First Smoke

[Traegerphilly]

Good Evening Guys,

I’ve been checking out your forum for nearly a year. I have wanted a smoker for over a year but was thinking about holding off until I moved out of the city (I live in Philly) and buying a stick smoker. I have limited experience, mostly with a large trailer smoker at my in-laws in Texas. I was nervous with traeger given some of the negative reviews of unhappy folks online. I finally pulled the trigger and got myself an Ironwood 650. Boy am I happy so far.

No issues with set up (in part because I set up a separate 2.4 ghz network once I read up on it on the forum). Followed the advice of others on here and did my burn in on Saturday afternoon. Went big and got a 14 lbs choice packer. Trimmed it (definitely need practice). 1/2 salt and 1/2 black pepper on the rub. Let it come to room temperature for about an hour and a half.

Used bear mountain gourmet blend pellets plus a smoker tube (thanks to your recommendations) with pellets and oak wood chips.

Put the brisket on overnight (it was cold - in the 30s and 40s). Did 10 hours on super smoke at 180 degrees. Started spritzing every hour-ish with apple cider vinegar after 5 hours. Continued to replace the smoker tube as needed

Then did 2 hours at 275 degrees. Wrapped it in butcher paper and dropped it back to 225 on super smoke for an hour. Then finished with another 2 hours at 250.

Took it off at about 203-204. (do you guys have difficulty knowing where to probe once wrapped?) Wrapped in some more paper and placed in the Yeti for another 2.5 hours.

Good bark, great flavor (I thought it had plenty of smoke) and very happy with the end product. I was a little nervous about whether I would get enough bark and smoke but honestly the bark and smoke was as good as almost anything I can find at BBQ places in the northeast. I definitely need practice trimming precook and then cutting the point for service. I’ve included some photos of the journey (couldn’t wait any longer to take better ones).

Thanks for all the helpful notes/threads/product recs!

 

[dflaher]

All I can say is great job! That brisket looks sensational. I've done about 4 so far and I still suck at trimming so don't worry. I've purchased a smoke tube but haven't used it yet. Did you use pellets or chips, and how did you light it?

 

[Traegerphilly]

All I can say is great job! That brisket looks sensational. I've done about 4 so far and I still suck at trimming so don't worry. I've purchased a smoke tube but haven't used it yet. Did you use pellets or chips, and how did you light it?

Thanks! I put pellets in the bottom of the tube, oak chips in the middle of it, and topped off with a few more pellets. I used a butane kitchen torch to get the tube lit. Let it burn for about 5-10 minutes until the fire died down. Then I threw it on. I didn’t light the first one long enough and it didn’t burn all the way through. The rest all burned through. I think I did 3 or 4 in total throughout the whole cook.

 

[JayHog]

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Good Evening Guys,

I’ve been checking out your forum for nearly a year. I have wanted smoker for over a year but was thinking about holding off until I moved out of the city (I live in Philly) and buying a stick smoker. I have limited experience, mostly with a large trailer smoker at my in-laws in Texas. I was nervous with traeger given some of the negative reviews of unhappy folks online. I finally pulled the trigger and got myself an Ironwood 650. Boy am I happy so far.

No issues with set up (in part because I set up a separate 2.4 ghz network once I read up on it on the forum). Followed the advice of others on here and did my burn in on Saturday afternoon. Went big and got a 14 lbs choice packer. Trimmed it (definitely need practice). 1/2 salt and 1/2 black pepper on the rub. Let it come to room temperature for about an hour and a half.

Used bear mountain gourmet blend pellets plus a smoker tube (thanks to your recommendations)with pellets and oak wood chips.

Put the brisket on overnight (it was cold - in the 30s and 40s). Did 10 hours on super smoke at 180 degrees. Started spritzing every hour-ish with apple cider vinegar after 5 hours. Continued to replace the smoker tube as needed

Then did 2 hours at 275 degrees. Wrapped in butcher paper and dropped it back to 225 on super smoke for an hour. Then finished with another 2 hours at 250.

Took it off at about 203-204. (do you guys have difficulty knowing where to probe once wrapped?) Wrapped in some more paper and placed in the Yeti for another 2.5 hours.

