Hi, new here from MA

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redoctobyr

Smoke Blower
Original poster
Jul 16, 2017
116
14
Northern MA
Hi all. I just joined, I have no smoking experience yet. I live in northen MA, not far from Boston.

After doing a bunch of reading here, I just ordered an electric smoker, a Gen1 digital Masterbuilt 30". Along with an AMNPS pellet tray, and 20 lbs of Lumber Jack Maple Hickory Cherry (MHC) pellets. I have an older Weber wireless digital grill thermometer which reads up to 199F, I'm hoping that will at least be enough to get me started, for monitoring internal meat temperature.

I already have a propane Weber grill, and a sous vide cooker. Elsewhere, I've read about some people combining smoking with sous vide, which sounds interesting.

I'm hoping to continue learning about smoking. And find some recipes suitable for beginners. Things I can't mess up too badly, and preferably somewhat straightforward to prepare. I'm not a purist (as evidenced by the electric smoker!), I'm fine with using purchased rubs, etc, vs making my own, at least to start.
 
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  Good morning and welcome to the forum from a beautiful sunny day here in East Texas, and the best site on the web.

        Lots of great people with tons of information on just about everything.

        Gary
 
Thanks for the welcome!

I got my smoker set up, and am looking forward to hopefully making something this weekend.
 
So I had my first smoking experience yesterday, it went pretty well. I got a dual-probe TP-20 wireless thermometer, to help me monitor what's going on. It showed that the smoker's temperature gauge is fairly accurate; if anything, it would run a little warmer than the setpoint.

I smoked some chicken sausage, and a rack of ribs, cut in half (all done at 225F). The sausages were fine, though not exceptional.

I tried the 3-2-1 method for the ribs, but I guess I didn't get something quite right. I read that they should reach an internal temperature of 195F. Mine got to about 175F by the time they came out of the foil. Then they dropped a lot after removing the foil, and adding sauce, I saw one probe get down to 155. I eventually re-wrapped them, and let the smaller half cook until they were around 175F. They were very tasty, but maybe a little too firm. The other half stayed in until reaching 195F. They seemed more tender, though I just tried a little piece. This ended up being about 7 hours for the first half, and 9 hours for the second half
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So I think either I should have just cooked by time, and ignored internal temperature, or I should have kept them in the foil until they reached around 190-195F. Live and learn! But I had fun, and the results were still enjoyable.

My AMNPS did well, though it apparently went out sometime after roughly 7 hours, I'm not sure why. I'll pull the chip tube out a bit next time, for more airflow.

I got a pork shoulder today, which I hope to try next weekend.
 
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