My first BBQ failure

So in my reasonably short amateur bbq career I had very few failures. I've had cooks that were significantly better than others but never a cook that was just plan bad... that is until this past weekend. Of course, luck has it it was also the first time I was making BBQ for my wife to bring into work.

Now I don't mind as long as I learn from the cook but I can't really figure this one out. I knew right away something was going completely wrong. Before I even took anything off the smoker I told my wife I had a really bad feeling about the way the smoker was putting out smoke. I just had a white cloud of smoke constantly streaming out of my UDS. While I've seen this happen for a short time when the charcoal is first light this just wouldn't stop. I tried increasing the airflow to bring the temp up. I tried decreasing the airflow to bring the temp down. Just nothing would get me the nice blue smoke I'm usually get. The resulting cook was overly smokey and had an almost gasoline like smell (and I'd say taste but I have never tested gasoline). Creosote induced maybe? Terrible tasting definitely.

What was different? Well not that much. I'd say the only part that was different was I used some fairly green (3 month old) wood but it was a very small piece and I've used green wood before with success. Maybe it was a bit wetter than the last piece? I'm not 100% sure.

As an aside, I'm beginning to deplore Kingsford Competition briquettes. I find that they are horrible for a Minion method that is typically used with most on my UDS as they kick off a lot of smoke as they are lighting.

Any ideas what else I could have done wrong?

landarc said:

I would look at the green wood as the likely culprit. Espcially if your temperatures were other wise good.

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The odd part though is I've used green wood before and Mixon advises it from what I've read. Difference with this green wood is it might have been slightly wet from snow a few days before.

landarc said:

If this is your first failure, you aren't trying hard enough :wink:

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Trust me I'd like to fail more but my waistline pays for it :mmph:

BayoustateBBQ said:

Wood needs to be dried a minimum of 6 mos in spring time temps, more for colder temps, less for hotter temps. Wood over 2 years old is just good for heat, you don't get the desired smoke flavor

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http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1735741&postcount=3

There must be more to it. How come it works for him?

Interesting... well I'm going to go with this theory that it's the partially wet green wood. I'm also going to switch to wicked good hardwood once I run out of kingsford. I think wicked good is all that's readily available around these parts.

hamiltont said:

Just by chance is it possible your charcoal picked up some moisture?

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could have... it lives in the garage by order of the matriarch of the house but it's not exposed to direct moisture outside of what's in the air

John Bowen said:

I have a neighbor who pulls his Lang offset out of his garage every three weeks and fires it up. He does this whether he is cooking something or not. I asked him why and he says that moisture builds up in the smoker and he wants to keep it burned out. He said that he started doing this after his smoker sat up for about three months and he went through the same thing you describe above. He said that it not only affected his smoke but that the entire smoker smelled like it.

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Now that is interesing because that sounds exactly like what happened to me. I hadn't broken the smoker out in some time and now it carries a slight funk from that cook.