Hello to everyone, I found this forum a few weeks ago and have found it very helpful. With tips from here and youtube, I have managed to smoke decent butts (no connoisseur has ever tried them).
I Read the (few) posts on smoking in high-altitude. However, none even close to the altitude where I smoke. I have smoked maybe 10 times so far in an offset smoker, custom made (metal thickness is about 3mm - nothing too great, but pretty much what's available here without importing).
My main concerns are the following:
1. Time. I first started smoking at 240-250 as advised, but I had to use tiny pieces of wood to achieve a stable temperature (1/3'' thicknes, maybe 4'' long and 1'' wide) and add new (cannot even call it logs) pieces every 5 minutes or so. It's just a pain and took me 13-14 hours (without oven finish) to reach 152 (temperature at which I decided to wrap because otherwise the water evaporates and the meat is too dry in the end).
Question 1: would raising the smoking temperature to maybe 280 in the hopes to reduce the smoking time to 10 hours (without oven time), approximately, ultimately affect the quality of the meat?
2. Smoking 6 pork butts that take up the whole smoker space. I really haven't found anything regarding this. I understand that the more stable the temperature, the better the end-result. I know that the smoker has pretty much 3 different temperatures along the smoking chamber. However, I run a small business and can't smoke 2 pork butts per session because of the time it takes. I attached a pic and, as you can see, my smoker is pretty packed with 6 butts. I rotate the meats every 55 minutes because the temperature varies from close to the fire to furthest point by 35 degrees or so (A LOT). Rotating has allowed to (kinda) achieve an even cooking temperature for all the butts.
Question 2: For those of you who like me try to make things perfect, do you think this rotating process (smoker stays open for maybe 2-3 minutes while I spray, change positions and rotate the pork-butts) will affect the quality of the end result? The bark?
I appreciate any kind of help. I have so many more questions, but I don't want the post to be super long.
Cheers to everyone for sharing your knowledge and helping those of us who just started smoking!
I Read the (few) posts on smoking in high-altitude. However, none even close to the altitude where I smoke. I have smoked maybe 10 times so far in an offset smoker, custom made (metal thickness is about 3mm - nothing too great, but pretty much what's available here without importing).
My main concerns are the following:
1. Time. I first started smoking at 240-250 as advised, but I had to use tiny pieces of wood to achieve a stable temperature (1/3'' thicknes, maybe 4'' long and 1'' wide) and add new (cannot even call it logs) pieces every 5 minutes or so. It's just a pain and took me 13-14 hours (without oven finish) to reach 152 (temperature at which I decided to wrap because otherwise the water evaporates and the meat is too dry in the end).
Question 1: would raising the smoking temperature to maybe 280 in the hopes to reduce the smoking time to 10 hours (without oven time), approximately, ultimately affect the quality of the meat?
2. Smoking 6 pork butts that take up the whole smoker space. I really haven't found anything regarding this. I understand that the more stable the temperature, the better the end-result. I know that the smoker has pretty much 3 different temperatures along the smoking chamber. However, I run a small business and can't smoke 2 pork butts per session because of the time it takes. I attached a pic and, as you can see, my smoker is pretty packed with 6 butts. I rotate the meats every 55 minutes because the temperature varies from close to the fire to furthest point by 35 degrees or so (A LOT). Rotating has allowed to (kinda) achieve an even cooking temperature for all the butts.
Question 2: For those of you who like me try to make things perfect, do you think this rotating process (smoker stays open for maybe 2-3 minutes while I spray, change positions and rotate the pork-butts) will affect the quality of the end result? The bark?
I appreciate any kind of help. I have so many more questions, but I don't want the post to be super long.
Cheers to everyone for sharing your knowledge and helping those of us who just started smoking!