# "Food grade" pellets my eye!!



## radio (Feb 15, 2018)

I just now filled the hopper on my GMG with their  "premium Gold blend" and a flash of color caught my eye.  I plucked out a piece of pellet with a half inch long piece of red plastic attached to it.  I will most definitely be sending a pic to Hreen Mountain!!!!!
We pay big bucks for these (compared to heating pellets) so we supposedly have cleaner, safer smoke for our food!


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## tallbm (Feb 15, 2018)

Interesting.  Have you looked through the rest of the bag for any other similar ones?


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## radio (Feb 15, 2018)

tallbm said:


> Interesting.  Have you looked through the rest of the bag for any other similar ones?



That was the last of the bag, but I did dig through the hopper looking for more but did not find any.  I have an e mail in to GMG, so will see what they say about it.  I was surprised to see there is no lot number or anything on the bag should a recall have to be issued


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## SonnyE (Feb 15, 2018)

Maybe a FREE bag is in order?

In the 1970's a friend of mine got a can of liquid baby formula with a solder bead rattling around in it.
He wrote the company and they sent him a profuse apology, and a _*case*_ of formula. (Back when a case was 24. Remember those days?)


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## Rings Я Us (Feb 15, 2018)

Some house gave that out for Halloween one year.:D


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## SonnyE (Feb 15, 2018)

I hope that isn't Old Joe at the plants lost denture.... :eek:


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## radio (Feb 15, 2018)

Just heard back, and they indeed offered a free bag of pellets.  I replied and asked if they wanted me to send the plastic to them so perhaps they could identify the source and prevent any further contamination.  Interesting to see what they say.


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## SonnyE (Feb 15, 2018)

radio said:


> Just heard back, and they indeed offered a free bag of pellets.  I replied and asked if they wanted me to send the plastic to them so perhaps they could identify the source and prevent any further contamination.  Interesting to see what they say.



Woo-Hoo!
Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner! :D


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## mneeley490 (Feb 15, 2018)

Interesting. I just bought a bag of those last weekend. I'll keep my eye out for any foreign contaminates.


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## radio (Feb 15, 2018)

mneeley490 said:


> Interesting. I just bought a bag of those last weekend. I'll keep my eye out for any foreign contaminates.




I'm reasonably sure this was an isolated incident.  They sent my pics to the plant manager and may or may not want me to send the plastic in question.
It's just interesting that you hear so many people swear pellets produced for pellet grills are so much safer and contaminate free than premium heating pellets.  In 10 years and hundreds of bags of heating pellets, I have yet to see anything remotely resembling plastic as I was filling the hopper.  :cool:


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## ross77 (Feb 15, 2018)

Just so you are aware, there is no such thing as a 'food grade' pellet standard.  There is only a standard for heating pellets which requires them to be free of fillers and junk like what you found.  There is no certification for food grade.

Food grade or BBQ or cooking pellets is just a marketing term.  There is nothing wrong with using premium grade hardwood heating pellets.  You just won't know which hardwoods make up the pellets.


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## hondabbq (Feb 16, 2018)

I emailed the "governing" body in Canada regarding the use of either pellet.  

Here is the emails.


Damian there are Canadian standards. The pellets used for grilling are the same as for heat except some manufacturers will use American hardwoods for supposed smokey flavour. I have tried all types and can’t tell the flavour difference apart. I use regular heating pellets in my own home grill as do my industry colleagues. They are much less expensive. 

(Please excuse brevity - sent from mobile phone)


 On Nov 9, 2017, at 4:43 AM, Damian Belanger <
Hi Gord,





I have been reading a lot about wood pellets lately. 



I recently bought a pellet grill and am divisive about the costs of pellets for heating compared to grilling.



Is there a Canadian governing body that regulates the processes and or materials used in either product?



Is there a standard for just the heating pellets in Canada?


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## hondabbq (Feb 16, 2018)

You can find the standards on page 6 of the document at this link.  https://www.pellet.org/CANplus/documents/WPACST03.pdf



You can use hardwood or softwood pellets for your grill.  I live in BC where our pellets are mostly made from pine, spruce, balsam, and Douglas fir.  The ones I use are mostly pine.  Canadian wood pellets are 100% pure wood with no additives or binders, so contamination is not a concern.



