Cold weather cooks

Deviledegger

It's been a damn cold week but I've managed to get a few good simple cooks in. Sometime this weekend I plan on doing some pork shoulder to use in baked beans. All on the egg of course. It's supposed to be a warm weekend. Well, above zero anyways. The average temp. For dinner this week is probably around -5. With -12 being the coldest!

Duganboy

I admire your pictures and your toughing out the cold weather.  I confess, I don't use my BGE nearly as much in the winter, because I just despise being out in the cold.

I much prefer to be sitting on the deck reading, drinking and relaxing while the BGE is working magic.

Deviledegger

I'm not as likely to cook the high maintenance meals or sit next to the grill and drink a cold toddie. I have figured out how to enjoy a cold bevarage in the comfort of a warm house. I'm sure you all can believe that!

jfm0830

Good for you!! Our winter has been milder than normal until last week. Your weather is about 10 degrees colder than what we've had here this winter. Coldest we've had (and I've grilled in) is -3. There is something surreal about hearing the sizzle of a stir-fry grilling with the lid up in -3 degree temperatures. What I like about the Egg as opposed to grilling in Winters past, is you are not trying to decide if you want to get all dressed up only to end up fighting with your grill or smoker to try to get something out of it. Now I know the Egg is up to it, and the only question is am I?

I'm curious on the pizzas: Do you find you need to add in a little extra time when you let all that sub-zero air in putting the pizza in the Egg?

Jim

brimee

I am in a much warmer climate so I have a question to ask of these cold cooks...

 

When you take your food off of the grill and take it in the house (assuming you dont have a picnic next to the grill) what do you do to keep it from freezing solid? Do you have to reheat it once inside?

 

gerhardk

One of my favourite features of the egg is the ability to cook during the cold weather.  I have a spot that is sheltered from the prevailing wind but at least 200' from the house and I have never had a problem with food getting cold from egg to house.  Last night made chicken legs and they were hot enough to burn the roof of mouth.

Gerhard

Deviledegger

Jim- I have been noticing my pizzas taking an extra 7-8 minutes. I had contributed this to not cleaning the egg in a few cooks. When its cold i have a tendency to just throw fresh coal in and go. Unless I'm cooking for a while.
I haven't had any issues with the food getting cold before its in the house. I am however very impressed with the performance of the BGE. Nobody can believe I grilled out all week. The neighbors think I'm crazy!

AlbertaEgger

Brimee - I have grilled in -25c many times (-13F), never an issue keeping the food hot from grill to the kitchen, however, keeping your drink from freezing while grilling is a differant story, you have to drink much quicker.... Today however we have a nice heat coming through i'll be grilling in -2C (28F) so no issues with the drinks getting to frosty... I have to say, it is a lot easier to keep the grill to temp on this egg then any other bbq i have ever used in the winter.

jfm0830

Deviledegger said:

Jim- I have been noticing my pizzas taking an extra 7-8 minutes. I had contributed this to not cleaning the egg in a few cooks. When its cold i have a tendency to just throw fresh coal in and go. Unless I'm cooking for a while. I haven't had any issues with the food getting cold before its in the house. I am however very impressed with the performance of the BGE. Nobody can believe I grilled out all week. The neighbors think I'm crazy!

@Deviledegger I know what you mean about the neighbors. I am often the talk of our neighborhood holiday party I'll get introduced and some will say: "Oh yeah you're that crazy guy that grills in the middle the winter."

Another question for you if I may. It was in the mid to high teens when I grilled my coldest weather pizza. And it actually cooked in the normal amount of time. I'm curious about your set up. When you cook pizzas do you let the pizza stone heat for 30 minutes at your designated cooking temperature? When my pizza didn't take any more time, I attributed the fast recovery to having everything stabilized for 30 minutes before I cook. The two pizza stones I have both recommend a 30 minutes preheat.

@brimee I have about 20 feet between my grill and my kitchen door, so I don't find any problems with the food cooling off provided I take precautions. In the warm weather I'll often bring a dish to land the cooked food on out to the grill with me. In the cpold weather I don't do this, I don't think it would do the food any good to go from the hot grill to a plate that's 15 or 20 degrees. So for things other than a stirfry I'll run into the kitchen and grab a plate just as I'm getting ready to take the food off the grill. This way here the plate doesn't have time to cool off. For Stir-Fry's you need to be out there stirring the whole time, so there's no time to make a last-minute dash to the kitchen. So all I do is take the wok off about 30 seconds before I think it's done. It takes me that long to get into the house and the food keeps cooking in the wok while I bring it into the house. Once inside I plate it immediately. I've gotten pretty good at gauging when my Stir-Fry's are 30 seconds from being done.

RAC

Not sure how ya'll do it. It's been around 80 here all week

Deviledegger

I use a platesetter legs down with a preheated pizza stone (heat it while egg gets up to temp). I keep stone on BGE feet and up off the PS. Cooking between 450-550*f (shooting for 500 but don't care too much). Then I usually plan on pulling pizza in the 12 minute zone, however I will check pizza through the daisy wheel with a flashlight and make judgement call if it needs more time or not. The time that I ran long was about a 20 minute cook. One thing different about that cook was i put cheese on about 7 minutes in because I wanted mushrooms and peppers to cook a bit more and thought that this might be the way. After 20 minutes the cheese would have burned for sure but I got lucky on that one (by chance). I am also learning that my dome temp is running around 35* hotter than my grate. So that might be something also. Not sure the differance a in warm weather because I just got thermoworks tw8060 for Xmas.

jfm0830

@Deviledegger thanks for the detailed reply. The reason I asked is I had a feeling you didn't let the stone heat for an additional 30 minutes after youi've reached your desired cooking temperature. 

Both my pizza stones suggested doing this, and I have a feeling it's also the reason why don't have a recovery issues in the cold weather. I was rather surprised that my pizzas are cooking in the same kind of timeframe in January as they were in August. I also think that is why when I cook three or four pizzas, the right time for the first is also the right time for the last. I also think that 30 minutes of additional heating evens out the temperatures on the stone which is why I've never had to turn my pizzas.

Like I said earlier, I'd also standardize on a temperature that you like the best and then start fine-tuning the time at that temperature. That way you'll get consistent results every time. The less things I have to think about when I'm cooking up a bunch of pizzas, the better. I now know that at 600° 5 1/2 minutes is about perfect time

BigWings

I cooked ribs last week on a day that hit -40 with the windchill. It was only about -32 but cold enough that they closed the schools here. Everything turned out fine, but I think the residual steam from the eggs caused some issues. I went out yesterday to cook some chicken only to find the lid had frozen shut.

The egg cooks fine in cold weather, but spring can't come fast enough!

Deviledegger

jfmo830-Thanks for the info. I will defiantly start to hone in on time/temp. Because I have nephews coming to Vt. From Texas and they are excited for a pizza party on the egg. Also how do you do the @jfm0830 thing at start of conversation. Not real tech saavy if you can't tell.
BigWings- amen to that. I am looking forward to tolerable weather at least.

jfm0830

@Deviledegger. Simply type the user name with the "@ sign in front of the name. BTW if you look at your last post, one referral worked & one didn't. The one that didn't come out right is because you used a o" not a "0" (zero) in my user name.

I haven't figured out a way to do a referral where you directly type a name that has a space in it. I tried the underscore "_" character but that doesn't seem to work. What does seem to work is going to the top of their message and copying their username and then paste it into your message and put an "@" sign in front of it.