New smoker.

Posted by Big Dog at 2/25/2009 3:40 PM
Categories: Info

Am I nuts.... what have I done this time....

In all of our recipes you can see our little arsenal of the smokers, I have a WSM and the Bradley, Susie Q has a WSM and a charcoal grill and Qfan has a WSM, a Backwoods and two Green Eggs. All of these smokers are competition grade smokers but limit the amount of product we can smoke at one time. At most we can handle per smoker is two slabs of bacon, or two hams or 20 pounds of sausage, and that is pushing it.

I have been on the lookout for a larger smoker that would accommodate larger production runs. I thought we might have to fabricate something our selves or put out $5,000 for a professional pit.  I had the idea to use a stainless steel commercial fridge but was concerned about heating it up to 300°F  as they are designed to cool not cook.

Sue, Barb and I were at an auction last month and there I spied our new project, a bread oven. This was perfect, it's designed for cooking, there is a heating element in the bottom for a water pan will serve as a cold smoker. There is a blower fan which when hooked up to a PID will provide air flow to the coals based on the oven tempeture. The top section can be used to hang bacon, hams or sausage. The bottom racks for ribs, brisket and pork butts.

So after cutting an access hole between the two sections, gutting out all of the electrical burners,
I had to rewire the element to function
on 120 service. A quick test and we have heat.

This is starting to come together and I have high hopes for our little experiment. However, I am concerned about air flow and proper ventilation.  I take out the light access at the top to vent the smoke, and hopefully the convection will carry the day. This thing is huge, it is 4 feet across and a good 3 feet deep and 3 feet high. I have not measured it out but I would guess the top has about 36 sq feet of cooking space, the bottom the same.

So here is where this starts to go bad, I had to put this in the driveway to fire up as there is no way it's going in the back yard. Barb comes out and shakes her head, our driveway is looking like it's belongs to pack of redneck hillbillies. What am I to say, I know I should have kept my mouth shut, I couldn't, I know better.

I commented  that with her outfit she ought to blend right in. Frack what was I thinking, I'm in the dog house now... (see the cheese fondue post to how I got out)

 

Back to the oven, I mix some cherry chips onto our pan and let it rip, we got an excellent supply of smoke and only 10°F difference in heat. We were cold smoking, but was the ventilation ok. I hung two pieces of cheese on my bacon hooks and let them smoke for two hours. Ok imagine two pieces of cheese a pound each in this huge smoker, they were a little lost.

A quick taste test and success. We have some additional modifications to go but you will be seeing more of the steel beast in the developing of new products. Our next test will be a hot smoke and I see bacon and sausage coming. Unfortunately Barb is just going to have to put up with our little redneck camp until I can get some ventilation installed in the garage. It a good thing that this thing is on wheels.

Hey we have some country hams that need some smoke... but that's another story

Cheers from the Big Dog
 
 

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