My UDS charcoal basket "breakthrough"

[expatpig]

And I respect your opinion as well, I can appreciate mods and tweaking, I've done a few myself, but sometimes I believe it's just splitting hairs.

[enasnidx]

Resurrecting an older thread here to report how this has been working for me over the past year. I can say after smoking many different types and quantities of meat that I absolutely love the results. This was probably the easiest part of my UDS build and it works without flaw. The heat in my UDS is dispersed pretty evenly and I am able to cook large meats without having to worry about the middle being done faster or hotter than the outside. I can throw 3 racks of ribs on and they come out cooked evenly every time (and finished at the same time) and I don't have to worry about rotating them on the grate. The cooks are more efficient because I don't have to open lid. I usually spin the lid periodically without lifting it to put the exhaust vent on a different side so that the coals burn evenly around the basket.


I only bring this up again to give others an update and show how easy it is. Plus I can simply leave it out when I fill my basket if I want to have a hotter center (for maybe doing one butt in the middle). It uses such a small amount of fuel with the ring in the middle that I can fill my basket with maybe 1/4 of a bag of coals and I always have left over after a 9 hour smoke. I was amused at my last (amatuer) comp when no one knew what the heck I was using for smoking and they were refueling their huge smokers for a 6 hour rib cook (and using a full bag of coals in the process).

Hope others try this and get good results as well!