A new cooking toy

I had some very good ribs on the 4th of July in someone's backyard and I got intrigued about smokers. After doing some research, I decided to take the plunge and get a propane smoker at Menards.

No doubt real BBQ purists will argue that propane is not "official" BBQ since my heat source is not wood or charcoal. However, back in school, I had tried a charcoal smoker and it was just way too much work for me. The biggest problem with all wood/charcoal smokers is maintaining a consistent temperature for a long time. The propane smoker seemed to provide a simpler strategy toward maintaining the "low and slow" technique needed for a good 'cue.

Two attempts so far have been good. Not extraordinary, but give it time, I'm just learning. My first attempt was a pork shoulder to make pulled pork sandwiches. It was my first lesson at trying to time BBQ - which clearly is a mistake. You see, a pork shoulder takes about 10-12 hours to cook on a smoker and even that is an estimate. (By the way, now you know why I don't want to tend a charcoal fire for 12 hours - propane is much closer to "set it and forget it".) It's pretty hard to time dinner with BBQ. In fact, the kids were screaming for food before the meat was officially ready. It was still very, very good though.

My second attempt was a pork loin which, in my opinion, just isn't perfectly suited for the smoker. Don't get me wrong, it was very good. But it was kind of like a smoke flavored, oven-baked pork roast. Good eats, but for whatever reason, it just seems like BBQ shouldn't be eaten with a knife and a fork.

After searching the web for some help on using the smoker and while searching for recipes, the real find has been this thing that seems to be affectionately known as a "fatty". A fatty started out as simply taking a chub of breakfast sausage and putting it in the smoker to sit along side the other meat in the smoker. Since a pound of sausage doesn't take that long to cook, my guess is that it started out as a snack for impatient parties waiting on their main dish to finish smoking.

Fatties have become significantly more involved and there appears to be an endless variety of ideas. During my two uses of the smoker, I've tried two fatties. The first was of the breakfast variety, filled with eggs, cheese, and vegetables. The second was a pizza fatty, with mozzarella, italian sausage seasoning, sun dried tomatoes, and onions. (The pictures shown are from the useful web site www.smokingmeatforums.com)

Over the coming weeks, I hope to try smoking a turkey which will likely be my warmup for the holiday season. Of course, Anna is going to be forcing me to have some ribs soon too. I guess practice makes perfect.