# New to the smoking world - tips?



## alysse (Apr 3, 2022)

Hi friends! I purchased the dyna glo offset vertical smoker for my birthday and am wondering if anyone has any tips for me? I have already sealed it with lava lock and put gaskets about both doors. Seasoned it this weekend so I’m ready for a cook ASAP! Just unsure if there is anything else I should be doing :) 

thanks!


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## Chasdev (Apr 3, 2022)

My best advice is to buy Franklin's book, it has 80% of all the info you need.
The rest of the info you need you learn yourself by smoking meat.
My first smoker was also the DynaGlow cooker and it produced some great briskets and ribs.
You might consider a higher quality temp gauge though, the one supplied is not famous for accuracy.


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## golfpro2301 (Apr 3, 2022)

A lot of fun is learning things as you go. Make sure you have A way of accurately reading temps and familiarize yourself with fire management. Other than that light a fire and throw some meat on


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## cansmoke (Apr 3, 2022)

alysse said:


> Hi friends! I purchased the dyna glo offset vertical smoker for my birthday and am wondering if anyone has any tips for me? I have already sealed it with lava lock and put gaskets about both doors. Seasoned it this weekend so I’m ready for a cook ASAP! Just unsure if there is anything else I should be doing :)
> 
> thanks!


Smoking. That's what you should be doing. I see reference to Aaron Franklin. Start with one that appeals to you. Remember, a bad day smoking is better than a good day at the office


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## SecondHandSmoker (Apr 3, 2022)

Welcome aboard and Happy Birthday from SE Arizona.
If you haven't yet done so, then purchase a remote multi-probe thermometer set up for monitoring cook chamber and internal meat temperatures.

SMF also offers a 5 day E course too.  

Many of us will smoke chicken as a first smoke on a new smoker to get a feel for how the smoker performs.


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## pineywoods (Apr 3, 2022)

Alysse welcome to SMF glad you joined us. You'll find lots of good info here and even better people. If you have questions just ask people will help.
I also think the place to start if with Jeff's free Ecourse here's a link
https://www.smoking-meat.com/smoking-basics-ecourse
Jeff is the owner of this site and the course should help.
I also agree you need a good dependable thermometer to monitor smoker temp as well as meat temp. Of course doing that remotely is handy and saves you from having to run out and check the smoker some.
As for a first smoke chicken parts is easy and fast, hamburgers is another easy smoke, pork butt is a long smoke but pretty easy and forgiving as far as smoker temps.
The nice thing about this hobby is you get to eat all those mistakes until you get it just the way you want it.


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## olecrosseyes (Apr 3, 2022)

pineywoods said:


> Alysse welcome to SMF glad you joined us. You'll find lots of good info here and even better people. If you have questions just ask people will help.
> I also think the place to start if with Jeff's free Ecourse here's a link
> https://www.smoking-meat.com/smoking-basics-ecourse
> Jeff is the owner of this site and the course should help.
> ...


I agree with Piney, One of the longest cooks are also the most forgiving is a pork butt for pulled pork. Many here will chime in and lend a hand for your questions. This site has helped me immensely over the last 20 years! It took me a few years to log in tho.


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## tallbm (Apr 4, 2022)

alysse said:


> Hi friends! I purchased the dyna glo offset vertical smoker for my birthday and am wondering if anyone has any tips for me? I have already sealed it with lava lock and put gaskets about both doors. Seasoned it this weekend so I’m ready for a cook ASAP! Just unsure if there is anything else I should be doing :)
> 
> thanks!


Hi there and welcome!

I agree 110% with what 

 SecondHandSmoker
 says about getting a wireless multiprobe thermometer.
It seems that you can never trust any of the themometers/probes that come with a smoker.
A wireless multip probe thermometer will save the day for you.  You need at least 2 probes but I recommend it have 4 or more.
Why so many?

You will want a probe or 2 at meat rack level to understand how hot the temp is across your rack where the meat is cooking.  It is likely 1 side is hotter than the other and you can only know if you have a couple of probes hooked up measuring temp.

Then you have more probes to put into the meat.  If you have more than 1 item of meat item at different levels or even on hot/cold sides of same level, etc. etc. then the meat will not be cooking at the same temp and some items will finish before others.
This is where having a couple of meat probes helps.
Now you can see why I recommend 4 as a minimum.  This stuff will take almost all of the temp guessing out of the equation and let you focus more on what is happening during your smoke rather than guessing about temps.

Next, I would suggest doing the easiest smoke of them all to see how your system works.
This is boneless skinless chicken thighs.  You just season them up and cook until they hit an Internal Temp (IT) of 180F in the meat.

You can practice with more chicken smokes to learn your system cause chicken is easy.
Also you can then move on to chicken with the skin on and/or whole chickens and begin to tackle chicken specific quirks now that you know your smoking system better.
Quirks like:  

chicken skin wants to come out like leather unless you smoke it at a high enough smoker temp like 325F smoker temp
whole chicken and chicken breast really really really benefits from being brined and you cook to where the IT of the meat in the breast hits 165F and you dont want to go any higher.  You could up your smoking game by learning a simple salt + water equilibrium brine to nail such a cook... again chicken is cheap too so you can repeat until you nail it
I always then recommend people do a rack of pork spare ribs and learn its quirks.

After that a big milestone is a pork butt. Its a long smoke for a big piece of meat and it's quick is that it is only done when it is tender, never by time or temp!
This smoke will also teach you a ton about how to manage your system and see how it behaves for 12hr+ smokes.

I could go on but I think this gives you a good idea for a road map and what you need to start your smoking journey being well prepared :)

I personally use and love this Inkbird, it has high and low alarms incase you have a flare up or the smoker heat dies on you for some reason:

I have never used the following one but for the price, high/low alarms, and the good reviews I would give it a whirl if I were in your shoes and wanted to save a little money:


I hope all this info helps.  Ask all the questions you have, this community is great and will surely have an answer :)


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## charlesmoxley (Jun 15, 2022)

alysse said:


> Hi friends! I purchased the dyna glo offset vertical smoker for my birthday and am wondering if anyone has any tips for me? I have already sealed it with lava lock and put gaskets about both doors. Seasoned it this weekend so I’m ready for a cook ASAP! Just unsure if there is anything else I should be doing :)
> 
> thanks!


practice and practice again!))


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## AudryeGlosser (Jun 26, 2022)

How much useful advice is there! Thank you all !


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## charlesmoxley (Jun 30, 2022)

alysse said:


> Hi friends! I purchased the dyna glo offset vertical smoker for my birthday and am wondering if anyone has any tips for me? I have already sealed it with lava lock and put gaskets about both doors. Seasoned it this weekend so I’m ready for a cook ASAP! Just unsure if there is anything else I should be doing :) P.S advice for students: Writers tackle complex tasks as easily as they write simple essays. You can easily order term papers, labs, coursework, dissertations, and reports on the studyessay.org  website





practice and practice again!))


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