Acrid Smoke Flavor

mcyork28

mcyork28

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Hello,

I picked up a used Sapphire Kamado cooker last week and smoked a rack of ribs. I had some issues with temp. control but I will get that worked out. The bigger problem I saw was the meat had a very acrid smoke flavor and I had absolutely no smoke ring. For the last couple years I have been cooking on a Masterforge propane smoker with pretty decent results. My first smoker was a cheap Brinkman charcoal version. I have smoked using charcoal before but never had this happen.

I was using Kingsford Competition briquettes and used no lighter fluid. I am planning to smoke a chicken today and picked up a bag of Royal Oak Natural Lump (people seem to speak highly of it here).

My question is what caused the acrid smoke flavor. I hear people talking about waiting until the smoke is "clean". As soon as I had smoke the meat went on. I also reloaded with additional wood chunks and chips (a mix of pecan chunks and apple chips) after about 45min.

Any help you can give me will be appreciated. I don't want to ruin another meal.

Thanks,
 
One thing to be careful of with ceramic cookers is their ability to absorb off flavors and everytime you cook on them the flavors come out into your food. For this reason I would be very cautious buying a used one. The previous owner may have ruined the ceramic on the inside with lighter fluid or some nasty charcoal or something. I would fire up the cooker with that royal oak you have, and smell the exhaust, if it smells bad, probably something cooked into the ceramic.

Maybe you used too much smoking wood?
 
Bitter,sharp,stinging,irritating describe creosote imo. Each time I have talked about creosote in the past,the majority pooh pooh the thought. I don't think you got it from the charcoal since you are obivously fimilar with using it. That leaves the chunks and chips. Pecan sometimes results in creosote if it's soaked in water or used with bark on. I believe a few cooking grimilins ( wood,tempature fluxation and a dash of crumy luck) conspired against you that day. I suggest A. stay with one fuel until you figure out your new cooker. B. Use different batch of chips and/or chunks for the next cook to see if there is a difference. C. Thougherly clean the cooker then do a dry run burn before putting more meat in it. The previous owner might have burned something strange in it. Good luck,I feel your pain mate.
 
Do not use chips.Do not soak your wood.Next time try just ONE fist sized chunk.If OK next try two chunks.
 
"as soon as I had smoke the meat went on"

there is your problem. Let it go for awhile until you get a nice thin blue smoke.

then put the meat on

and be careful reloading the wood. Try and load your cooker so that you are not throwing more wood on at 45 minutes.
 
Do not put you meat on as soon as you see smoke Let your fire become established You should see thin bluie smoke I let my egg go for 1 1/2 to 2 hrs befoere I cook Do not soak wood There is another thread similar to this You shoul read it. Be careful with poul;try it absorbs smoke fast and if too much it is nasty Cook around 325
Read post ruinned dinner by bubbyque
 
Definitely, ditch the chips and grab a bag of wood chunks. Remember every time you open the lid to throw chips on you're loosing heat not to mention the acrid white smoke that's coming off of them each time you throw a handful on.

You should try out some lump charcoal. Fill up the smoker with unlit lump. Light 2 spots on top with some weber starter cubes. Give it 10-15 min to light the charcoal. Then push a chunk of wood into each spot of lit coals. Close the lid and leave the vents wide open until you're 50-100* from your target temp. Wait until the smoke turns from billowy white to thin blue and then put the meat on. Usually 30-45 minutes.

Check out this thread, for thin blue smoke.
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/showthread.php?t=148650
 
Try this:

Locate and use a highly rated lump like Ozark Oak. Start it in a chimney by a method other than lighter fluid no wood chips. Deposit burning premium lump into fire bowl and allow the kamado to warm up and grill yourself a nice porterhouse medium rare to medium . Leave the top vent wide farkn open and control the fire by nearly shutting down
The bottom vent. Enjoy the steak-notice any off flavors??

Yes- Houston you've got a problem
No- please proceed

In an old stainless cupcake tin insert your favorite meat loaf recipe.
Place offset in Kamado or with diffuser (my primo does both)
Insert meatloaf cupcakes and cook to desired doneness. Taste anything acrid or bad?? Yes- well you've got a problem. No?? Enjoy the meatloaf. I don't soak wood and I use chunks-2 at the very most about the size of a medium lemon without bark. Preferably pecan, followed by hickory-never mezkeet.

I'm tired of tapping and used "I" way to much. Peace.
 
You used too many wood chips and by adding more you added too much smoke. Use two chunks the size of a woman's fist after it is at temp in a kamodo style cooker and you are good to go. You really only want smoke for an hour or two and then the exhaust will go clear.
 
sslak said:
Bad, stale, acidic...

It's like the smell of your jacket in the morning after all night in a smokey bar...you don't want your food tasting like that.
Click to expand...

I learned something new...must not be a word used much in Texas!
 
Only use lump in a kamado style cooker. I see you are going to try Royal Oak - good choice.
 
Here's a good reference pic that comes up from time to time. You want your smoke to look like the one on the right. The one on the left will give you a nasty flavor. If it was thin blue while you were cooking then I would check out other factors that may be involved, like what was cooked in it before, the condition or quality of fuel used, etc.

smokegoodvsevil.jpg
 
Like others have said, let your fire get established. Whith charcoal briquettes you also have a little more restriction in the air flow so when yu added chips you might have been choking the fire. I use lump in my eggs and a couple of chunks. all are started at the same time an, with top open, the fire gets well established and stable before I put food on.
 
Thanks for all of the feedback. I smoked a beer can chicken and a small portion of beef ribs tonight with much better results. I used Royal Oak lump and started it with a Weber cube in the center. I never brought the cooker above 300 degrees this time and I think that helped with the overall temp control results.

I used three un-soaked cherry chunks. I initially put all three in but it was quickly apparent that it was going to be to much smoke so I took one slightly smoldering chunk out. I let it burn for a while before I put the meat on. It was a fairly windy day here so it was hard to tell if the smoke was bluish or not.

Long story short: The chicken had a good smoke flavor. The wife said it was bordering on to strong but it didn't have the acrid flavor of the ribs. I think I will get the cooker dialed in before to long.

I tried to add some pics but kept getting an error. I will start another thread.

Thanks again for the help.
 
Sounds like you are on the right track. If the smoke was bad you would have been able to smell it.
 
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