Smoking meat

[megamonster805]

plus one on the smoked deer jerky 1/4 " thick 150 deg for 4 hours on the green mountain grill crazy good

 

[ArcherAdam]

I just got into smoking last year and after having elk meat I don't know how I can eat whitetail without smoking it anymore.

I experimented with bratwurst and needless to say I will be making more!

I found a recipe online and then developed a variant--shredded cheddar in the mix and a bottle of octoberfest beer and let it sit overnight in the fridge before casing. It turned out fantastic!

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[DroptineDC18]

Waltons Inc has lots of good spice kits as well as their meatgistics information pages that is helpful. Curley’s meats out of Iowa makes some good kits that are fairly foolproof as well. As mentioned before, Hank Shaw has a good book or two that should be on your shelf.

 

[Dan74]

I have a pit boss smoker now and that is smoking made easy. I had a regular smoke for years and decided to get an electric two years ago. I love the pit boss because anyone can smoke on it.

Slow is the key to smoking. Brine is the key to keeping meat moisten and butter.
As seasoning goes it's depends on the person.

I have always enjoyed smoking you gain so much flavor and the long you do it the better you get.
Smoked boston butt is hard to beat.

 

[HoughLePuff]

Jump on Hank Shaw’s Honest Food website and see what he has for smoked venison and start there. He’s a pretty solid source. There may be a pastrami recipe on there too that’ll tickle your fancy.

Are you looking for a smoker too? If so, a Grilla Silverback pellet grill works awesome here at home. We have a Pitboss at work that’s been heads and shoulders above a Traeger. Rectec and Green Mountain make good pellet grills too.

I am in the market for a pellet smoker. I am strongly considering a traeger. My buddy has one and I have eaten plenty of steaks and burgers off of it. He loves his but I have seen a lot of people say other brands are better. What makes the Pitboss better than the traeger?

 

[PNWGATOR]

The Traeger we had at work was a made in China model that simply was plagued with reliability issues despite it being well maintained, stored under cover and fed quality pellets. It would over and underfeed pellets before and after adjusting the P setting. Cooks would go out. Cooks would turn into a pellet inferno. Customer service from Traeger was good, but the issues were never resolved with this unit and it was a good day when the owner of the pellet grill got reassigned and took it with him. Flip side of this personal experience is that I have several friends with Traeger brand grills that have had no issues.

The pit boss we have now has been consistent. It simply works as any pellet grill should. Turn it on, set the temp and walk away. We have had to replace the igniter within the first year. Pit Boss customer service was great and the igniter was delivered for no charge.

Personally, I own a Grilla Silverback and it’s been fantastic. Use it regularly and it’s been awesome with zero issues over the last several years.

 

[HoughLePuff]

The Traeger we had at work was a made in China model that simply was plagued with reliability issues despite it being well maintained, stored under cover and fed quality pellets. It would over and underfeed pellets before and after adjusting the P setting. Cooks would go out. Cooks would turn into a pellet inferno. Customer service from Traeger was good, but the issues were never resolved with this unit and it was a good day when the owner of the pellet grill got reassigned and took it with him. Flip side of this personal experience is that I have several friends with Traeger brand grills that have had no issues.

The pit boss we have now has been consistent. It simply works as any pellet grill should. Turn it on, set the temp and walk away. We have had to replace the igniter within the first year. Pit Boss customer service was great and the igniter was delivered for no charge.

Personally, I own a Grilla Silverback and it’s been fantastic. Use it regularly and it’s been awesome with zero issues over the last several years.

Thanks for the detailed response! When investing a good chunk of change into a smoker I figured it's best to do as much research as possible. It's nice to hear from someone that has experience with a handful of brands.

 

[Steve from GA]

I have a lot of experience with smoking meats, but none with wild game. Here's one thing I do know - prolonged smoking/heat tends to dry out lean meats. Pork butts for instance do great, because they're full of fat. Given that game meats are very low in fat, I'm still having trouble picturing how one ends up with a juicy final product. Brining does seem like a decent solution, but I would love to hear about other tricks for how one would turn a lean roast into tender, juicy, smoky goodness.

 

[Dan74]

I have a lot of experience with smoking meats, but none with wild game. Here's one thing I do know - prolonged smoking/heat tends to dry out lean meats. Pork butts for instance do great, because they're full of fat. Given that game meats are very low in fat, I'm still having trouble picturing how one ends up with a juicy final product. Brining does seem like a decent solution, but I would love to hear about other tricks for how one would turn a lean roast into tender, juicy, smoky goodness.

I personally after brining inject the meat with lots of butter and also keep it in a pan with a foil tent to hold moisture in. I also keep smoker at lowest temperature setting. I do finish meat on direct grill for around ten minutes. You do have to monitor more closely than pork or fatty meats. To not over cook or let get dry.

 

[Hootsma]

You’ve gotten a lot of great suggestions, but they were in all kinds of different directions. I think you need to first narrow down your cooking method, because there are a lot of choices as evidenced in this thread. You can go with a traditional offset barrel stick burner smoker, a charcoal ceramic setup (think Big Green Egg or Komodo Joe), an electric, a propane or a pellet. And I’m sure there’s a couple others styles of smoking that I’m missing, but you get the point.

I just recently went through this process and a buddy of mine made it easy to decide with just a few simple questions. It’s obvious you like to eat BBQ, but do you like to actually BBQ. Does the whole process of monitoring the meat and your cooking apparatus interest you or are you wanting a simple set it and forget it setup? And most importantly, do you like playing with fire? If so, then you can’t beat a good offset stick burning barrel smoker. If you want a set it and forget it setup, then the pellets are your go to. If you want somewhere in between, then the electrics or ceramics are for you. You can even get an aftermarket fan/thermostat kit for the ceramics and turn it into a set it and forget it setup that uses charcoal.

The sky is the limit, you just need to figure out what cooking system suits your preferred cooking style and expectations and budget and go from there.

 

[Chesapeake173]

I’ve been using a Kamado style (vision) for the last year or so. I love it for direct grilling as well as smoking , but I went and bought a Pit Boss pellet smoker yesterday and here’s why.

I was never able to keep a consistently low (200 or so) temp with the kamado. No matter what I tried it always got too hot.

It takes a fair amount of playing around o get it to the temp you want and keep it there. Life gets in the way and I just didn’t have the time to babysit it.

Size. I’ve gotten into doing more sausage and jerky and the kamado just didn’t have the surface area to dry it (also see above for heat control).

So we’ll see how the pellet grill goes. I’ll keep the kamado and use for certain cooks but I’m excited to “set it and forget it”.


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[Mike Islander]

Smokin-It Smoker Model #1. Made in USA. 100% stainless. $379 delivered. Electric, so zero fuss. Comes with a great recipe book. Since I got mine my BIL and nephew each got one. We love them!

 

[jrbarnes9972]

I do not, nor have ever owned an electric smoker. But I would suggest a pellet style grill. I personally have a pit boss that I can smoke meats on ( I've done squirrel and some game birds, no big game yet). I see the advantage of that type of grill being that if I can open the broiler plate I can just grill hot dogs, hamburgers, etc.

I see it as the best of both worlds, but truthfully I'm still a rookie!

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