Smoked Turkey on an Offset. My Method.

I've been agonizing over how to smoke the turkey this year. Usually I use the Traeger but I really wanted to hickory smoke it. My offset struggles to keep a cooking chamber temp of 300 degrees for any amount of time when used the traditional way. Here's the idea I finally came up with. I'll be using RO Chef's Select and hickory chunks. I'll be using a bigger water pan but this is the basic idea.

Teamfour said:

Why not put the basket in the firebox?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Click to expand...

Because I want the cooking chamber to maintain 325-350 degrees. When it's in the firebox I have to have a raging fire to keep the temp above 300. And even if I do get it up there it's much less consistent. This way I can have an even temp and a clean burning fire. The plate in the middle helps even out the heat so I don't have to rotate the turkey every 20 minutes.

superdan said:

Be careful of a grease fire if you're firing up the main chamber...

Click to expand...

Thanks for the heads up. I haven't tried it this way yet. We are having baked turkey and ham as well so if this idea is a failure we won't have to go hungry. I'll just make sure I have a larger water pan and not fill it too full.

Well, I'll be happy when I get my UDS together and running. It worked alright but offsets are a lot of work no matter how you use them. I was having to rotate the turkey a lot and even had to flip it over because the top was cooking faster than the bottom. It was a real struggle to keep the temp anything close to consistent. Adding a modest amount of fuel would drive the temp up 100 degrees and would drop steadily making it necessary to open the lid way too often to add fuel. Also, the cooking chamber bottom is less curved than the fire box bottom leaving less room for ashes. This idea would probably be good for chicken halves or turkey breasts but is too troublesome with a whole turkey.