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My original three holes were 1/8". The main concern is avoiding convection through the pot, which is why I sealed the lid with flour paste. (Also, an exercise in not fearing complexity; a flour seal simply isn't that hard. Also, a nod to Moroccans who seal their couscous pots that way. Ahh, the romance!) There is an art to getting the pot hot enough without losing control of the fire itself. I generally use weed burners to light the fire just under the dutch oven. More trouble than it's worth on most occasions, but I have sometimes needed to add a nicely smoking pot to an existing already hot fire. I'd get the smoke pot up to speed over a blazing second Weber fire, then move it. Way too much trouble, right? If you were paying Thomas Keller $300 for dinner you'd expect him to do this! I do this when I'm stuck, but my reputation is on the line.

My name is Al and my nickname for this forum is Papaya16. I live in Maryland and have been grilling on a couple Weber Kettles for over 30 years, but only recently started to get more serious about learning more about the world of barbecue, grilling and smoking. After receiving a Christmas present of Steve Raichlen's book, Project Smoke last December, I began checking out forums and websites and YouTube videos and all of this has culminated in my recent order of a Terra Blue Ultimate 23 KK, whose arrival I am very eagerly anticipating. Hopefully it will be at my house sometime in the next week or so! I've been practicing low and slow on the Weber, but its been more than just difficult to maintain steady temps as I've had to repair a broken one touch sytem and I have a very leaky seal between the cover and the base. Nonetheless, I am proud to say that I have accomplished some slow cooked baby backs, a low and slow pastrami, and some Texas style beef short ribs. And they were all edible (with room for improvement lol)! Now I feel I'm ready to get my feet wet with the KK... I can't wait to start and I'm looking forward to posting some pics of my new grill and even better, some cooks!

Disaster at work yesterday led to me working 17.5 hours so I saved the tasting until tonight. All I can say is........ Hell Yea!!!  I've been making this for a few years now and this is the best to date. This is a finishing/dipping sauce. Chicken or pork sounds right to me. Next weekend I'll make another batch but do a slightly different procedure with the smoking phase. This has KK cold smoker written all over it, unfortunately I don't have one yet. (one day I will)  @tony b unfortunately it was a bad one. 2 people hospitalized overnight for observation. They should be alright but............

So I have been gone for half the month to London and Iceland and now am slowly acclimating back to my time zone..... Which is really difficult. I needed to make sure that I atleast got one pizza in for this month's challenge on the guru and as always I wanted to try something new. I kept hearing about Detroit style pizza, seeing write ups in my magazines, and then some posts on here, so I went to my favorite web resource for new recipes.... Serious eats. I have NEVER had a bad recipe from serious eats, and if they are from j. Kenji Lopez-alt, they are even better. Anyway I was thrilled when he had a Detroit Pizza article and recipe. https://www.seriouseats.com/2017/02/how-to-make-detroit-style-pizza.html After my first post vacation long run I decided to give this a shot. First the dough This was to rise for 2 hours so I had some time to kill. Then I made the sauce which was a cooked sauce. I have been a fan of the no cook sauce for my NY style pizza, but I usually follow a recipe pretty closely the first time I try it. and let it reduce for about a half hour. During this time I was to stretch and let the dough rise some more. I did not have a Detroit pan, but this worked. Then cubed up the cheeses and got the pepperoni. Now this is where I slightly deviated from the great Kenji's recipe. It called for 12 Ounces of pepperoni.... Which would be equal to the amount of cheese called for. His was thicker cut, which I couldn't get, but I still only bought half the amount (in weight) thst was called for.... 2 full packs. His recipe called to layer pepperoni, cubed cheese to the edges than another layer of pepperoni followed by sauce layered in lines. This was so much pepperoni that I didn't end up using the two full packs..... And it was still a ton. Then onto Koko Right before taking it off... Man it smelled amazing... Dislodged it from the pan to wait a few minutes before cutting into it. Then sliced and served with some blistered shitshito peppers. This was positively delicious. The flavor reminded me somewhat of Chicago style.... Sweeter cooked thick sauce with lots of cheese and a thicker crust, but came together more quickly. Of course there were differences, the chewy but slightly crispy cheesy edge, the crust was a lot lighter.... But this will definitely in in the rotation. The next time I make it, I will reduce pepperoni by atleast half and make sure to rotate the pan halfway through baking to make sure all sides get and evenly crisp cheese crust. The family loved this one and it was fun to try a new style of pizza.

