just got an egg

McQ · February 26

hey yall i just got an egg and im looking for tips on pretty much anything. i used to sell them so i know alot about them but i have only cooked on them a couple times. i want to learn from people with experience cooking on them. i want to smoke something this weekend but i havent decided what i wanna cook. im kinda stuck between a pork shoulder or maybe beer can chikens. any recipes for either of these would be great.

FanOfFanboys · February 26

Welcome. This place is a Mecca of knowledge. Pork butt is easy and tasty cook. I would say spatchcock chicken over beer can. Tasty, easy, and awesome.

Fred19Flintstone · February 26

I agree with @FanofFanboys that a butt or spatchcock chicken is a good starting spot. This forum is great, but experience is your best teacher. Go for it! Welcome!

Griffin · February 26

Spatchcock chicken or chicken pieces would be the best place to start. Cheap and don't take as long. First long smoke, I would go with pork butt.

McQ · February 26

thanks i will probably try the spatchcock first. any tips or should i find a recipe on line?

jlsm · February 26

Welcome. 350-400 raised direct or indirect. Brine first if you have time. Grease up the bird then apply rub or herbs. For the crispiest skin, air dry in the fridge for 24 hours, but, quite frankly, I never plan far enough ahead for this. If you go raised direct, cut off all the fat you can before cooking. I even like the bird skinless.

Solson005 · February 26

First off welcome. where are you from and what size egg did you get?

Spatchcock is a great first cook and shows all your guests how much better chicken is cooked on the egg. Here is the Naked Whiz Spatchcock page. That website with this forum should be great at helping ease the learning curve to get cooking on the Big Green Egg. Just put whatever rub you like on it. If you have time try and leave it uncovered in the fridge overnight to help crisp up the skin. (Naked whiz goes more into it on his page)

Here is my pork butt post that I did last time, true low and slow Pulled Pork one day / Carnitas the next

Lots of people also do Turbo Butts cooking at a higher temp and not spending all day cooking. Lately there have even been people doing Nitro Butts here is a post from @MrCookingNurse where people talk about Turbo butt times

Ask questions and even though you will probably get many answers you can use one or a combination of them to create some great meals on the egg.

Here is information about Raised Direct and some FAQs

six_egg · February 26

Welcome McQ. I see Solson005 has you covered. Follow his advice and man will you be happy, happy, happy.

lousubcap · February 26

Welcome aboard and +1 for Solson005's post. As you know it is a game changer. The one bit of info that bit me with my first indirect cook on a BGE (that was not mentioned anywhere) is the calibrated dome to cooking grid temp off-set. The dome usually runs around 20-40*F hotter when starting out. (Gap closes the longer the dome is shut) My low&slow ribs took forever til I was enlightened. Enjoy the journey!

Charlie tuna · February 26

Although i never do, it would have been a whole lot easier for me if i would have concentrated on everything i did and how the egg reacted. Kind of like reading the instructions after everything is put together wrong!!! There is no stupid question here, we all learnt in many different ways since there are many ways to achieve great results using the egg. I have been egging for three years and learn things here on this forum daily. I am just now realizing after three years, that just me and the wife, can't eat all the food i keep cooking. And many meals we have been enjoying, can be improved by the recommendations of the great forum members. Glad to have you here and awaiting the pictures of some great cooks !!

MrCookingNurse · February 26

Does your egg have a great gasket or black?

Good advice @solson005

Skiddymarker · February 26

Welcome, you are about to receive information overload, smile and enjoy. ;))

scooter759 · February 26

I concur that spatch chicken is a great start. My first one blew my mind with it's simplicity and taste, very moist. I still do beer can chicken (Weber poultry cooker), but that's in the oven when I want the chicken/mashed potato/gravy thing.

YEMTrey · February 26

Welcome aboard. Prepare to get obsessed. You're about to change the way you eat forever.

calracefan · February 26

Welcome all good advice , enjoy you can't go wrong whatever you choose to start with !

Eggcelsior · February 26

Welcome to the cult. Don't forget the Nikes and purple shroud; they complement the Egg's color.

Mind the bourbon(Kool aid) talk. That stuff will kill you.

