Testing rubs and struggling for control

[GVDub]

When I jumped into the latest rub and sauce swap, my initial plan was to send my trading partner a collection of Western-Style rubs from BBQ Bros, a spin-off of Tampico Spices who are the biggest purveyor of Mexican and Latin-American spices in L.A.. My order got held up and didn’t arrive in time, so I found some other local rubs to send and ended up with BBQ Bros pack of California, Kansas City and Texas-style rubs. I also had The Judge and The Jury rubs courtesy of sfisch, who I was trading with. What to do? Why pick up a couple of slabs of spares and test four of the five (The Judge looks to be pretty much a garlic pepper rub, so I though I’d wait until I was doing a chicken for that). Here’s a half slab that’s been coated with mustard and The Jury.

Rub test half slab spares. by George Van Wagner, on Flickr

So I fired up the POS (Lowe’s house brand grill that was a gift from a friend after someone waltzed into the backyard and stole our last grill, as one of his tenants had left it behind in not great shape, but free is free, and when you’re a broke musician …) American National Outdoors that doesn’t have a single airtight joint in it’s construction and is always a bear to maintain temp on. Dumped this chimney on top of a scoop and a half of lump and a handful of cherry wood chips.

Rub test half slab spares. by George Van Wagner, on Flickr

Set it up for indirect heat with a heavy duty foil shield between the mound of lump and the slabs. Because of lack of space, I had to rotate positions every 20 minutes or so, but this was my starting configuration.

Rub test half slab spares. by George Van Wagner, on Flickr

Managed to keep if between 265 and 289, according to the grill level probe, for about two hours, but the temperature started to drop and I wasn’t able to get eenough extra by opening vents (as I said, it’s far from airtight, and the vents are more of a suggestion, really), while the meat probe was stalled at 157. So, I wrapped all four half slabs in foil, added a scoop of lump on top of the last of the dying coals and pulled the heat shield. This managed to get the grill temp from the 215 it had dropped to back up to 255, for long enough to finish the cook. Pulled at 190, rested for half an hour in foil, and this is the result.

Rub test half slab spares. by George Van Wagner, on Flickr

I am so looking forward to getting enough pulled together for a PBC, so I don’t have to jump through quite so many hoops just to do a couple slabs of ribs.

 

[LloydQ]

When you get your funds together, get a 18" WSM. I have both, and the Weber is light years better.

 

[GVDub]

When you get your funds together, get a 18" WSM. I have both, and the Weber is light years better.

Based on? Performance? Ease of use? Versatility? I've been very impressed by what I've seen of PBC results, less so with WSM. Had water smokers in the past and didn't particularly care for them.

Or is this the cooker equivalent of Gibson vs. Fender?

 

[IamMadMan]

Great looking ribs...

 

[16Adams]

Excellent cook.

 

[LordRiffenstein]

Nice looking ribs George!

 

[Right on Q]

Based on? Performance? Ease of use? Versatility? I've been very impressed by what I've seen of PBC results, less so with WSM. Had water smokers in the past and didn't particularly care for them.

Or is this the cooker equivalent of Gibson vs. Fender?

Don't think of a WSM as a water cooker. Plenty of folks (including myself) never put water in the pan.

IMO the WSMs are very easy to operate and very versatile. I've cooked on cabinet smokers, offsets, etc and the little WSMs still get fired up more often than anything.

I gave a WSM to my FIL, who was a die hard offset guy, and he told me the next weekend that cooking on a WSM was so easy he felt like it was cheating :razz:. Now he's a loyal WSM fan too after 20 years of offset cooking.

 

[LloydQ]

I would base my choice of the WSM on several factors. Foremost is the flexibility of the amount of smoke flavor you can give your food. I have had my PBC for 20 months, and have tried every type of charcoal, every configuration of placement in the basket, and different amounts and types of wood chunks. There is just no getting around the fact that the fat dripping directly on the coals has a distinctive flavor, and it is not subtle. I have found that to MY taste it is overpowering. With the WSM, I feel that the smoke flavor is more pure, and that you can better taste the difference in various types of wood. Also, I think that subtleties in your rubs and spices are more easily discerned. I personally feel that these differences are most apparent when using the water pan, although there are many who would argue that point.
Although I have no hard evidence of this, my experience also tells me that briskets and butts turn out more moist on the WSM. Again, many will argue this, but I think the PBC runs a little hot for these cuts. It is difficult to get one to run lower than 270 or so, so the edge in temp control goes to the WSM.
My take is this: You can get a Gateway rib hanging kit for $50 or so that fits the WSM perfectly. You can do anything the PBC can do with this set up with better temp control. Plus you have the capability to do true low and slow if you so desire.
Sorry to be so long winded!

