Who has tried a Pellet Pooper and Not Liked it. ?

No complaint but it can be boring

SmittyJonz said:

Why did you Not like it.? Too Light on Smoke Flavor.? Too Boring using it?
Neighbors were Laughing at you.? Wife offered you some of her Dresses.?

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LOL!!! I have a friend who wanted to get into smoking meat as he liked mine. However, he did not want to do all the work of tending the fire, watching the temps, etc. So he bought a pellet smoker and it worked well until he lost power!!

I agree with Tom, boring would be one complaint. I am out doing yard work or using the pool and am itching to tend a fire. Then i look over at the pellet just chugging along. Other complaint I have is not enough smoking space. Last would be the hassle of plugging it in. I hate cords.

I think the smoke flavor is perfect for just about everything besides brisket. Brisket tastes like pot roast to me, no smoke. I am not a brisket lover though. I like to think of pellet grill as the rib machine.

I had a Daniel Boone for about 6 months.

The food was ok. Just not really what I was looking for. The startup was easy and conveneant but cleanup seemed to me to be more of a hassle.



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I've had a Traeger and a Pit Boss (I think, from Lowe's) and wasnt thrilled with the food that came from them. Granted, they weren't the highest quality grills in the grand scheme of things.

I like my GMG (as I've posted a dozen times or so). I accept what it is, and don't expect more. ..But there sure are a lot of reasons not to like pellet "grilling"

One more.. Chicken. Chicken should stay far far away. That needs a good old charcoal grill

I hope more folks put in their shortcomings here. This is a thread I would love to see flesh itself out. I'm the target audience ! I have a single L BGE. I'm looking at all the smoker commentary and definitely have smoker envy and am looking at a future acquisition. With all the noise about pellet smokers, I have to look at them. But knowing the shortcomings is pretty important since nobody will tell you that BEFORE you buy.


So keep those cards n letters coming. Don't spare the criticizm. Give it both barrels.

It almost needs a new thread.....all the reasons you dislike pellet poopers in general, and brand specific.

Only complaint I HAD.. light smoke profile. Fixed that with the amzen tube.

mowin said:

Only complaint I HAD.. light smoke profile. Fixed that with the amzen tube.

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What temps were you cooking at? I get good smoke with Lumberjack pellets and starting out low (220 - 230 degrees) then ramp up towards the end of the cook if needed. My first cook I did at 275 and it was horribly disappointing. It seems once the temps get over 250 the pellets are burning too clean. I have a smoke tube but haven't needed to use it yet.

I brought Pit Boss for my son with pit boss comp pellets, he loves it but I don't like the lack of smoke. Chix breast, fish taste great. Never did a brisket or pulled pork but ribs did not have enough smoke.

I do want to try other pellets to see if that is the issue.

Jeff

Only real complaint I have about my YS640 is, I didn't buy it sooner. Compared to the benefits, none of the small negatives matter. They could do better on metal prep and paint. I wish the bottom cooking grate pulled out. Other than that, it is awesome. You can get a light smoke flavor with it, or if you want you can get a heavier smoke, both with very little work.

IFlyEm said:

What temps were you cooking at? I get good smoke with Lumberjack pellets and starting out low (220 - 230 degrees) then ramp up towards the end of the cook if needed. My first cook I did at 275 and it was horribly disappointing. It seems once the temps get over 250 the pellets are burning too clean. I have a smoke tube but haven't needed to use it yet.

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225* . Verified with igrill2. Use only lumberjack 100% hickory. GMG DB.

I have the camp chef SmokePro SE. I find it is a bit small. I am learning that you can't do everything on a smoker. I tried to cook pizza on a pizza stone with it, and did not like the way it worked compared to my gasser. I don't think a pellet smoker can do everything. I don't think a gasser is good for ribs and brisket. The Camp Chef does a great job with those. It is made of thin metal and I wonder how long it will last.

I am going to keep my Delta Heat grill, and upgrade to a Yoder YS-640 when the camp chef gives out (maybe sooner than that).

Had to plug it in for it to work properly.

Was doing 3 briskets in a Rec Tec unit. Everything was going as planned until the wrap sprung a leak on the far left brisket. Some of the juices hit the temp probe wires and it shorted out the temp probe.

Pellet grill doesn't operate blind, so it just stopped getting hot. Had to finish in gasser and oven. Rec Tec fixed the issue in a matter of days. They were great about it.

Problem was that even after it was fixed, I was forever paranoid about electrical issues. I didn't like the stress, so it was easier to eliminate the stress by sticking with charcoal and chunks.

Edit:

oh, and clean up. I can hose down my cabinet. With the pellet grill, it was always a more hands on, greasy mess.

I had a Traeger Junior. My first smoker of any kind, bought on a Costco whim for $299.

1. Low smoke profile. I dumped the traeger pellets right away, then tried lumberjack and cookinpellets. While I liked those better, never got the right smoke flavor. Tried the Amazen Tube...still not enough smoke flavor. Now, the meat was cooked well, nice ring, tender, juicy...and still better than the flavor from my propane gasser...but just not enough. I would go out for BBQ and cringe when I could taste the smoke better than mine.

2. Design issues - my traeger had an issue with the pellets feeding the auger. It would hold over 6 hours of pellets at 250-275. But after about 2 hours the pellets would feed in the middle, directly over the auger opening...but fail to feed from the sides. This would eventually create an empty cone of air in the pellets, the auger would keep turning but would feed no pellets and the fire would go out. Tried different things, weights on top, spraying the sides of the hopper with pam to make them slick...started looking into one off hacks to fix it, but never trusted it after a nice Costco Prime brisket that i threw out in the morning when I found the smoker at ambient temp after trying to get 6 hours of sleep overnight.

3. Electric chit breaks...and needs electricity. Had two slabs of ribs and salmon prepped, rubbed and ready to go on...go flip the switch...nothing...turns out it was a bad induction fan blowing fuses. Traeger sent me a new one under warranty, took a week or so...by then the ribs and salmon werent good anymore. Then it happened again...this time it was the controller blowing fuses. This time it was a pair of pork tenderloin that ended up in the trash....

So did the Traeger. Launched it off my deck and dragged it to the curb. Ordered a PBC, and never looked back.

proof of death - on the curb...ready for pickup

Top ten reasons to hate pellet poopers...

Needs power.
Have to make room for another stack of fuel.
Cost of fuel.
Needs a thorough cleaning every few cooks.
The number of failure points.
Shouldn't be used in direct rain.
More likely to be stored inside a garage or shed, which requires a cool down period.
Lighter smoke without accessories.
Boring.
Forfeit man card.



Ok, so last 2 or 3 were fillers.