Ribs were pretty good and left me with a solid game plan. Time to tackle chicken thighs. Trying 4 varieties; Italian marinade with butt rub, Italian marinade with custom chicken rub, mojo marinade with butt rub and mojo marinade with custom chicken rub. Cooking technique is a blend across a few sources. Got lazy and didn’t pull skin off to trim fat under skin, but cleaned up bottom and trimmed skin to fit size of thigh. Don’t think it will matter for this cook because goal is to nail flavor profile. Not a bad way to spend a rainy afternoon.
Firebox test went well, time to put some meat on the smoker. Did two varieties of rib rubs, good test run, ribs turned out yummy!
Came up with a snake design with hopes to prolong burn times. Firebox was a bit heavier than expected, go figure…
After a total of about 7 hours of seasoning, decided it was time to put some food on it. Made up some bacon burgers and a few extra strips of bacon on a bit of mesquite and apple wood.
Got up and started around 7:30am. Sean came over and helped until the afternoon, but 2 doors took forever! Wrapped up around 9pm, but it is finally ready to operate. Threw some charcoal in and gave it a quick 3 hour run, it did great! Temps are within 5 degrees in meat locker with the exception of the water bowl area, which averaged about 8-10 degrees below other areas. The fire was undersized for the smoker but we held 275 for about 90 minutes with no issues before the fire ran out. Will plan to season it again tomorrow for another 3 hours or so, hopefully cooking something tomorrow evening!
Just need a top and some doors!!!
Wrapped the bottom, back and sides and mounted the wheels. Can barely move it without wheels it’s so heavy. Also, even hotter than yesterday.
Sean came back for another day and we made a ton of progress, sides are tacked on and cut some insulation.
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