Newbie question...

Unknown

I recently acquired a 30 year old Hibachi pot that was my father-in-law's. I plan on attending Eggfest 2006 in Waldorf and buying one of the large demo BGE's. In the meantime I want to use this one to get some experience under my belt.[p]I wanted to know if it is alright to do a load of pork butt without having a drip pan. I plan on getting the plate setter with the new one, but didn't want to go through the trouble of rigging up something on this cooker if it will work adequately without.[p]Any drawbacks to not doing an indirect cook with the drip pan? Mess? Hard to control fire? No problems...??? I've read up on a lot of websites, especially nakedwhiz, so I think I have the the basics, but wanted to know what to expect without a drip pan and indirect cooking.[p]I've done butts before but it was on a Brinkman water smoker, results weren't too bad. Which is why I plan on moving up and getting the BGE. So I've had some experience, but not with this type of cooker. [p]Sorry for ramblin' on.[p]thanks!
fred

stike

Fred Smith,
without going indirect, you'll have some part of the butt firectly exposed to the radiant heat of the coals, which is actually much higher than your dome temp. that runs the risk of that exposed part burning to a crisp over the length of a twenty hour cook.[p]some sort of indirect set-up is a must for that long a cook, i'd think. you can do a raised grid perhaps. on your regular grid, put a pizza stone (which will soon become YOUR pizza stone, and no longer the wife's). then maybe a couple bricks (which don't really need to be fire bricks in this case) as spacers to hold up a second grid, on which your meat will rest.[p]

fishlessman

Fred Smith,
if your old Hibachi pot is a kamado style cooker, i would atleast put a pan between the butt and the fire, i wouldnt beleive that you would need to add wter to it if you kept it closed, but you would need some type of barrier to protect the bottom of the meat from the heat of the fire. there isnt enough distance between the fire and the butt to not have a barrier IMO to cook that long directly. is your Hibachi pot some type of kamado similar to an egg

Unknown

fishlessman,
The cooker that I have looks identical to the large BGE, same measurements... It orange and green. I was thinking about setting up another rack below the original one with a small pizza stone and a drip pan. I was worried about burning the meat without, but didn't want to jury rig something if I could get away without it. [p]Like I said, after May, I'll have my new BGE and all the accessories, I just wanted to get a few cooks under my belt with this one and will keep it around to use in addition to my BGE. [p]I've read that I don't want to get this one real hot or it would crack.[p]It looks like I'll be at the home depot rigging up a drop rack for this setup.[p]thanks for the info!!!
fred

Unknown

stike,[p]Thanks for the info!! I figured I would risk burning the bottom. Like I said in my earlier reply, I'm going to rig up a drop rack and use a pizza stone and drip pan. And I'll make sure I buy another stone, the one we have in the house is just getting right after about five years of constant use, my wife would kill me if that ended up being my smoker stone... [p]fred

AZRP

Fred Smith,
I learned to cook pork shoulders on a 55 gal drum stood upright. Coal was at the bottom with the grate two thirds the way up the drum. This put the meat at least 2 feet above the heat. Even with that distance we turned the meat every 30 minutes to avoid burning. If it is an Egg type cooker, I think indirect is the way to go. You don't want to be opening it that much. -RP

thirdeye

Fred Smith,[p]A high school buddy was given one of those cookers in the 70's and it still is cookin' today. He is cautious about building only low temp fires and he recently bought a BGE platesetter which works great. Prior to that he rigged up a raised grate and used a deep dish pizza pan with sand in it on the regular grate. It acted as a heat shield and a drip pan all in one. After the sand went in, the pan was covered with foil to avoid any blowing sand when opening the cooker. (We live in Wyoming) A lot of folks using WSM's use sand instead of water in their pans.[p]A large BGE will be a great addition to this cooker![p]~thirdeye~

WessB

Fred Smith,
Not to side step your questions......I work in the Plant Sciences bldg. and live in College Park....where are you at, might have to have you over for some feed. I looked at your e mail addy...[p]Wess