Marketers of heating pellets charge more because people use smaller quantities, the packaging is fancier, and they promote exotic woods claiming that the flavours are unique.  Most people that only grill occasionally are not too concerned about the fuel cost.  I leave the flavouring for you to judge.  I can’t tell the difference and I have tried them all.  So I use heating pellets for grilling, and so do all my pellet industry industry colleagues.  In fact, we even use heating pellets when putting on barbecues at our annual conferences where we have international delegates attending from Europe and Asia.



I would prefer if you don’t quote me on this because the marketers of grilling pellets would not be very happy with me telling you this.


Yes I did quote him but I left his name out of the posts and purposely left out the name of the organization that I emailed.


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## ross77 (Feb 16, 2018)

I personally would not use softwoods like pine in my grill.


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## hondabbq (Feb 16, 2018)

Why?


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## hondabbq (Feb 16, 2018)

ross77 said:


> I personally would not use softwoods like pine in my grill.



Why?


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## ross77 (Feb 16, 2018)

Pine resin and you’ll get creosote when you burn it. It’s not a pleasant taste IMO. I suppose if you’re cooking at high heat it may not matter but no way would I smoke any raw meat with pine or similar woods. 

Pine and other softwoods also burn hot and fast so you’ll burn through them faster than hardwoods. 

Do a search on this forum. There are many threads discussing the usage of pine. 


I would stick with premium hardwood pellets.  I’ve tried a couple bags of premium hardwood pellets and they worked fine but I prefer the smoke flavor from 100% hickory pellets. I use Lumberjack which only contains hickory with no other filler woods. 

Some might not be able to tell the difference but I’ve noticed it when using non-blended pellets vs blends.


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## radio (Feb 16, 2018)

hondabbq said:


> Why?


Pines and such have a gummy sap known as Rosin which is what Turpentine is made from.  Softwood pellets burn much quicker and produce more ash than hardwood pellets.  Softwood pellets have a somewhat acrid smell when burning which I would not want on my BBQ


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## mneeley490 (Feb 16, 2018)

[U said:
			
		

> [/U]
> You can use hardwood or softwood pellets for your grill.  I live in BC where our pellets are mostly made from pine, spruce, balsam, and Douglas fir.  The ones I use are mostly pine.  Canadian wood pellets are 100% pure wood with no additives or binders, so contamination is not a concern.
> 
> Marketers of heating pellets charge more because people use smaller quantities, the packaging is fancier, and they promote exotic woods claiming that the flavours are unique.  Most people that only grill occasionally are not too concerned about the fuel cost.  I leave the flavouring for you to judge.  I can’t tell the difference and I have tried them all.  So I use heating pellets for grilling, and so do all my pellet industry industry colleagues.  In fact, we even use heating pellets when putting on barbecues at our annual conferences where we have international delegates attending from Europe and Asia.


Wow. I can, and I'm sure many other forumites here can as well, tell what wood is being used merely by the smoke scent. So if this person can't tell wood flavoring apart, let alone softwoods from hardwoods, I would not want to go to one of his bbqs.


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## tallbm (Feb 16, 2018)

It was my understanding that trees like pine, cedar, and other similar softwoods have harmful tars and toxins that shouldn't be eaten.
Maybe someone can confirm this.


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## gmc2003 (Feb 16, 2018)

tallbm said:


> It was my understanding that trees like pine, cedar, and other similar softwoods have harmful tars and toxins that shouldn't be eaten.
> Maybe someone can confirm this.



Since they're being made into pellets I'm pretty sure the pine tar/pitch has been eliminated. That being said I still don't think I would knowingly use them. 

Chris


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## ross77 (Feb 16, 2018)

Unless you don’t have access to hardwood pellets I see no benefit to using softwoods. The flavor alone is enough reason to skip them.


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## bregent (Feb 16, 2018)

>Pine resin and you’ll get creosote when you burn it.

