Lend a Smoke

It's fall, it's football its my youngest son (32) asking if I could smoke a pork shoulder and some ribs for him to bring to Sunday afternoon football at his buddys house. Hey, whats a dad for. He bought the ribs and made his own rub and sauce. I bought a 9 lb shoulder which at $.89 lb with a $5 off coupon at Shoprite cost me about $3. Good deal, all I need to do is tend the fire.

2030 hrs on Sat night, shoulder is slathered with yellow mustard, rubbed with my sons mixture and placed on the Brinkkman.

How late did you stay up? Did everything turn out OK? It's nice that your son got involved with the rub and sauce instead of expecting you to do everything...

I usually end up on the couch, taking catnaps so I can tend the fire and maintain the heat.
Around 0600 hrs, I foiled the shoulder put the ribs on the rack and added more coals and a couple of hickory chunks. Started basting the ribs with my sons sauce at 0930 and took everything off at 1100. Everything was wrapped, waiting for my daughter in law to pick up the goodies.

Since I never got any of that BBQ and the smoker was still hot, I went to Shoprite, bought a rack of baby backs and four turkey thighs. Rubbed them, smoked them for 5 hrs, basting them in the final hour, with a quick sauce I put together. Dinner was pulled turkey sandwiches, ribs, pierogies and pasta with broccoli. Hey I was happy.

At 0600 hrs, foiled shoulder and added ribs All was taken off at 1100.


Put my turkey thighs and rack of ribs on at noon, off 5 hours later.

What a great Dad you are, doing all that for your son!

I have that same grill, but it has since gone down to live out the rest of its life at the ranch. Doesn't see near the use it used to. Fun to cook on every once in awhile, now, but man does it take a lot of work tending to it. Great job.

Nice work, Joe! I'm cooking turkey thighs tonight but will be using a higher heat to shorten the time.

FYI, Lowes has the Chargriller on sale for $119., which was $20 off the usual price, but the side firebox was not on sale. If it is still on sale this week, I will pick a unit up and hold it to give to him for Christmas. Who knows maybe the price of the firebox wil be reduced prior to the holidays.

My Brinnkman was leaking, but a piece of sheet metal cured that. I've also found that during an extended smoke, using Kingsford, I need to get rid of some of the ash, which helps the air flow and temp control. I use a fireproof pan (aluminum) under the side firebox and drag the ash thru the opening with a piece of rebar or metal shovel.

Yup, that's what I have to do when I use mine. Has to be tended like every 30min to an hour.

Griffin wrote:

Yup, that's what I have to do when I use mine. Has to be tended like every 30min to an hour.

Thats why I had contemplated purchasing a Traeger pellet smoker at Costco or an electric smoker I saw at Sams, but that would take all the fun out of the cook. It would have been better if the son didn't need it before noon. Usually I start my stuff early morning, depending on whats cooking, and by dinner time it's done. No lost sleep.

I was watching a show on PBS (Mike Colemecos Real Food), which may only be shown locally in the N.Y. area. There was a BBQ show and alot of BBQ restaurants were cooking for the crowds.

What impressed me was a group that was producing their own cooking coals. They had two barrels fastened together, standing on end, with access holes on the top and bottom. There was rebar between the barrels and a good fire going. Wood placed in the top hole fell to the rebar and the hot coals that fell to the bottom of the lower barrel was shoveled into the smoker. Funny what impresses city kids.

You're a good Dad! Looks wonderful.