Good bark, great flavor (I thought it had plenty of smoke) and very happy with the end product. I was a little nervous about whether I would get enough bark and smoke but honestly the bark and smoke as good as almost anything I can find at BBQ places in the northeast. I definitely need practice trimming precook and then cutting the point for service. I’ve included some photos of the journey (couldn’t wait any longer to take better ones).

Thanks for all the helpful notes/threads/product recs!

That looks amazing!! Congratulations on your first smoke!!

 

[GrillMeister]

Great job! Looks awesome!

 

[Big Man Dan]

I've been apprehensive about trying a brisket and you nailed it on your very first go with the smoker! Congrats!!

 

[midwest]

Congrats, looks great. Only thing I see you might do different is there is probably no need to use the super smoke once it is hot enough and you had it wrapped. I don't think it will be taking any of the smoke in at that point. Others may disagree though.
My 780 does not have super smoke so I don't know much about that setting but I am guessing it doesn't run more efficient and doesn't save pellets in that mode so no need to use it once it's over 165 or so and been wrapped.

 

[Traegerphilly]

Congrats, looks great. Only thing I see you might do different is there is probably no need to use the super smoke once it is hot enough and you had it wrapped. I don't think it will be taking any of the smoke in at that point. Others may disagree though.
My 780 does not have super smoke so I don't know much about that setting but I am guessing it doesn't run more efficient and doesn't save pellets in that mode so no need to use it once it's over 165 or so and been wrapped.

Thanks! I figured it wouldn’t do anything since I had wrapped and it had gotten to temp but since I dropped it to 225 anyways I decided to put it back to supersmoke. I’m still to excited about getting a Traeger to worry about pellet efficiency. I’m sure I’ll care about that more as time goes on.

Besides the butchering skills, I also want to play with temps less in future. I fiddled a little bit too much probably. No negative result but probably unnecessary.

 

[dflaher]

Midwest is correct in post #7. Plus your smoke tubes likely produced more smoke than the SS setting anyway.

As far as fiddling with temps I adjusted mine a lot when I first started out also. Then I started to realize (hopefully correctly) that the most critical temp, by far, is the IT of what you're cooking. For example there are hundreds of combinations of temperatures to get a brisket to 203, but the key is that it's 203 when you pull it off. The other thing I've noticed is I get more smoke at lower temps.

I'd like to be able to separate the point from the flat someday. They cook so differently that I feel it would be a good skill to have. I watched a few YT videos but still don't feel comfortable.

 

[midwest]

While on the topic of "temps" you might as well learn that a big majority of the Traeger users have found their temp probes are off. Some by a lot, it is one of the more common complaints. If I cooking at temps under 235 mine is pretty close but I have seen it off as far as 50 degrees when I get between 300-400. Many people (myself included) use aftermarket temp probes. I have Ink Bird and love it. The meat probes are know to be off also.

 

[Traegerphilly]

While on the topic of "temps" you might as well learn that a big majority of the Traeger users have found their temp probes are off. Some by a lot, it is one of the more common complaints. If I cooking at temps under 235 mine is pretty close but I have seen it off as far as 50 degrees when I get between 300-400. Many people (myself included) use aftermarket temp probes. I have Ink Bird and love it. The meat probes are know to be off also.

Thanks. Yes. That is the one thing I did not pull the trigger on yet as I wanted to figure out which one to get. I do have a thermapen that I used to confirm internal temp (seems like my traeger internal read was pretty accurate).

From what I have seen on here, there appears to be 3 options. Fireboard, Ink bird, and meater. Is there a thread that breaks down the benefits and disadvantages of all 3? I saw references to them throughout but didn’t find one comparing all 3.

I did buy some sealant as recommended but didn’t apply it yet. That is the other thing it sounds like I should do.

 

[Big Man Dan]

Many people (myself included) use aftermarket temp probes. I have Ink Bird and love it.

Love my Inkbird! I have the 4 channel wifi version as well as the instant stick type. I would highly recommend to anyone who doesn't want to buck up for the Fireboard.