Easiest and fastest way to light coconut charcoal.

[Elaine]

Have been loving this forum for all the great information and inspiration!

Just received my coconut charcoal from Amazon and wondering what is the best method to light it? It is larger than what I have been using and should I use it the size it is? Mix it with smaller lump? Do you recommend a torch to get it going faster?

Appreciate all advice!

[wilburpan]

When using the coconut charcoal, I’ll hit two whole pieces against each other so that they split into 2-3 smaller chunks, and then put them into the basket. I’m usually shooting to break them into thirds.

 

I have found that lighting them takes longer than Royal Oak, which is my usual other choice for charcoal. I use a weed burner to light the charcoal, whichever one I’m using. If I’m using coconut charcoal, I’ll just keep the weed burner on it longer. Whatever your current method is of lighting your charcoal, just give it extra time.

 

Theoretically, I suppose that if I have the basket full of coconut charcoal, I could put a small amount of Royal Oak at the top of the pile, light that, and let it light the rest of the coconut charcoal. I haven’t tried that yet.

[tony b]

I go with Wilbur's second method - put the coco on the bottom in pieces, then a small amount of small-to-medium pieces of lump on top. Light those and let them kick start the coco.

[DennisLinkletter]

My favorite analogy is bringing a full pot to boil VS a quarter pot of water.  It needs to get to 212ºf to boil.

Is the water in the full pot more difficult/ any different than the quarter pot?

 

Because of the CoCo Char's density it takes more heat/Btu's to bring it to it's ignition temp of 660ºf 

I light a small piece of lump and use the heat generated from the lump to light the coco.

I use a cheapo hair drier that has at least a large lemon size fan to make the lump glow madly which creates the heat to ignite the coco.

I love my drier as a grilling tool..

[Elaine]

As always, I very much appreciate the great advice!

[CeramicChef]

Elaine - excellent question!

First, I'm decidedly NOT a fan of mixing cheap wood based lump with Coconut Char! To me that's like mixing Mogan David with a fine wine. mixing Coconut Char with regular lump really defeats the whole reason for Coconut Char. I only use my Coconut Char for low-n-slow cooks. The neutral odor of the Coconut Char allows you to pick the flavor profile you want to lay on your cook, i.e. cherry and apple smoke word, or pure oak, or alder and peach, etc. You can't do that if you've adulterated your Coconut Char with a lesser quality lump.

Secondly, as Wilbur stated, just knock the sticks of Coconut Char together to get the pieces into thirds when in the basket. Don't arrange anything; just let the pieces fall where they may. You'll get really good air flow through your Lu p pile that way.

I light all my lump, including Coconut Char with a MAPP torch. It takes a bit longer than with my normal lump, but the MAPP Pro gas powers through in easy fashion. MAPP is is ole, easy to use, and very cost effective.

Hope this helps!