Getting Started with a Large Big Green Egg

Dundee

Hello Team,

I am a convert from an electric Materbuilt that quite frankly, I loved.  I was moving to Germany and couldn't imagine running the Masterbuilt on an electric converter, so my wife, with all her brains and beauty, suggested the Egg.    So we bought it and shipped it unused in May 2019.  Here I am a little more than a year later, and I can say I do love it.  It makes ribs, roasts, turkeys, chicken and snacks every bit as well as the Masterbuilt, and the smoke flavor is the bomb.  

I was making some German pork pot stickers earlier this summer and ended up with a small fire that scorched the seal, and I replaced it with a Nomex seal from Amazon.  That was surprisingly easy and I will up and running again on the same day I go quickly.  https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B017XZLZEO/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o08_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I have read many forums that suggest that low and slow is possible in the 200F-220F range.  That is the target I have been looking for but I have only achieved stability around 250F-260F.

I have a DigiQ3 temperature controller because lets face it, I cam from an electric, so I love that kind of control.  Need or not, it does seem to work but my guess is that I have 2 problems.

1.  Maybe air is leaking around the fan on the DigiQ3?  
2.  The Lid Seal had e a leak in the back, that I have recently fixed and tested  with heavy smoke.  The seal is sealed.  I basically loosened all the lid screws on the strap, and while applying slight up-pressure on the lid strap, I retighted all the screws ensuring I could see a little of the green ceramic in the gap.

I cannot fix #1 but I believe I have fixed #2.

Confirm that these two items could be the culprit?

Also, I am considering the recommendations of other posters that changing the way I start it might also provide a more stable low temp.  This was simply to start s lump or two in the front, close it up with the DigiQ in place and on, and let it roll.  

This is is just my frustration from losing my throne as the BBQ Boss in my neighborhood and my Briskets have been consistently Not Exactly right.  I would love to hit 220 or lower.  Aaron Franklin's 275F seems crazy!

I do have a few good books/Tools.
Franklin Barbecue: A Meat-Smoking Manifesto [A Cookbook]
Smoke & Spice: Cooking With Smoke, the Real Way to Barbecue
Pink Kraft Butcher Paper Roll - 18 Inch x 175 Feet (2100 Inch) - Food Grade Peach Wrapping Paper for Smoking Meat of all Varieties - Unbleached, Unwax
Mydracas Lump Charcoal Fire Basket with Divider Big Green Egg Accessories,Stainless Steel Grill Ash Baskets for The Large Big Green Egg,Kamado Joe Classic

Big Green Egg Fire Bowl Charcoal Basket, large

HeavyG

Welcome to the forum!

How do you set your daisy wheel openings on the dome? Is it set so there are just very small openings in the holes? If not, try that. If the holes are barely open that will force the fan to do its thing to flow air to maintain the desired temp. With the holes barely open that also lessens the natural draft so even if the fan is not tightly sealed against the base air will be less likely to flow on its own thru the top.

As far as lighting it I would agree that for low temps you really just need to only light up a handful of charcoal to get things going.

Dundee

HeavyG, Thanks and good question.  I have gone from full open to a sliver.  Sliver gives the best low temp, around 250F, and wide open can soar to 290F+.   In fact, I put the suffocating ceramic cap on and it still didn't go below 250F.  That is why I think air is being sucked past the fan on the DigiQ, because it is powered, but not running.  And on that cook, the seal was leaking which is now fixed.  During a daytime cook, I don't really need the DigiQ, but on overnights, it is my pacifier.  On my next cook, which will be daytime beef ribs, I will use the DigiQ and see if the seal works.  I was planning to use 275F but that wont test low and slow, so I will try a lot of basting, and 225F and up to 12 hours with a 1/4 of the daisy wheel open or less.

WeberWho

Welcome!

You should be able to hit 225 degrees on your BGE. Especially if you have DigiQ to lock the temperature in with. It sounds like your egg may have an air leak somewhere.

You might try the "dollar bill test" to check for any gaps.

https://eggheadforum.com/discussion/660308/dollar-bill-test-for-the-type-a-personality

You might want to double check and recalibrate your temperature gauge if you haven't already. 

Honestly, 225 degrees is really low for low and slow cooking. 250-275 is ideal. 

Brisket is really hard to compare from one cook to another. It's different every single time. The cow drives the cook. So time and internal temp will always be skewed as it's different on every brisket. 

If you can hit 250-275 degrees you're golden. I wouldn't personally worry about anything lower. You won't find a different in taste/texture from 225 to 250 degrees. The 25 degrees is miniscule with low and slow. I wouldn't sweat it personally. 

Dundee

WeberWho, thanks I will try to Dollar Bill test, but as I said, my seal had a big smokey leak in the back near the hinges but I fixed and tested it after that cook.  My dependency on low and slow came from a technique I tried successfully with my Masterbuilt.  I made hundreds of briskets that were incredible on that sucker.  No, I didn't have a lot of bark, and no I didn't have a lot of smoke ring, but consistency and best ever reviews by my other friends with other products (including EggHeads/TreagerHeads/WeberHeads) made it a tried and true technique.  But that was all done at 190F for 19-22 hours with a Texas Crutch.  And truth be known, I have tried to find good brisket in Germany is pert near impossible.  That technique was born of the Salt Lick BBQ in Driftwood Texas.

jazimmerman

Check the air flow valve on your Digi-Q blower. I’ve found that i need to close it down to under half open to maintain lower temps.

