# Royal Oak Lump Charcoal ????



## GaryHibbert (Sep 15, 2014)

Getting lump charcoal in Drayton is almost impossible, so when I saw some Royal Oak at Cdn Tire, I bought a bag--BAD decision. This weekend, Linda was out of town looking after her parents in Calgary (both are in a nursing home), so that gave me the chance to cook the food I like--hot and spicey.  Our weather was cool, so perfect for cold smoking.

Planned to make my version of jambalya/goulash to serve on jasmin rice, with a pound of hamburger, precooked chicken, ham sausage, bacon, shrimp, a can of green chiles,  some  diced green tomatos (plus some to bread and fry up separately), half a dozen cloves of garlic, onion, diced red tomatos, a couple of cold smoked jalapenos from the freezer, and spices.  Perfectly good opportunity to try out the lump charcoal.  The plan was to cold smoke the meat and veggies for an hour to get a nice smokey flavor and then slow cook everything on the stove to meld the flavors.  

So I lit the charcoal, and while it was getting ready, I sliced up the veggies and made up some stuffed mushroom to cold smoke and finish in the oven as an appie.  Went out to check the charcoal (again) and it was just ready--looked great.  Tossed on a split of birch (really like the mellow flavor) to burn off any remaining paper bark and get a TBS going before the food went in.  When I put the wood in, the charcoal fell apart--just litterally disintegrated to a pile of ash--wasn't even enough heat to light the birch bark paper.   JUST A TAD POed!!!!  So EVERYTHING came back inside and onto the stove.  Turned out great, but the only smoke flavor came from the jalapenos.

Just as a side note, I decided to make a side dish of frozen corn.  Cumin, Chile powder, onion, a clove of garlic, butter, and a couple of the smoked jalapenos, and S and P--great taste, but on reflection, for a serving of one, only one jalapeno would have been QUITE sufficient  LOL.

So, any thoughts on the lump charcoal??  I was careful and am pretty sure that I didn't simply "over-prepare" it.  I usually use briquettes and burned off the lump in the same manner.  

Now I have a bag of lump charcoal and have no idea what I'm going to do with it.

Sorry, no qview--still can't get the add picture icon back.

Gary


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## pc farmer (Sep 15, 2014)

I have never had that happen but I hate RO lump.

Lots of small pieces and seems to burn fast.


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## justplainbob (Sep 15, 2014)

had the same problems with it 

so each time i loaded up with the blue bag a sprinkled some of the red bag on top

just to get rid of it 

never again


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## knifebld (Sep 15, 2014)

Same experience on my end too...completely turned me off of lump charcoal. :(


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## pc farmer (Sep 15, 2014)

knifebld said:


> Same experience on my end too...completely turned me off of lump charcoal. :(


Not all lump does this.


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## knifebld (Sep 15, 2014)

I would imagine that not all do it...but I am limited around my parts to what Canadian Tire, Walmart, and Home Depot keep in stock...unfortunately Royal Oak is what is being stocked :(


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## pc farmer (Sep 15, 2014)

knifebld said:


> I would imagine that not all do it...but I am limited around my parts to what Canadian Tire, Walmart, and Home Depot keep in stock...unfortunately Royal Oak is what is being stocked :(


Got ya.


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## themule69 (Sep 15, 2014)

I use Ozark Oak lump with good results. I have never used Royal Oak.

Happy smoken.

David


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## ak1 (Sep 15, 2014)

Thing is, Royal Oak is crap shoot. Sometimes you get good stuff, sometimes you get crap. But then again, this can happen with any brand of  lump.


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## ristau5741 (Sep 15, 2014)

Royal Oak brand is far superior than Cowboy Brand,  After I switched, I felt like I upgraded, although I still find a few rocks in the bags.  never had them fall apart on me, but I've has alot of issues with tiny fragments of charcoal, I get around that by running a few bags at a time so I can use up the small stuff after I've gotten the fire started with the big stuff.


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## link (Sep 15, 2014)

I cannot say that I ever had that issue with RO. I used RO all the time when I First started smoking and loved it. It burned hot and was easy to keep a constant temp. It became hard to find so I switched but I still buy it every now and then if I find it.

Sorry you had a bad experience.


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## 5oclocksomewher (Sep 15, 2014)

Wow....I'm surprised at that.  I use Kingford Comp Briquettes, but once in a while I use lump.  RO has been the brand that worked best for me as far as lump goes.  Maybe it was an old bag.  Like I said I'm pretty surprised because it's worked better than any lump I've tried.