By the way, more Cowbell! What kind of cult did you think I was talking about?

500 · February 27

Welcome aboard. From here on out your clothes will smell like smoke.

smokinsooner · February 27

Welcome.... you might as well sell the oven in your kitchen....put a flat screen in there instead.

Aviator · February 28

Welcome aboard.

Start looking for a small egg.

:))

caliking · February 28

Howdy and welcome!

Many good points have already been mentioned. Some observations that I made when I first cooked with my large:

- the dome temp does differ from the grate temp, but my first cook or two I noted that the front of the grid (raised on a platesetter legs up) i.e. towards the handle was pretty close to what the dome temp was reading. However there was a significant hot spot towards the back of the grid (towards the hinge). My platesetter was set making a Y, with me standing in front of the egg (at the handle). Maybe this could have been avoided by placing one of the legs towards the hinge, with two legs on either side of the handle.

-instead of spatchcocking by cutting along the spine, I split the chicken in half by cutting along the breast as well, so you end up with two halves - a wing and leg on each. Chicken cooked quick, was easy to handle, and tasted just as good as the usual spatchcocked bird.

You're going to have a rockin' good time!

HogHeaven · February 28

McQ... Welcome. I to am a fairly new BGE owner. I got a large egg for Christmas this last December. I see the other guy's are giving you great imput. Let add this... You must know how to build a fire for a long, long cook. It is not wise to take a bag of lump and just pour it in until you fill up your fire box. There is a very important reason for picking and choosing big piece's of lump for the bottom of the fire box. You are trying to block ash and small pieces of lump fron blocking you air flow. After you have the bottom covered with you big lump, build the next level in medium size lump pieces. This too is intended to protect your air flow. Once you have your large and medium lump in place there should 3 or 4" of fire box left to fill. That is where you use up all of you small pieces of lump and the dust. For a long cook if you do like that you can cook over 24 hours without adding new lump. I just got done cooking 2 Boston butts yesterday. Before the cook I cleaned out my Egg completely. I even took out the fire box to clean up the ash that falls out the air holes. You would be surprised how much ash ends up there. Buy a small shop vac by the way that is so much easier than that rake they sell with the BGE. Anyway my cook this week was a 16 hour cook that I started the fire at 10:30pm on Monday night. I put the 2 butts on at 11:00pm and sat by the Egg to stabilize the cooking temp, not the dome temp. I always have a temp thermometer in the meet and another one within an inch or 2 of the meat to know what temp it is actually cooking at. I stabilized the cooking temp at 225 degrees and went to bed at midnight. I woke up Tuesday morning at 8:00am, got my morning joe and went out to see my egg. The cooking temp had fallen from 225 to 211. I turn the daisy wheel a little and watch it work back to 225. Me and the dog go out to get the paper and I sit inside where it is warmer and read the paper. I'd go out every hour or so to check my temps and make little adjustments. I wad determind to make this a NO PEEK, no Texas Crutch cook. I did open that lid once from 11:00pm Monday night until my temp thermometer said my meat was at 203 degrees. I knew what I was going to see when I opened the lid... 2 beautiful meteor like looking objects that looked like they had fallen on my grid from heaven!!! I looked at the lump that was left after that cook this morning. I used that thing they give you to scrape ash out of the bottom vent to move all the loose ash down out of the fire box just to see how much usable lump was left. I still had about 25% of lump I started with to use for my next cook. I repeat... Learning to know how to fill you fire box for a long burn is CRITICAL. Had I just poured coal in out of the bag, it probably wouldn't have burned for 16 hours. I learned that in an article on the nakkid whiz. Go there and click on recipes, then click on pork. The first thing listed is an article by a man called Elder Ward. He is famous for knowing how to cook butts in ceramic cooker's. Anyway... Welcome to the Egging world.

flemster · February 28

McQ said:

hey yall i just got an egg and im looking for tips on pretty much anything. i used to sell them so i know alot about them but i have only cooked on them a couple times. i want to learn from people with experience cooking on them. i want to smoke something this weekend but i havent decided what i wanna cook. im kinda stuck between a pork shoulder or maybe beer can chikens. any recipes for either of these would be great.

