Pellet Smokers

batchaps4me said:
Yes, I went with the 1000D4E. We are hoping to be able to smoke a couple of yard birds next weekend. I will probably go with apple pellets and just salt, pepper and baking soda on the first birds to test the smoke.
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Let me know how it looks and goes. Im not a pellet fan but also. 700 bucks for free grills for life ain't a bad gig
 
I got the email that it is shipped and should arrive Thursday so I went and bought my pellets. I went with Pit Boss Applewood/Oak blend and a Pit Boss Hickory/Oak blend and two Lowe's buckets to put them in.
 
My buddy uses a couple of Oklahoma Joe buckets. Mainly because you can pull the pellets out to get rid of the dust and crumb left overs. And of course they are air tight etc. Was just at his house last night talking about this program. He very well may buy into it himself lol
 
Irishblooded said:
My buddy uses a couple of Oklahoma Joe buckets. Mainly because you can pull the pellets out to get rid of the dust and crumb left overs. And of course they are air tight etc. Was just at his house last night talking about this program. He very well may buy into it himself lol
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That's the bucket I want to end up with but none of the box stores around here have any or anything comparable in stock so I went with cheapest airtight container. I hope to have it put together Thursday evening and will probably do the burnout and biscuit test Friday and smoke some chicken Saturday. Do we have a phone app for 5Q that makes it easy to upload pictures? I will give a fair review of it by this weekend.
 
Guys, I got the rest of my grill today and have assembled it along with the priming part of the burn off procedure. Assembly was easy even with just using the $0.25 wrench and screwdriver took a leisurely paced hour and half to assemble alone and without strain. It was actually one of the easiest assemblies I have completed. Will try to post pics from my phone directly.
 
batchaps4me said:
Guys, I got the rest of my grill today and have assembled it along with the priming part of the burn off procedure. Assembly was easy even with just using the $0.25 wrench and screwdriver took a leisurely paced hour and half to assemble alone and without strain. It was actually one of the easiest assemblies I have completed. Will try to post pics from my phone directly.
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Keep the updates coming, this sounds like a great deal. I’m not sure I’d get enough use out of it, but I know a couple of people who would.

I’m curious to see how you like it.
 
Shower Fart said:
Keep the updates coming, this sounds like a great deal. I’m not sure I’d get enough use out of it, but I know a couple of people who would.

I’m curious to see how you like it.
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So far so good. I got the initial burnout done and am planning to smoke some spatchcock chicken tomorrow. The recipe is going to make a simple rub with baking powder, salt, pepper, and garlic and lightly coat the chicken. I'm going to try to smoke it skin side up at 225 until internal temp of 135, then flip it and bump the heat to 350 until 165 internal. I just want to get a read on how much smoke the chicken will take.
 
Okay guys, I am resting my first Babcocked chicken on the pellet grill. And will post pictures of the bird here in a few. Here is the recipe that I used and performance comments(Part 1 of 2 or 3; I was told there would be no math):
1. Follow a YouTube video's instruction on how to Babcock a chicken. I found it extremely easy to do and removed the backbone and
breastbone in less than five minutes. IMHO this is an extremely easy method of prepping.
2. I made a rub of 3 tbsp. baking powder, 1tbsp. each of coarse salt, coarse black pepper, and dry garlic flakes and applied liberally to
the chicken. Put chicken back in the fridge. It's worth noting that the chicken was barely thawed with the innards having a slush on
them. I have to admit that the baking powder was most concerning later, see number 4.
3. Preheated the grill to 225F using Pit Boss Apple Blend pellets. I chose apple because it is my experience that chicken is the
toughest to keep from absorbing too much smoke and getting bitter. I have hickory and was scared to use it. More on that error
later. As far as the grill's performance so far, it overshot the 225F setpoint by about 50 degrees and quickly settled back to 225. I
let it hold temp for 30 minutes before putting the chicken on.
4. Placed chicken on my middle rack and inserted the meat probe into the breast. Initial internal reading was 41F, FWIW. Here is
where my first lack of planning became evident. I forgot to do the biscuit test so I don't know the hot/cool zones in the chamber
so I rotated the chicken 90 degrees every 20 degree increase in internal temp. I will post pics of the biscuit test results tomorrow.
 
Part 2:

5. Grill Performance Notes:
A. Smoke generation-
* Smoke appears to generate either when you startup/increase temperature or are in the 218-225 range. Increasing temps causes
more pellets to be dumped into the firepot and 218-225 is the smoldering temp for the pellets. It is a decidedly lighter smoke
than wood or charcoal, but we knew that going in to this. I purposely ran at 225 to get the upper end of the scale so it would
allow for adjustments.
* On the initial burnout, I cold started to a temp of 450F. It shot up to over 650F according to the app. More on the app later but
this gives me hope of being able to sear at startup. Whether cold starting to 225 or 450, it is at and holding temp in half an hour.