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## ak1 (Sep 15, 2014)

knifebld said:


> I would imagine that not all do it...but I am limited around my parts to what Canadian Tire, Walmart, and Home Depot keep in stock...unfortunately Royal Oak is what is being stocked :(


Can you not get Maple Leaf or Basques? Up in your neck of the woods I would think those are easy to get.


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## smokinadam (Sep 15, 2014)

GaryHibbert said:


> Getting lump charcoal in Drayton is almost impossible, so when I saw some Royal Oak at Cdn Tire, I bought a bag--BAD decision. This weekend, Linda was out of town looking after her parents in Calgary (both are in a nursing home), so that gave me the chance to cook the food I like--hot and spicey.  Our weather was cool, so perfect for cold smoking.
> 
> Planned to make my version of jambalya/goulash to serve on jasmin rice, with a pound of hamburger, precooked chicken, ham sausage, bacon, shrimp, a can of green chiles,  some  diced green tomatos (plus some to bread and fry up separately), half a dozen cloves of garlic, onion, diced red tomatos, a couple of cold smoked jalapenos from the freezer, and spices.  Perfectly good opportunity to try out the lump charcoal.  The plan was to cold smoke the meat and veggies for an hour to get a nice smokey flavor and then slow cook everything on the stove to meld the flavors.
> 
> ...


What method did you use to start it? When I run lump for my kettles I place some briquettes on bottom of my chimney for a base then in with the electric starter and the lump. I heard blow torch works very well also. My first attempt was exact same as you had but it's better now and I know they burn quicker so I need more usually but for steaks the hot heat it gets to I like for finishing the steaks quickly.


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## knifebld (Sep 15, 2014)

AK1 said:


> Can you not get Maple Leaf or Basques? Up in your neck of the woods I would think those are easy to get.



Can get Maple Leaf at Home Hardware...but they have a very small store in the town I live in...and Basques I might be able to get if I decided to trek to a Lowes in Ontario...

So for me charcoal briquettes are good enough :)


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## GaryHibbert (Sep 15, 2014)

Nope, can't get either of those brands--guess I'll just have to try Edmonton

I was out of briquettes, so I'll get some and try putting them on the bottom before I light it

Thanks guys

Gary


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## chase1300 (Sep 16, 2014)

New guy here, so I don't know if this will help.  My first 2 smokes I used RO lump and it did fine.  The 3rd  time ( I only have 3 smokes so far), I used Frontier lump and I liked it a lot better than the RO.   I would have kept using it but I happened to be in SAMs Club and they had a 20lbs bag for 10 bucks.  I was using RO from Menards for about 7 bucks for a 8.8 lbs bag.   The Fromtier seemed to burn hotter. It also has much larger pieces that the. RO did.  But like I said I only have 3 smokes worth of experience.  :yahoo:


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## ak1 (Sep 16, 2014)

One issue I found with Royal Oak, is that sometimes I've gotten a bag that smells like it has starter fluid in it. This basically happens about once out of 10 bags or so.

Normally I use Basques which is sugar maple charcoal, and my usual back up is Maple Leaf which is a mix of Birch, Beech and Maple, but I will buy RO if I find it on sale as well as Kingsford Charwood.


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## sammysound (Sep 16, 2014)

AK1 said:


> Can you not get Maple Leaf or Basques? Up in your neck of the woods I would think those are easy to get.


yes maple leaf, possibly one of the best i've used!!

stub's is also awesome, but i only found it at winners so i save those only when i bbq steak!

AK, are you around vaughan by chance?


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## ak1 (Sep 17, 2014)

No, I'm in Stoney Creek.


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## rob sicc (Sep 17, 2014)

JustPlainBob said:


> had the same problems with it
> 
> so each time i loaded up with the blue bag a sprinkled some of the red bag on top
> 
> ...


Bob,  Are you saying that the royal oak comes in either a blue bag or a red bag?  I've only seen the red bags.  Are they different quality?  I've been using the red bag all summer and I've never had this problem.  I just picked up a bunch more bags so I don't run out through the winter.


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## x0xsaywhutx0x (Sep 24, 2014)

The only RO ive seen is in brown bag. Ive got it a couple times and its hit or miss. Ive had good batches that burned well, others that burn way too quickly and one that literally went up like fireworks












0517142031.jpg



__ x0xsaywhutx0x
__ Sep 24, 2014


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## rob sicc (Sep 25, 2014)

great pic


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## x0xsaywhutx0x (Sep 26, 2014)

I wish it would let me upload tge video. It went on like that for about 3 minutes.


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