Brewer
is one Smokin' Farker
In the spirit of Naked Whiz's charcoal review and database, I decided to buy a few bags of Charbroil Apple chucks from Home Depot to determine if the product really sucks as bad as popular opinion says it does.
I buy my smoking wood from a few different smoking wood suppliers across the US. Overall, I'm extremely happy with the quality of the product I receive and feel that the price per is fair for high quality clean smoking wood. What kills me is the shipping cost. If I'm lucky enough to meet up with one of them at a comp and call in an order in advance, it's a real deal. However, most often, I find myself ordering and paying shipping costs on roughly 100lbs of wood at a pop - which can get very expensive.
After seeing a few threads on Home Depot wood, I decided to take a gamble and pick up 4 bags of Apple this last week for $6.99 a bag. Each bag weighed 4-4.5lbs. I broke open the bags and separated good stuff, bad stuff and shake to determine how much of it was usable. The good stuff if highest quality - typically the type of stuff I get from my smoking wood suppliers. The bad stuff is comprised of small branches, oil stained wood, chunks with wood rot or anything else that looked suspicious.
The first pic below shows the composition of the first bag. As you can see, about 1lb of the 4.5lb bag was unusable bad stuff and shake. Yielding roughly 3.5lbs of good smoking wood.
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/album.php?albumid=404&pictureid=3134
The second pic below shows the composition of the second bag. It was a little smaller than the first at 4lbs. After removing the bad stuff and shake, the net was a little over about 3lbs.
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/album.php?albumid=404&pictureid=3133
The 3rd pic below shows the composition of the 3rd bag. It weighed in at roughly 4lbs and after removing bad stuff and shake, the net was about 3lbs. There was quite a bit of branch fragments and shake in this bag.
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/album.php?albumid=404&pictureid=3132
The 4th and final pic shows the composition of the 4th bag. This bag weighed in at roughly 4.5lbs and after removing the bad stuff and shake, the net was about 4lbs. This bag has less unusable crap in it than the 3 others.
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/album.php?albumid=404&pictureid=3131
The average yield of usable wood across the 4 test bags was roughly 3.5lbs (3.3lbs to be more specific). So Home Depot wood works out to $6.99 per 3.5lbs or roughly $21 per 10lbs - which is nearly twice the cost of one of my suppliers before factoring in shipping costs. After factoring in shipping costs of roughly $10 per lb, the Home Depot wood is roughly $2-3 cheaper than my supplier per 10lb box of wood chunks. After adding tax into the cost of Home Depot wood, it works out to be roughly $2 per 10lbs cheaper than my suppliers wood.
After using the home depot wood to smoke a load of MOINKS, I can say that I didn't notice any issues with the aroma, burn-time or taste that would lead me to believe the Home Depot wood is any less quality than the wood I'm buying from my suppliers.
Is the $2 savings per 10lb box of wood chunks enough to justify buying wood from Home Depot rather than a specialty wood supplier? That depends. For me, I prefer to save time sorting and feel real comfortable with the quality of wood I'm getting from my supplier - I'll continue to order from my specialty wood supplier for the extra couple bucks per 10lbs. It's a small price to pay in my opinion for quality control and to help keep specialty wood suppliers in the business. However, if I'm in a pinch and need some cherry or apple, I won't hesitate to grab a bag from Home Depot to get me through to my next shipment of wood from my supplier.
I buy my smoking wood from a few different smoking wood suppliers across the US. Overall, I'm extremely happy with the quality of the product I receive and feel that the price per is fair for high quality clean smoking wood. What kills me is the shipping cost. If I'm lucky enough to meet up with one of them at a comp and call in an order in advance, it's a real deal. However, most often, I find myself ordering and paying shipping costs on roughly 100lbs of wood at a pop - which can get very expensive.
After seeing a few threads on Home Depot wood, I decided to take a gamble and pick up 4 bags of Apple this last week for $6.99 a bag. Each bag weighed 4-4.5lbs. I broke open the bags and separated good stuff, bad stuff and shake to determine how much of it was usable. The good stuff if highest quality - typically the type of stuff I get from my smoking wood suppliers. The bad stuff is comprised of small branches, oil stained wood, chunks with wood rot or anything else that looked suspicious.
The first pic below shows the composition of the first bag. As you can see, about 1lb of the 4.5lb bag was unusable bad stuff and shake. Yielding roughly 3.5lbs of good smoking wood.
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/album.php?albumid=404&pictureid=3134
The second pic below shows the composition of the second bag. It was a little smaller than the first at 4lbs. After removing the bad stuff and shake, the net was a little over about 3lbs.
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/album.php?albumid=404&pictureid=3133
The 3rd pic below shows the composition of the 3rd bag. It weighed in at roughly 4lbs and after removing bad stuff and shake, the net was about 3lbs. There was quite a bit of branch fragments and shake in this bag.
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/album.php?albumid=404&pictureid=3132
The 4th and final pic shows the composition of the 4th bag. This bag weighed in at roughly 4.5lbs and after removing the bad stuff and shake, the net was about 4lbs. This bag has less unusable crap in it than the 3 others.
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/album.php?albumid=404&pictureid=3131
The average yield of usable wood across the 4 test bags was roughly 3.5lbs (3.3lbs to be more specific). So Home Depot wood works out to $6.99 per 3.5lbs or roughly $21 per 10lbs - which is nearly twice the cost of one of my suppliers before factoring in shipping costs. After factoring in shipping costs of roughly $10 per lb, the Home Depot wood is roughly $2-3 cheaper than my supplier per 10lb box of wood chunks. After adding tax into the cost of Home Depot wood, it works out to be roughly $2 per 10lbs cheaper than my suppliers wood.
After using the home depot wood to smoke a load of MOINKS, I can say that I didn't notice any issues with the aroma, burn-time or taste that would lead me to believe the Home Depot wood is any less quality than the wood I'm buying from my suppliers.
Is the $2 savings per 10lb box of wood chunks enough to justify buying wood from Home Depot rather than a specialty wood supplier? That depends. For me, I prefer to save time sorting and feel real comfortable with the quality of wood I'm getting from my supplier - I'll continue to order from my specialty wood supplier for the extra couple bucks per 10lbs. It's a small price to pay in my opinion for quality control and to help keep specialty wood suppliers in the business. However, if I'm in a pinch and need some cherry or apple, I won't hesitate to grab a bag from Home Depot to get me through to my next shipment of wood from my supplier.