 

[kevinstaggs]

I would base my choice of the WSM on several factors. Foremost is the flexibility of the amount of smoke flavor you can give your food. I have had my PBC for 20 months, and have tried every type of charcoal, every configuration of placement in the basket, and different amounts and types of wood chunks. There is just no getting around the fact that the fat dripping directly on the coals has a distinctive flavor, and it is not subtle. I have found that to MY taste it is overpowering. With the WSM, I feel that the smoke flavor is more pure, and that you can better taste the difference in various types of wood. Also, I think that subtleties in your rubs and spices are more easily discerned. I personally feel that these differences are most apparent when using the water pan, although there are many who would argue that point.
Although I have no hard evidence of this, my experience also tells me that briskets and butts turn out more moist on the WSM. Again, many will argue this, but I think the PBC runs a little hot for these cuts. It is difficult to get one to run lower than 270 or so, so the edge in temp control goes to the WSM.
My take is this: You can get a Gateway rib hanging kit for $50 or so that fits the WSM perfectly. You can do anything the PBC can do with this set up with better temp control. Plus you have the capability to do true low and slow if you so desire.
Sorry to be so long winded!

100% accurate according to my experience.



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[sudsandswine]

^^^ same, had a PBC and got rid of it for that reason. Later got drums, same "problem" unsurprisingly. Cooking over pans helped but did not eliminate the flavor from dripping on hot coals. Definitely a personal preference but for me I don't like the flavor.

 

[GVDub]

^^^ same, had a PBC and got rid of it for that reason. Later got drums, same "problem" unsurprisingly. Cooking over pans helped but did not eliminate the flavor from dripping on hot coals. Definitely a personal preference but for me I don't like the flavor.

On the other hand, I grew up on open pit cooking and the flavor from drippings hitting hot coals is, for me, an integral part of the entire barbecue experience.

 

[sudsandswine]

Well look at it this way...you can use the WSM like a PBC but you cant use the PBC like a WSM.

 

[GVDub]

Well look at it this way...you can use the WSM like a PBC but you cant use the PBC like a WSM.

Sure you can. Stick a diffusion plate above the charcoal tray. You can even put a drip pan on top of it and use water if you feel you have to. Seen plenty of folks doing that in the PBC Appreciation Thread. Any design can be modded to do stuff that the original designers didn't intend.

There are other things I dislike about the WSM's design that removed it from my consideration. Glad you love yours, but, like guitars and cars, all this stuff is down to personal taste.

 

[sudsandswine]

Well my point was that you can easily cook on two shelves in the WSM but can also hang like a PBC, I've owned both so thought I'd give some friendly input. Guess I won't make that mistake in the future since you have things all figured out.

 

[GVDub]

Well my point was that you can easily cook on two shelves in the WSM but can also hang like a PBC, I've owned both so thought I'd give some friendly input. Guess I won't make that mistake in the future since you have things all figured out.

No need to get so touchy about it. I have things figured out for what I need. I’m a research geek, and a lot of time and energy always gets put in up front. It looked to me like the mods required to make a WSM cook like a PBC were roughly equivalent, in an inverse sort of way, to the mods needed to do the converse, and, since I know where the bulk of my cooking is going to lie, I’m choosing the cooker that does that and can be modded to do something else if I need, rather than buy the cooker that does something else, and needs mods out of the box to do what I’m looking for. That’s the long and short of it. I appreciate the advice, but I don’t need the other things the WSM does right now.

 

[WilliamKY]

Maybe it's because a PBC is smaller (30gal?)but my 55gal UDS has no problem holding temps between 225-250 for hours. Maybe it's my vents or maybe my drum is thicker metal than normal but temp control is a non-issue for me. I would like to have a WSM in my collection eventually.