I may stop using lump

When I had my WSM I got wicked long burns on lump. Unfoiled butts at 250 til done no problem. I did use some KBB in it though.........a dozen briquettes in the chimney until the flavor was out of it to get the lump lit. Just my $0.02, YMMV
 
Bludawg said:
I have to Call BS on Lump not lasting or doing well with the Minion method. I use lump in my UDS I have since the first burn 3 yrs ago 10 lb will go 20+ hrs. I use Lump in the Kettle with the ring of fire and get 16 hr burns at 275. You can BS a BSh*t'er but son you can't Snow the Iceman.
Click to expand...

Please do tell of your method, I would love to get those kind of burn times. :grin:
 
Bludawg said:
I have to Call BS on Lump not lasting or doing well with the Minion method. I use lump in my UDS I have since the first burn 3 yrs ago 10 lb will go 20+ hrs. I use Lump in the Kettle with the ring of fire and get 16 hr burns at 275. You can BS a BSh*t'er but son you can't Snow the Iceman.
Click to expand...

+1 I put a 20 lb bag of B&B oak lump in my UDS and it will last in excess of 30+hrs. Some people like the predictability of kbb but your trading that clean natural flavor of lump for borax, lime, random Charwood including cedar and who knows what else. I have already done the test of 20 lbs of lump compared to 20 lbs of kbb @275, lump won by a landslide. The kbb ashes up and is not that great for long cooks without refueling. They are great for grilling IMO but I can't stand them for smoking. All of my YouTube videos of me cooking are with lump. I have tried the briquettes a few times, but the flavor just ain't right, so I'm done with em! Good luck on your future cooks. A good sealed cooker is the utmost important factor for stable temps and low fuel consumption.
 
JS-TX said:
Please do tell of your method, I would love to get those kind of burn times. :grin:
Click to expand...
It's no big secret. In the UDS.> a small layer of lump on hte bottom two chunks of Wood another layer to cover the chunks more wood 90 deg off the last layer, top it off with lump. light up a 1/3 of a chimney of Cheap HEB briquettes to light it up. after a 10 min burn drop in the drum add a chunk of wood on top.

In the Weber I use 14" ring to set up the chain top it with chunks pull the ring, add a drip pan, light one end, adj the vents and let it do it's thing. The only maintenance is to rotate the lid 90 deg every 4 hrs so the exhaust is opposite the fire.
Pictures001.jpg

ring removed
DSCN0718.jpg

6 hrs into the cook.
DSCN0719.jpg

13 hrs ( if you look close at the 10 o'clock there is a wisp of smoke where the fire is) enough fuel left for 3- 4 hrs more.
DSCN0722.jpg
 
I could never figure out why people are so anal about getting whitish smoke from wood and declaring how it hurts the food, but they'll shut food up in a barrel for hours with smoldering Kingsford charcoal briquettes that smell like burning diesel fuel-soaked plastic unless they're ashed over. I can't stand the taste of anything cooked over unashed briquettes-might as well use lighter fluid as that white, noxious-chemical smelling smoke that comes off of them until they turn white. Kinda like using old plastic milk jugs for fuel. I can't stand to be anywhere near a chimney of briquettes until they get all the nasty crap burned off of them, and I sure don't want my food to taste like that crap smells.
 
Well I bought a bag of stubbs briquettes. It says the binder is veg oil. We'll see how it does this weekend. Any suggestions on what to smoke in an offset?
 
Gnaws on Pigs,
I was definitely thinkin it! There are some die hard briquette cookers out there! I aint one. :tsk:
 
I am confident in using Kingsford Briq's. That is what I started with. Over the past few months I have been trying different lump brands, not much choice around here, and I can say that I am happy with the results. My gripe is the quality control of the lump. It seems every bag that I get has a LOT of small pieces and dust in the bag.

I guess I just gotta get over it as once it is done burning I have less ash with lump compared to briq's. It's just that I have more waste at the beginning with the lump.
 
My .02 cents

When I was first starting I would get over excited about spikes in temp. Now I just relax and try not to look at the temps too much. It will come out tatsing great and lump will taste better then briquets.

Just gate down the intake a bit...

Good luck and enjoy!
 
I have used both lump and Kingsford Blue, and had good luck with both. As stated above with lump you have to make sure that it is tightly packed to get good burn times. Wicked Good lump is the best out there. I use Kingsford Blue most of the time based solely on cost. I don't see enough of benefit to lump to justify paying more.
 