Actually, as I understand it, hardwood creates more creosote than softwood. In fact, beech is most often used in commercial production of creosote. So pine may be a bad choice for other reasons, but not because it produces more creosote.


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## SonnyE (Feb 16, 2018)

Frankly, I'll stick with what I believe are selected hardwoods.
Most of my life, and since I was a small child, I've loved the flavor of Hickory smoked fish. (Or at least that was what the man on the pier told my dad it was) And I do remember the name 'Albacore' and 'Halibut' as choices.
So I stuck with what I liked, Hickory Chips.
Only very lately have I branched out into other smoking woods, like Alder for my Salmon smoking. It has the same smokey goodness, but a milder flavor. Not the "bite" (as I call it) that Hickory imparts.
And now I have a small amount of Apple chips. But can't say I can distinctly tell the Apple from the Alder. At least not yet.
But for all of my smoking life, I always used home made smokers. Simple enclosures, an electric heat source, and a can or container for the wood being slowly burned for it's smoke.
I always smoked for preserving and flavoring.

But now days it seems the lines have been smeared drastically. In order to sell products, anything that makes any sort of smoke gets branded a smoker. Even things that are closer to a smoker in the traditional sense, have enough heat in them to Bar-B-Que a cows butt.
They are a Smoker, but also an outdoor oven as well.
I think when Treager decided to expand their heating business by making a cooker that burns pellet fuels is where the lines began to blur. And the temperature of the art of Smoking Meat for flavor, and to preserve it, began to become a way to cook it.
In my honest opinion, I take exception to a pellet grill being called a Smoker. The temperatures in a Pellet Grill are far too high even at the very lowest. They are designed to burn pellets with an electric heating element and a fan to blast air into a chamber pot that results in a flame... roughly. They even roar.
So how could the subtle nuances of different wood species be differentiated when incinerated in such a manner?
They are about as far away from Great Grandpa's smoke house as California is from Maine.

That said, I do like the idea of pelletised wood fuel. It's absolutely great as a source of wood for smoking, cooking, and heating. It burns very consistently, and reliably in different methods. Mine is to ignite it, then let it smolder to complete incineration making the most smoke a smoldering wood can, with the least amount of heat.
But... just like 'window food' poked at you from a drive through, there is no telling what is really in it. It could be 25% cat crap made to taste good surrounded with painted meat proteins flavor enhanced with beef fat byproducts.
And we'd eat it and say Yum!
Same-o, same-o we burn the pellets, but don't really know what's truly in them. (Except if we find a chunk of plastic in them...)

It's OK to find you are confused about smoking, smokers, smoker-ovens, Pellet grills, or stick burners. The companies marketing these want you to be confused.
Just like they use terms of vagueness calling out Hardwood, when who knows what crap they made it from. It could be pelleted pallets and be a 'Blend'. But it'll burn.
Just like cow tails, bull rectums, and old leather shoes are all "Beef Byproducts". Grind them together, cook them into little chunks, and call it 100% beef dog food.


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## ross77 (Feb 16, 2018)

What temp am I supposed to smoke meat?  I always thought 225 was the sweet spot. My pellet smoker goes down to 180 with nice blue smoke rolling out of the chimney. 

But the hotter you get the less smoke is produced with a pellet cooker. 

Maybe you’re referring to cold smoking?


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## troutman (Feb 16, 2018)

I agree 100% with SonnyE.  The pellet pooper is a great outdoor convection oven.  With the advanced PID controllers and all manner of extras, it may be better then most ovens inside most homes.  But lets stop calling it a "smoker" because it just is not.  I just call it a cooker and leave it at that.  And oh by the way, I think it does a great job of cooking, its just not the same as a smoker or a stick burner.

So let's talk a minute about the difference between a pellet cooker and a pellet heater inside a home.  The heater in the home is essentially a closed system.  It has some sort of heat exchanger and the radiant heat produced by burning pellets gives you the desired thermal bump you need to heat your home all cozy.  The combustion gases and whatever smoke produced by the burning pellets is confined and exits the chimney.  If not one would probably die of asphyxiation.

