, GMG, Pit Boss, etc. with a PID controller...although there are plenty of 3rd party conversion kits, but those things ain't cheap.

My mistake

I tend to own too many smokers because I've found not one is perfect. That's why there is so much debate over which one is best because there is no best. They all make good meat you just need to learn their limitations and quirks.

Kamodo style ceramic/insulated: I think is the most versatile. You have to get a good seal so you can close all the dampers and kill the fire. Because of the insulation and thermal mass if you overshoot the temps they can be a PITA to bring the temps back down. There is a learning curve on how much fuel and how you arrange your fuel and damper positions for what temperature and how long you can cook. Once you learn how to control both high and low temperatures it's a one and done package who's only negative is surface area. Great for any meat Brisket to Butt to Chicken.

Horizontal stick burners: My least favorite type. You have to be good at tending a fire. There is always a temperature gradient from left to right so it's hard to avoid a hot spot. I've used a small grill sized up to a tow behind sized horizontal. Was always the most work to make BBQ.

Vertical Propane: I have two a small 18" wide one Great Outdoor Smokey Mountain and a 40" wide Masterbuilt. Out of the box the GOSM was cheap ($74 at WalMart maybe 10 years ago) and extremely versatile and didn't require any modification. The water pan was just the right size. The chip tray is a little on the small size so requires refilling more often but worked great. I've done everything from cold smoked salmon (175F) to Chicken (300-350F) in my 18". It needs to be just a hair wider or it would have been a perfect do everything smoker.

I bought a 40" wide Masterbuilt to do some high volume butt smoking. The water pan way way too small. The "just throw your wood right on top of the burner" wood tray did nothing but cause fires as all the fat dripped around and past the small water pan and flared up at the bottom. I drilled some extra holes to move the water pan down until it was as close to the burner as possible and used the water pan covered in foil to hold wood chunks (yay no more chips!) The bottom shelf I put in a big full sized sheet and used it as a water pan. Now I can comfortably cook 9 butts at a time and I can leave it running all night and not have to worry about fat dripping to the bottom causing a flare up or the water pan running out of water. It's a great smoker and if I had one complain is that it doesn't get hot enough for my liking to do chicken. I like to run my chicken with 20-30 minutes of heavy smoke at a low temp then I jack up the temps to 350 to finish and get the skin crispy. I hate rubbery chicken. Unit just will not run above 300 unless I take the water pan out then I get fat fires instead.



Traeger: Set and forget like the propane. Zero learning curve. You get more surface area over the Kamodo style but you lose the high temperature ability. I think maybe some non-traegers can get hotter but I don't have experience with those. Best I can do on my brother's is 450ish. You can do steaks at that temperature but I prefer hotter.

Electric: I have no experience with these but I do want one. I've been hoping to stumble across one on clearance and I'll pick one up. I wonder if they will get hot enough for my liking for chicken.

Crock Pot and/or instapot: Only reserved for pulled pork but you can make damned fine pulled pork in 1/2 to 1/4 the time. In the crock pot I'll 1/4 the shoulder cover it with rub and throw it in the pot (no water needed). 6 hours later take it out sprinkle with rub and scatter it over a hot fire with 2/3 charcoal and 1/3 of your favorite chunks of wood. You want to sizzle and crisp up the fat and slightly caramelize the rub on the surface of the meat. Doing it this way you get a ton of caramelized rub which is the best part of the butt. Your get a ton of good clean sweet smoke flavor with the meat scattered giving more surface area for the smoke instead of white bitter creosote smoke on the outside of dried out bark. You can do a butt in about 2 hours with way if you cube up your shoulder and stick it in the instapot with about 1/2 cup of water. I'll take my meat injector to pull the non-fat juice out of the bottom of the pot and add a little back into the meat after I've finished pulling it to give it an extra bit of juiciness you can't get off the grill. Hands down everyone prefers the butts done this way as you can just get way more flavor and juiciness you can't get off a long cook on a smoker. First couple of times I did it this way everyone would say how it was the best butt I'd cooked yet. So why the heck am I cooking them for 12+ hours then? Now all my single butts are done this way.

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You do any Ham & Egg on your smokers?

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I got the bag tag.

anyone seen one of these in person? nor really many reviews online except one dude on youtube.


amazon

Im looking for a vertical offset wood/charcoal burner. and i dont want to spend thousands. My Primo bangs out great meat.....but only one brisket or 2 butts at a time. I want more surface area. What ever i get i will be running my heatermeter with fan and dampener to control the temp.