Big fan of wicked good lump here. Burns hot, clean and doesn't burn up quickly. It's got some decent sizes of lump in the bag also. The store I usually buy from in Tacoma ran out. I tried some BGE lump and wasn't too happy with it. Small pieces and burned quickly. I've also gotten good smoke rings with Wicked Good by itself. I don't really mind KB, use it every now and again.
 
BayoustateBBQ said:
Well I bought a bag of stubbs briquettes. It says the binder is veg oil. We'll see how it does this weekend. Any suggestions on what to smoke in an offset?
Click to expand...

I use Stubb's exclusively in my smokers. Tried it about a year and a half ago and haven't looked back at a bag of KBB since.

I don't use lump in my smokers but I do in my kettle for grilling.
 
flyingbassman5 said:
I use Stubb's exclusively in my smokers. Tried it about a year and a half ago and haven't looked back at a bag of KBB since.

I don't use lump in my smokers but I do in my kettle for grilling.
Click to expand...

No chemical smell? Taste etc? Why don't you use lump?
 
I'm a big fan of using whatever you're most comfortable with, but we've used lump exclusively in our WSM's for 5 or 6 years now, and if I really took the time to load it right, I can get 12-14 hours, but normally, I don't mind adding a little coal from time to time. I get 8-10 without too much effort most of the time. Kingsford is ok, but I notice whenever I cook with it I end up belching for hours afterward. The K competion briquttes seem to not cause that, but for what I can get an 18lb bag of Royal Oak lump for, and the results I get, I'm a lump fan.

And we almost exclusively cook on either a WSM or a Weber kettle

I like Bludog's method for the kettle. It's very similar to how the aftermarket Smoke-EZ unit works.
 
Just bought. 20# bag of the new Cowboy. I don't do long cooks. The last cook I did was a big pile of lump on a 13.5 rack turned 90 degrees to the fire rack. Now it was 32 degrees but I had to keep all the vents open and feed handfuls every 20 minutes to keep it around 260. How big is the ring in the 18.5 WSM? 14"
 
scp said:
I use lump in my WSM and I think it works better than briquette. I fill the ring with lump..a few pieces of desired wood added. To start...I stick a small propane torch
thru one of the vents for about 3-5 mins. Leave all the vents wide open till dome temp reaches 150...then start closing vents to slow dpwn the rise. I would say I am up to 200 in about 30 minutes. A full basket of lump easily lasts 10 hours.


Eastwood Pinpoint Flame Propane Torch : Amazon.com : Power & Hand Tools

This isn't exactly my torch...but just the cheapest one at the hardware store...maybe 20 bucks. I love it!! Easy and fast
Click to expand...

I second this. I personally had more problems with KB than I do with lump and with less ash and not the after taste of KB. As far as burn time, I haven't seen enough difference to be concerned with. You need to watch the heat as it is rising and catch it before you reach your desired temp and you are fine. KB is for heating dutch ovens only in my opinion.
 
Bludawg said:
It's no big secret. In the UDS.> a small layer of lump on hte bottom two chunks of Wood another layer to cover the chunks more wood 90 deg off the last layer, top it off with lump. light up a 1/3 of a chimney of Cheap HEB briquettes to light it up. after a 10 min burn drop in the drum add a chunk of wood on top.

In the Weber I use 14" ring to set up the chain top it with chunks pull the ring, add a drip pan, light one end, adj the vents and let it do it's thing. The only maintenance is to rotate the lid 90 deg every 4 hrs so the exhaust is opposite the fire.
Pictures001.jpg

ring removed
DSCN0718.jpg

6 hrs into the cook.
DSCN0719.jpg

13 hrs ( if you look close at the 10 o'clock there is a wisp of smoke where the fire is) enough fuel left for 3- 4 hrs more.
DSCN0722.jpg
Click to expand...

hey dawg...I gave your snake method a go today (doing a batch of almonds), but had trouble getting my temp over ~150°. I usually load up the bottom, and dump my lit coals on the top, in the center
how deep do you go with the lump...hard to tell from the pics. are you really careful about how you load it in, or do you just sort of fill it in around the ring? I'm guessing your outside temps aren't quite as low as what I'm dealing with here, but it's also not cold enough that it would normally give me trouble (currently 41° here)
any input would be appreciated :grin:
 
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