Dundee

jazimmerman, interesting thought!  I looked at in with the look of a puzzled mouse in a cheese maze wondering if I should try that.  But yes, I think it will work.  I will let you know.

MO_Eggin

I haven't used my controller in a while (it's "safely stored" in an unknown box since a move a few years ago), but I always had trouble keeping temps below 250-ish when using it, vs being able to maintain with 225 without.  

sumoconnell

I have to close off the fan opening quite a bit on my controller too- with the fan not running, it leaves too big of an opening

Have fun!  I'm missing Oktoberfest this year, had two tables lined up when it was cancelled. (wine tent and bratwurst)

johnmitchell

Welcome

lousubcap

Welcome aboard and enjoy the journey.  Above all, continue to have fun. 
No help with the mastering of the controller, but I will echo @WeberWho 's comments about running with a higher temperature (on a calibrated dome thermo) and the outcome is just as impressive.  FWIW-

Dundee

Thanks Everyone, I will check all advice above and let you know.  This is a work in progress but I know this is not a fire and forget toy.  With time, and success, confidence will build.  Endurance and repetition of successful techniques is the key.  

jtcBoynton

I would suggest rethinking why you want to cook at such low temps. Ceramic cookers are a different animal than metal offset cookers. Learn about smoke quality. We use smoke as a flavoring and not all smoke tastes good. It is extremely hard to produce quality smoke in a ceramic cooker at low temps. Easier at moderate cooking temps and other benefits also. The Jamison book is great but they are coming from the view of offset cookers and a time before higher cook temps were accepted. 

fishlessman

i used to keep it as low as 170 for jerky, one trick is not opening the dome. going from an electric and basting may be carrying over to the egg out of habit. the majority of us dont baste during low and slows. everytime you open the dome you are letting in more oxygen and spiking the fire up at the same time. never used a controller so no help there

Dundee

jtcBoynton said:

I would suggest rethinking why you want to cook at such low temps. Ceramic cookers are a different animal than metal offset cookers. Learn about smoke quality. We use smoke as a flavoring and not all smoke tastes good. It is extremely hard to produce quality smoke in a ceramic cooker at low temps. Easier at moderate cooking temps and other benefits also. The Jamison book is great but they are coming from the view of offset cookers and a time before higher cook temps were accepted. 

I agree entirely, that is what this thread is about.  I have read several books, on the quality of smoke.  My Masterbuilt was actually a good example, it cooked with a heating element, and flavored wood was added to produce smoke.  It worked, but as you know, there was little bark, and no smoke ring.  Not enough real wood burning to produce the NO2 and then react with the proteins.  So this is just my experimental phase, explore the envelope as we said during my flying days.  There is rarely one best way that works every time.  When I retire, I may build a massive offset using a couple old propane bottles on my property, but for now, I will play with the green egg, drink beer, and host some great block parties.  So low and slow is a carry over from my Masterbuilt, and will not last long in my repertoire.  While my Large BGE is well sealed now, and my seasoned Oak cup runneth over, I will smoke at whatever temperature produces crisp quality smoke.

Dundee

Let me first thank all that have commented on this thread.  I have had a few good brisket smokes and techniques are improving.  For one, the idea of choosing the DigiQ fan about half way worked like a charm.  No more air rushing by the fan and jLMKust enough air for precise temperature control.   Second, since the German beef, probably French beef where I live is mostly grass fed, it is very dry, almost to a fault.  Well after many failures, I tried a small brisket today that worked perfectly.  Here is what I did.  

The brisket was small, approximately  4 lbs,
Overnight I let the fully trimmed brisket rest in a zip lock bag with olive oil.  
This morning,  I set the brisket out to take the chill  off of it and went out to start the Green Egg by filling it and packing the all natural starters under the front few inches of lump coal and lit them.  I also fired up the DigiQ and went in to season the meat.

Simple rub of paprika, onion powder, Garlic powder, cayenne pepper, and good coat of course black pepper.

The fire came up to 250-275F within 45 min and stayed there throughout the cook.  The brisket went on at 8 am.

My failures in the past were probably pushing to 195-203F internal which does work when the poke test confirms the button sensation, but with this meat, that never seemed right.

So this time, I decided to wrap as soon as a good bark formed,around 150F at the 2.5 hour mark.

The stall began at approximately 4 hours and like clockwork, the temperature spiked at 6:15 hours.  The poke test was good, and the internal temp was 183F.  Into the cooler it went at 2:30 pm

At 6pm, I unwrapped it and cut it.  Best yet in Deutschland. 

lousubcap

That is a thing of beauty.  Congrats on nailing the cook.  However you get there is all that matters.  Impressive.  I would inhale some of that.  

Photo Egg

Dundee said:

jazimmerman, interesting thought!  I looked at in with the look of a puzzled mouse in a cheese maze wondering if I should try that.  But yes, I think it will work.  I will let you know.

You might even need to close it down to 1/4 open to hit the low temps you want.
also, bring you temp up slowly. Especially when using Guru. The fan can stoke the fire more than needed. After your ceramics and cold meat temp stabilizes, it takes very little fire to hold low temps. It’s easy to initially start out to hot. This is not an issue with electric box smoker.

I also think once you find a good source for brisket, you will get the results you want or better cooking at 230-250 on the Egg. You will find the way that works for you. It’s obvious you understand all the mechanics.
Have fun, but don’t try and carry over everything from your electric cooker. Grill types have their own unique characteristics.