A pellet cooker, on the other hand, is an open system.  It burns pellets the same way as the heater but it let's loose radiant and convective heat, combustion gases such as NO (which oh by the way is what gives you a smoke ring which should be called a combustion ring, but I digress) as well as some amount of smoke, usually acrid in nature.  Since the system is somewhat contained all of that is funneled in and around the item you are cooking.  So what ever that may be, noxious fumes, creosote, acids, nitric oxides; is all coming in contact with the food, not just exiting through a chimney.

Heating pellets can contain whatever they need to burn at a sufficient BTU to heat a home.  They can use soft or hardwood dust (whatever is plentiful), ground up leaves from the forest floor, cardboard or even Kevin's old gym socks.  They don't have to be discriminatory.  Those pellets, if they contain tar or pitch or other such softwood components, give off some pretty nasty gases.  In the heater who cares, in the pellet cooker we might care, or at least I care.

Heating pellets are cheaper for that reason.  Cooking pellets (at least legitimate ones and I'll use Lumberjack as my example) have to cull trough and provide certain 100% woods of various species or blends of those species.  That is somewhat labor intensive and requires a greater degree of quality control.  Therefore a higher price point.

The other issue you have to be aware of is a lot of heater type pellets are produced near to the source of their use.  I live in Texas.  If I want pellets here, either heater or cooking type, I have to pay for freight.  That can amount to as much as the cost of the actual pellet due to bulk and weight.  That's why I buy mine at discount prices because I buy 500# at a time with 5 other guys who all split the cost of that freight.  If I lived near the pellet mill, that cost goes way down.  So to compare the cost of heating pellets to cooking pellets near to the mill, the cost differential is much less.

So to get back to the original topic, I would think long and hard about cooking anything with heater pellets.  Yea there are no standards for either one, you are putting your trust into the hands of the producers.  But saying that you don't smell anything different or taste anything different does not mean there is something that has been imparted to your cook that might affect you sight unseen.  Toxic levels of pollutants in farm raised fish, as an example, cannot be detected by the naked eye or tasted when eaten.  But it's still a very real problem and one I avoid.  So too with heater pellets.


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## ross77 (Feb 16, 2018)

Actually premium heating pellets do have a standard and are regulated. And no they aren’t allowed to use gym socks or other fillers. 

You should be fine if they are a member of the Pellet Fuels Institute. 

http://www.pelletheat.org/participating-fuel-manufacturers


I’ve used these pellets but mostly for high heat grilling:

http://www.indeckpellets.com/ourQuality.php


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## troutman (Feb 16, 2018)

The socks thing was a joke but my point is valid.  I know several of the manufacturers and I hear these things from the horse's mouth.  Be that as it may you can certainly use whatever pellet you think is best, but I personally am not going to risk it for low and slow, just like I would not throw a pine log on my stick burner.

As to the so called "standard" and "regulations", that's strictly voluntary.  I believe they are pushing hard for some type of formal legislation or regulation that governs the body of producers, but again the standards are voluntary NOT mandatory.


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## ross77 (Feb 16, 2018)

By that rationale, heating and BBQ pellets would both be under a voluntary standard then.

All you can go by is what the manufacturer claims. At least with the PFI standard, the pellets are tested by a third party. There is no BBQ pellet institute standard. 

If they are premium hardwood pellets from a reputable manufacturer, I don’t have a concern. 

*OUR TESTING*
Indeck Energy Premium Wood Pellets are tested for quality both on-site and through a third-party testing firm, Twin Ports Testing, located in Superior, Wisconsin. Quality control sampling is done on-site routinely each day and a sample of our product is shipped for independent, third-party analysis in accordance with Pellet Fuels Institute (PFI) guidelines. 

Indeck Energy Premium Wood Pellets consistently exceed The Pellet Fuels Institute's Premium Wood Pellet Standards. 


From the Dept of Energy:
“The Pellet Fuels Institute launched the PFI Standards Program, a third-party accreditation program providing specifications for residential and commercial-grade fuel. This standard assures the consumer of the highest quality pellet when certified pellets are purchased.”


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