Go for the Weber Bullet. Simple, fairly inexpensive, gets the job done. I've got an old friend from ye old high school days that does competitive bbq on a semi-serious hobby level and he has made it to the national championships with a couple Weber bullets. I help out whenever he is competing in the area and I'm sold and am picking one up in the next couple weeks myself. We won a couple of top 5 placings at the Oregon national qualifier last weekend using 3 of them plus a standard Weber grill. Should run you less than $300.
There are some add ons which are nice but not necessary, like a built in thermometer. I like a wireless probe with alarm, though once again, not something you need right away. There are also some fun opportunities to add on to them as you go along. My friend Ryan is working on a rig to hook up to the bottom vents to push/block air intake that has a monitor to measure temp to try to keep it constant but also has a little built in web server. Hook up your iPhone and you have high tech meat monitoring in all its glory. In terms of the time it takes, yeah, it takes awhile to really do up meat well. A really good pulled pork can take 14 or 16 hours. Brisket might go 10. Tri tip is only like 3 or 4 hours though. The thing is, though, that once you get it going, it can generally just hang out, it doesn't require a lot of intervention. You'll want to mop the pulled pork a couple times, check in on the others now and then, but by and large you want to keep it closed, keep an eye on the heat and just let it go. Slow and steady wins the flavor race. And, on a side note, if you are feeling low-tech, there is always the Cardboard Box Smoker technique which I learned from Alton Brown. Haven't done it myself but had a friend who did and it turned out nicely. Here is someone's take on it: http://www.gardenfork.tv/how-to-make-a-cardboard-box-smoker Happy meat consumption, Judah On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 7:48 AM, Scott Stroz <[email protected]> wrote: > > Any one have a recommendation for a good, but not terribly expensive one? > > -- > Scott Stroz > --------------- > You can make things happen, you can watch things happen or you can > wonder what the f*&k happened. - Cpt. Phil Harris > > http://xkcd.com/386/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology-Michael-Dinowitz/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:321001 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