Welcome. I have been a quiet voyeur for sometime and learning from the posts. I say go get a pork shoulder this weekend and try the long slow cook. I believe it is the key reason I own and egg and it is the type of cook to master. there are too many great ideas on this forum to point you toward a single one. have fun with the experiments.

Chapsz28 · March 1

HogHeaven said:

McQ... Welcome. I to am a fairly new BGE owner. I got a large egg for Christmas this last December. I see the other guy's are giving you great imput. Let add this... You must know how to build a fire for a long, long cook. It is not wise to take a bag of lump and just pour it in until you fill up your fire box. There is a very important reason for picking and choosing big piece's of lump for the bottom of the fire box. You are trying to block ash and small pieces of lump fron blocking you air flow. After you have the bottom covered with you big lump, build the next level in medium size lump pieces. This too is intended to protect your air flow. Once you have your large and medium lump in place there should 3 or 4" of fire box left to fill. That is where you use up all of you small pieces of lump and the dust. For a long cook if you do like that you can cook over 24 hours without adding new lump. I just got done cooking 2 Boston butts yesterday. Before the cook I cleaned out my Egg completely. I even took out the fire box to clean up the ash that falls out the air holes. You would be surprised how much ash ends up there. Buy a small shop vac by the way that is so much easier than that rake they sell with the BGE. Anyway my cook this week was a 16 hour cook that I started the fire at 10:30pm on Monday night. I put the 2 butts on at 11:00pm and sat by the Egg to stabilize the cooking temp, not the dome temp. I always have a temp thermometer in the meet and another one within an inch or 2 of the meat to know what temp it is actually cooking at. I stabilized the cooking temp at 225 degrees and went to bed at midnight. I woke up Tuesday morning at 8:00am, got my morning joe and went out to see my egg. The cooking temp had fallen from 225 to 211. I turn the daisy wheel a little and watch it work back to 225. Me and the dog go out to get the paper and I sit inside where it is warmer and read the paper. I'd go out every hour or so to check my temps and make little adjustments. I wad determind to make this a NO PEEK, no Texas Crutch cook. I did open that lid once from 11:00pm Monday night until my temp thermometer said my meat was at 203 degrees. I knew what I was going to see when I opened the lid... 2 beautiful meteor like looking objects that looked like they had fallen on my grid from heaven!!! I looked at the lump that was left after that cook this morning. I used that thing they give you to scrape ash out of the bottom vent to move all the loose ash down out of the fire box just to see how much usable lump was left. I still had about 25% of lump I started with to use for my next cook. I repeat... Learning to know how to fill you fire box for a long burn is CRITICAL. Had I just poured coal in out of the bag, it probably wouldn't have burned for 16 hours. I learned that in an article on the nakkid whiz. Go there and click on recipes, then click on pork. The first thing listed is an article by a man called Elder Ward. He is famous for knowing how to cook butts in ceramic cooker's. Anyway... Welcome to the Egging world.

I don't know.. I throw the lump in from the bag... and I've cooked brisket for 22 hours.. Little chunks and all. I've smoked ribs and chickens until the ash built up to the fire grate... worked no problems... The egg is pretty fool proof if you ask me... no need to overthink things. Even easier if you get one of them bbq gurus.

dlk7 · March 1

Airflow through your lump is much less of an issue with a XL. It has a much wider fire grate and much bigger holes. Can usually dump and start with few problems.

McQ · March 2

sorry yall i dont have internet at home so i can only get on here when i have time at work (for some reason i cant get on the forum with my phone) to answer the questions i am from arlington texas, i have a large, and the gasket is grey. i played around with it last night and cooked some steaks. i can honestly say they were the best steaks i have ever had, so tender i could cut it with a fork (although it took a little work so i just went back to using a knife lol) and even though i cooked them medium instead of rare they still came out extremely juicy. thank yall for all the tips and advice i honestly never imagined this much help and suggestions. i will try to keep yall posted and if i can figure out how to get on here with my phone then i will post some pictures. thanks again!

chris123stock · March 3

Welcome, I love this place, I just look around and find out how to cook whatever I want. Just get ready for overload the knowledge here is incredible.

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