First Time Using A Drip Pan In My BDS

thirdeye

thirdeye

somebody shut me the fark up.

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In a couple of months it will have been 4 years since I got my BDS. I have no idea of the number of cooks (sometimes I have both of them going at the same time), but I have never used a drip pan or a heat shield or anything (except when smoking cheese over a tray of ice, but that was to keep it from melting)

My briskets, butts and chicken come out too good to ever try a drip pan with those, but fatties can really drop a lot of grease into the coals, and the clean-up is the worst after cooking a load of them.

This afternoon I was cooking 6 one pounders for work tomorrow and I used a drip pan on the lower grate. I have 6 or 7 inches between grates, so the smoke was able to circulate really well, and even though some drips of fat got by the pan, it did capture a lot. A couple of cups anyway. The real test will be the flavor tomorrow.

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Great looking fatties...!!! I am about to fire up my UDS for the first time and have been reading the back and forth about water/drip pans. I've always used one and will probably start trying out each way for a test. Thanks for sharing...
 
With most cooks, the little flavor bombs of fat that hit the coals impart an open pit type of taste to your Q. It's one of the reasons I like to use them.
 
I have thought about using a Drip Pan in mine. Those are some fine looking Fatty's!
 
"kkkkk - we're going to need back-up here - some joker's got 6 - 1lb flavor nukes that he's cooked up in his backyard. Be sure to let the bomb squad know that they've got a live one here... kkkk - Kkkkk - copy that."
 
Hey Wayne, did you use wood for smoke, or just rely on what got past the drip pan?
 
swamprb said:
It's the end of the world as we know it!
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If so, we're going out with a bang..... I just sampled one while slicing them up. They met the expected level of quality.

Desert Dweller said:
Hey Wayne, did you use wood for smoke, or just rely on what got past the drip pan?
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Oh yeah, three chunks. Two cherry and one sugar maple. I'm also burning mesquite lump.
 
I would be real interested in knowing how much "pit" flavor you lost. Cleaning my Mega is a pain & anything I can do to minimize cleanup without sacrificing flavor would be a blessing.
 
Desert Dweller said:
I would be real interested in knowing how much "pit" flavor you lost. Cleaning my Mega is a pain & anything I can do to minimize cleanup without sacrificing flavor would be a blessing.
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Looking at it this way, and with the drip pan, these fatties are exactly as flavorful as fatties I have done in my Eggs or my buddies offset. There was enough room between the cooking grate and the drip pan (7") and an additional 7" from the cooking grate to the lid to get great smoke circulation.

I'm certain that drippings into the coals would have improved upon the flavor, but I wanted to try the pan because fatties give up as much grease in a very short period of time as two briskets do in the first 8 hours of the cook. I did a dozen one time and it was dangerous opening the lid to roll them over because all the grease in the bottom would catch.

If I'm only cooking one or two I most likely would not use the drip pan. I have no reason to use one under butts, ribs, chicken or briskets either, because I want that additional flavor from those dripping fats.
 
I wonder how much of it because it smells so good cooking that a person believes it tastes better? Would be real interesting to do a blind taste test with and without the juices dripping into the coals.

What got me to thinking about this is there seems to be no pattern that stick burners have better taste scores in contests with blind judging.
 
It's going to be a beautiful weekend here finally if the world doesn't come to an end. I have had my daily dose of reading and looking at pictures so now it's time to get to the store and fire up the grills and smokers. Hope the rest of the brethern have a Great and Hardy Weekend.
 
HeSmellsLikeSmoke said:
I wonder how much of it because it smells so good cooking that a person believes it tastes better? Would be real interesting to do a blind taste test with and without the juices dripping into the coals.

What got me to thinking about this is there seems to be no pattern that stick burners have better taste scores in contests with blind judging.
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I have served side-by-side Egged briskets and BDS briskets..... the BDS ones were more flavorful.
 
thirdeye said:
I have served side-by-side Egged briskets and BDS briskets..... the BDS ones were more flavorful.
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Very helpful information. Thanks.
 
Thanks for the info. Good looking Fatties.
My drum gets nasty after long cooks with a bunch of meat on her...a pain to clean.
I thought about using the drip...but i am afraid I will lose that special UDS flavor.
I am going to give it a shot next time i do some fatties...
 
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