B. Zgrills App:
* To me, it acted funky. I am sure the feeling is mutual. In all fairness this is the first app that I have downloaded to my first
smartphone which is an old Samsung. With that in mind, consider the source for my critiques. I am not claiming tech
competence.
* For some reason, possibly user error, at times I wasn't getting real time updates on the chamber temp through the app nor the
PID. I assume that it was a me problem because I got the correct meat probe readings during this time (constant 225 setting).
* Getting the grills Wi-Fi setup was easy and quick. Ditto setting up the app. It worked on both BT and Wi-Fi with my phone but
for a while it appeared that the following was user error (skip this point unless you are interested in the possible effects of THC):
A. I needed to start the app in close proximity to the grill in BT.
B. I needed to restart the app or at least switch between BT and Wi-Fi to get updated chamber temps. The internal meat probe
updated every degree.
C. All at once, for some reason totally unbeknownst to me, these issues cleared up leading to the following observations:
1. at the setting of 225 was reached and stabilized for over 30 minutes, the chamber's temp dropped over 40F when I put that
cold assed chicken in. It was fun to watch the chamber temp versus chicken internal temps. It took about 30 minutes for the chamber to recover to the set temp. I have never before observed this and think I learned more about cooking the
chicken properly today than ever.
2. With the temperature set to 225, it nominally ranged from -12 to plus +15 but spent a real majority of its time in the
pellets' "smoke zone". It did have brief temperature spikes both high and low, but again I was the tech guru and the spikes
appeared to me to be anomalies limited to the chamber temps, NOT the grill's meat probes.
3. Again consider the source when I say I think this is the most important finding of the day, regardless of my pre test
thinking: I bought a $30 ThermoPro meat probe from Lowe's to use to check the grill's meat probe and found that at
about a quarter inch apart in a chicken breast, they varied less that 1.5 degrees from each other. I can trust my grill's
readings to be accurate enough to alert me within a few degrees of my desired meat temp.

6. Back to the cook:
A. We left off after I just got the grill to 225F and the chicken on. In about 30 minutes, I the internal temp reached 135F, verified
the temp (itshowed 133.8 in the same breast about a quarter inch away), and then flipped the chicken to skin side down and
increased the cooking temp to 350F.
B. I let the chicken breast get to 165F and pulled it to rest. Since I was on my fifth Yuengling and 54th mg of thc, I didn't check
the finish temp and it rested for about an hour before cutting into the breast and thigh. It was probably the first time I
properly cooked a whole chicken and it was moist as can be. I am shocked, pleasantly shocked at the quality of the cook.

7. Recipe and Grill Performance Observations:
* I could smell the smokiness more than taste it. It seems that the smoke only penetrated the skin as far as flavor goes. I think this is
a product of me using one of the the lightest tasting smoke pellets, apple, cooking at the high end of the "smoke zone" and
overshooting my internal temp benchmarks by a few degrees on safety/uncertainty allowances.
* As far as moisture and texture goes, it's some of the best I have made. Admittedly that bar is low.
* I was really worried about the color due to the neon white baking powder. When I bumped the temp up to 350 and flipped the
chicken, it was white. I said to my sister in law, "That chicken looks like it just finished shooting an Alabama porno ... white, dried,
and crusty. The finished color was nice, all things considering.
*In all fairness, I cant fairly judge the rub today because I did nothing to go for max flavor flavor. It has great potential IMHO.
* I will retest tomorrow going for flavor, hopefully making the right adjustments without fear of bitter chicken.

8. TLDR, final thoughts:
1. It's day one, cook one but so far so good. I think I am going to like pellet grills but keep in mind that my cooking goal is
consistently decent BBQ. I know the limits to pellet smoking and accept them.
2. My chicken today turned out about like a quality rotisserie chicken from Food City. That's probably better than I expected given
where I wanted my margin of errors for testing, new type grill and a general tendency to cook chicken leather. I believe that I
know, and knew before today, the adjustments I would have to make to start bringing flavor to properly cooked meat.
3. As far as the Z grills brand and this sale go, all I can say is that the assembly was really easy and mostly was of decent quality. The
only cautionary tale I've heard is not to use power tools for fear of stripping the bolts/screws. IMHO that is a valid concern but in
fairness, when assembled it is fairly sturdy. No complaints so far.
4. I would recommend that anyone has neither the time nor skill to use an offset wood burner to start with a pellet grill.
5. IF I just get an average lifecycle out of my grill, I think I will be well satisfied with the brand. I have had it for one day so I can't
recommend Zgrills yet. IF someone is in the market, I recommend they consider it, especially if they are looking at something in
the same price range. I don't think I will be disappointed but then again, I can prove my level of crazy in a court of law.
 
Good to hear and good review

The knock I have always had on pellet grills is that they do everything good. But nothing great.

They smoke but not a good smoke flavor. They sear but not a good solid sear etc etc.

But if you like hands off grills they are your best friend.
 
Irishblooded said:
Good to hear and good review

The knock I have always had on pellet grills is that they do everything good. But nothing great.

They smoke but not a good smoke flavor. They sear but not a good solid sear etc etc.

But if you like hands off grills they are your best friend.
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I cooked my second chicken today with a couple of minor adjustments. I started the cook at 210F to generate more smoke and longer exposure, and I started the crisping process at 131F internal. The skin turned out great, smoky, and crispy. I think I am going to be satisfied with the grill. We are switching to hickory pellets and doing a butt Saturday.
 
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