Newbie

M

MWP49

New member
Hi everyione,

I am very new to smoking (never done it before) and dont know anything about it quite honestly.

I have a Red Line smoker, not really sure how to use it right :eek:

I have just come in to about 20 bags of smoking pellets in various flavors. My questions are:

1) How much pellets do I use
2) Do I still need to add any kind of rub to a pork butt if I am going to be making BBQ out of it?

Thanks in advance,
Mike
 
Pappymn

Pappymn

New member
Hi Mike, welcome from Minnesota. No idea what a red line is, but the brains of the forum should be around shortly.

Heck yah, use a rub....or don't. Salt and pepper work just fine too. Bottom line is start smokin.
 
RickB

RickB

New member
Ok that is a charcoal smoker not pellet. You can certainly use pellets by putting a handful wrapped in tin foil and poking 1 hole in the pkg. onto the coals and go..
 
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M

MWP49

New member
did not know there was a difference between smokers? ok, so how much pellets do i use for a smoker like this? sorry for the questions, i`m just totally lost on this
 
TentHunter

TentHunter

Moderator
Welcome to the forum Mike!

As far as your rub question: Yes, you would still use whatever rub you like on your pork butt no matter what kind of smoker you use.


As far as "How many pellets..." If you're using charcoal you can throw a handful of pellets on the charcoals, but honestly they just end up burning up quickly and not smoking much. The best thing is to do exactly like Rick said. Make some foil pouches, seal a good handful of pellets inside and poke one small hole in the pouch. You will be tempted to poke more holes BUT DON'T!

Place that pouch on your charcoal and once it heats up that little pouch will become a little smoke factory pumping smoke out of that tiny hole for a good 30 minutes or more.

If you want additional smoke, then use additional pouches and stagger them down into the coals, or switch them out every half hour to 45 minutes. But be careful as they will be HOT!
 
scooter

scooter

Moderator
Welcome to PS.com!
You my friend have a LOT of reading to do! My suggestion:
  • buy several big bags of Kingsford "blue bag" charcoal, just enough to get you through the winter until Memorial day where the priced drops by half to about .24/lb then buy enough to last the year. I usually buy 500-600 lbs to last me through the year.
  • Go to Amazing ribs.com BBQ Ribs Recipes, Barbecue Recipes, Grilling Recipes, Baby Back Ribs, Barbecue Spare Ribs, Outdoor Cooking, Rating Barbecue Grills and Smokers and read it cover to cover. Meathead has piles of information on how to cook all kinds of meat.
  • Keep a log. Nothing will help you improve your cooking quicker and guarantee repeat successes better than a log that you can refer back to! Each cook you do gets a page. Jot down everything you did. What kind of meat, how much it weighed, where you bought it, what glue you used, what rub, sauce, pit temp, ambient temp, finished temp etc etc etc. You'll be able to repeat your successes and avoid failures better if you document them.
  • The next time you make the same thing only change one thing making it easy to determine what change resulted in the better flavor or texture.
  • Buy yourself a good quality digital instant read thermometer like a Thermoworks Thermapen. Also a wireless digital like a Maverick 732 is VERY helpful
  • Buy a camera, take lots of pics and post them on this website so we can see what you're doing and help you. Read the posts on this website and use the search feature if you want to know something specific.

This is off the top of my head. Others will follow and chip in!
 
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MWP49

New member
Thank you all for your input, now all I need to do is figure out this smoker as far as where to put the meat, whether its on the top grill or the bottom. seems like if i use the top grate then the meat will cook slower which would be better, use the bottom one for "grilling". as for the charcoal, i went to an auction and got a whole pallet full of charcoal and pellets so think i`m set on that for a while :) got something like 20-20lb bags of pellets and 4-30lb bags of lump charcoal, only gave $15 for the whole thing. :)
 
scooter

scooter

Moderator
Was it a going out of business auction? That's like $400 worth of pellets and charcoal! Can you give me the date/time/place of the next auction???
 
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