The Grilling, Smoking & BBQing Thread of 2014!

Nice pics. I will say that while I prefer grilling on coals I just bought the Char Broil Tru Infra-Red gas grill, ranked #3 by Consumer Reports. It's pretty amazing.

 

We had my brother-in-law's gas grill for a couple of years, because it was too big for him to take when he moved to Colorado. I think I used it once. Anyway, I much prefer real fire, so I gave it away when somebody was asking what I thought of it. Just said, "take it off my hands and it's yours."

Now I do have a Jen-Air in my kitchen, which I use a lot in the winter or when it's raining. It is an okay option, but only as a back-up. But if the weather is nice enough to be outside, I want the real thing.

 

Unless it's torrential there ain't nothing wrong with grilling in the rain!

 

Agree, and I've even been known to grill in the snow. But if I'm going to do that, it needs to be something worth doing. In the Summer, I might do burgers outside, for example, but those are going on the indoor grill in the winter.

Anyway, the clambake turned out quite awesome:



And some ribs:



All finished off with s'mores!

 

Two boneless pork shoulders and a boneless beef roast.

 

It seemed a shame to cut those beasts up into pulled pork (and chopped beef for my wife) but that's what my daughter wanted.



Seems like cheating.

 

Oh, and bacon!

 

A month later and I'm finally back to full strength on the grilling/barbecue front.

The big one on the left...



...is slimmer now.



The guy who built it for me ten years ago put a smoker on the end, but it was a separate box and tedious to use. Since I hadn't used it for four or five years, I had one of my cousins cut it off.



He installed a door, which I didn't ask for (and didn't really need) to make removing ashes easier and I had him replace the ill-conceived wooden "shelf" with one made from expanded metal.

This is the biggest improvement:



The original grates were so old and had been used so many times that they had a permanent heat-induced "sag". This expanded metal is heavier and the frames are thicker and stronger as well.

My cousin apparently didn't understand the way the lid was designed (very cleverly, IMHO) and installed a horseshoe "stop" so the lid didn't swing too far back.



The original builder made it so the "hinges" threaded into bolts that tighten the further back you open the lid. The horseshoe isn't really needed, but it is a little decorative, I guess.

I shot a coat of high temperature paint on it last Saturday and left it in my garage to cure for a week. Tomorrow, I'll start a fire in it and burn in the paint (as well as any impurities/chemicals on the grates) tomorrow night while I monitor the Emmy twitter feed.

My next goal is to get a high quality offset smoker, but that'll take some saving.

 

That smoker is almost fap worthy.

 

No, this one is.



It's around $1100.

 

I have one that is similar to that. It has the smoke box on the side, and where the meat goes (what's it called anyway) has a grate that can be raised or lowered if you want to use additional wood or charcoal under the meat. I usually will build a small charcoal fire on the side away from the smoke box to help maintain a more stable low heat.

I'll probably fire it up again in the next 2 weeks or so, it's been too hot here until this week to really be in the mood to use it.

 

It's been more than a month since I grilled or barbecued anything because I've been so busy with work.

That changes tomorrow.

 

Yeah, good smokers aren't cheap but some where on youtube there is a video series about how to make a red neck smoker out of an old oil barrel. It actually looked pretty good when it was done but the sanding part looked hard.

 

I've got a friend from high school who will only use barrel pits because they're cheaper. He only gets a few years of use from them before they rust through and have to be replaced.

I've had both of my grills/pits for more than ten years and in all likelihood they'll still be around after I'm dead.