Smoke Signals

One of the things I’ve really missed since moving up to Connecticut was the fact that my smoker got left behind. I finally got around to building it’s replacement and I added a number of enhancements this time around!

I’m still working on getting it dialed in and have a few updates to make, but so far I’ve enjoyed a couple of briskets, hamburgers and corn on the cob, as well as stuffed jalapenos! Temperature control still needs some fine tuning, but everything has come out surprisingly well so far…

So the type of smoker I build is typically referred to as an UDS (Ugly Drum Smoker.) You can find plans all over the internet as it’s a fairly cheap way to build a good size smoker. It’s build using 55 gallon metal drums and can be as simple as adding some air inlets and outlets, mounting a grill, and building a box to hold the charcoal / wood mix. My earlier builds weren’t much more than that.

This time around I got a little more creative and welded part of a second barrel on top of the base to give me a little bit more height. I’m not the best welder as I just play around with it. I only burnt through the barrel in a couple of spots and you can clearly see the improvement as I made my way around the barrel. Thankfully I saved the front for the last! Anyway, this lets me keep the grill high enough from the heat source and still have room to smoke something like a turkey.

I also cut out a section on the top part of the barrel and added a door so that I have easy access to the grill area without having to remove the entire top (I still can for when I’m doing something like a turkey, but for everything else the door lets me check on things without loosing so much heat and smoke.)

At the base I also added a door to access the charcoal / wood box. This lets me add additional wood if the smoke is dwindling without having to drop it in from above. That and cleanup is a whole lot easier this way as well.

It took a little more effort to get those doors sealed up well, but it’s now good enough that by closing all the air inlets and exhaust I can kill the fire within completely. That also means if I load it up right I can easily keep it running for nearly 24 hours on a full load if I need to.

As with my previous builds, I control the air flow with a ball valve which lets me fine tune how much oxygen the coal has to limit the heat when I need to. Additionally, I have a baffle from a steel pizza pan I drilled holes in. This allows the juices to drip down onto the coals and vaporize and cook back into the meat, but limits the direct heat from the coals as well – important if you want to have a long, slow cook.

I still have a little cleanup to do. I want to mount permanent clamps to keep the lit on (I’ll use a modified version of the red handled clamps I got for the doors.) I also need to cut of the bars I have going through the barrel to hold up the grate and the baffle. Neither are a problem right now other than looks. I might eventually fiddle with putting in a temp control fan to keep the temperature more accurate, but for now I’m good to go.

I painted the exterior with a high temp paint (not a lot of options on colors.) I added smoker insulation tape for the doors to get a better seal. Once it was all together and painted I sprayed down the inside with canola oil and ran a few loads of coal through it to give it a good seasoning.

Overall, the biggest challenge with this build is prepping the barrels. I got them cheap at $10 a piece finding them locally, but I prefer to make sure they were food grade in their past life and it can be a challenge to remove the inner liner. A through hot burn for a few hours will take care of most of it, but the lid has to have the paint and liner removed by hand with a grinder stone or something similar. Try to burn it off with the rest of the barrel and you will warp it to the degree that it will never fit again.

Add to the pain, for me I had a break after burning it all out and we have had a constant stream of rain so it left me going over everything a second time to remove the rust that built up when I didn’t get it finished when I originally planned. Definitely not a step I wanted to deal with, but the end results made it well worth it!

First up was my stuffed jalapenos… I smoke chicken strips and bacon and then shred both and add it to a mix of shredded cheese, creame cheese, and some of the insides of the jalapenos I split in half. I then fill the jalapenos and some foil pans with the cheese mixture (I always make plenty of extra because the cheese block I smoke is great on crackers and such.) I then smoke both again to get as much flavor as I can. I usually use mesquite to give it a nice strong smoky flavor, although hickory works well for it as well.

For the burgers and corn on the cob it’s fairly straight forward. I remove the silk from the corn and soak it in water for an hour or two. I then butter and season it and then wrap it back up in it’s husk. I smoke those and the burgers for a couple of hours usually over mesquite or hickory, but I also add a water pan that has a mix of water and Dr Pepper. This gives it a sweet flavor that can make the corn taste like kettle corn when it’s done.

As for brisket, we tend to like the flat. It’s cheaper than getting an entire brisket and no one in the family likes the fat that typically comes in the rest of it. I used a rub I found online that ended up being a little heavy on the cayenne pepper giving it a rather strong kick. It came out perfect and now, just two weeks later I finished up a second one yesterday already. It went very fast both times and I couldn’t be happier with the results!