It was delicious and one piece would have been perfect.... Except this was on a long run day, which means I'm always craving a little more. So it was 2 We had an absolutely amazing time in England and Iceland. I had never been to Iceland before, but I was completely blown away by the scenary and just how otherworldly it could be. We drove quite a bit and went on several hikes.... Amazing basalt spires in the ocean next to columns in geometric hexagons of varying heights towering over a black sand beach with glaciers in the background was just one stop....

Yes. I bought the Smoke as an upgrade over my old Mavericks, but found I had dead spots in my house, so bought the Gateway to get rid of those. The Smoke dead spots are gone, but I now have nearly $200 in Smoke gear with only two probes. The Maverick XR50 is far simpler, four channels, easy to use, and no dead spots anywhere. This thing is a Smoke killer. It really is. Between this and MEATER, I’m pretty well covered for temp monitoring.

Just when you though Maverick was dead, they came out with this: Maverick XR-50 No bluetooth, wi-fi, cloud, or other gimmicks to make up for lack of range and dead spots in your house. Just four channels with hybrid probes, easy to set up, and 500' of RF range. Mine just arrived and I've been walking around the house and yard checking for the dead spots that resulted in my purchasing the Smoke Gateway...just so I could get a read in my home office. Bottom line: there are no dead spots. There it is, giving me four glorious, dead simple channels of signal in my worst dead spot in the house. BONUS: If you hit the buttons just right, it will also play Donkey Kong!

I love Konro skewers. This weekend I ordered 2 more LG bags of Marabou lump for future use. Within the next few days should be receiving a care package from a new found friend that lives in Japan. A bunch of different stuff used for making marinades. I'm really excited about this as it's all stuff you can't buy readily in the states.

The old recipe is posted. Give me one more weekend and I'll update the recipe. If works cooperates we plan on doing another large picking at the local Blueberry patch tomorrow.

Glad to hear that the injured parties are expected to be just fine.:)

Unfortunately, the recipe I'll be using from Milk Street is behind a paywall, so I can't post it here. However, if you're interested you can PM me an email address and I'll send you a PDF of it (I have a subscription).

If you freeze the blueberries before vacuuming sealing they will stay in tact.

Nice job, Shuley! Huge fan of Detroit style pizza. Local place specializes in it. My standard order - Medium, Detroit, Mambo Combo - no green peppers! It just naturally rolls off my tongue without even thinking about it! Make sure that you pile up the cheese around the outside edge. That's what sets Detroit style apart from the more traditional Chicago deep dish - no outer crust, just nice crispy wall of cheesy goodness!

Ah. Hopefully the urge to buy will have worn off by the time the get back in stock.

Lol' no, spilt some of the juices from the previous cook. Just went out and cleaned it

Shuley, your pizza looks and sounds perfectly delicious.[emoji4][emoji4][emoji4] I suspect it was a one slice is the perfect portion.[emoji4] I trust you and your family had a wonderful time in the UK and Iceland.[emoji4]

This is something I came up with and have been using for the last couple of years. This is Mrs skreef's favorite sauce of mine. I usually make it early summer with fresh picked Blueberries from the front yard. Blueberry BBQ Sauce 1 pint Blueberries (about 2 cups) 1/2 cup ketchup 1/3 cup packed brown sugar 1/4 cup orange juice 1/4 cup white balsamic vinegar 2 Tbsp yellow mustard 1 Tbsp sriracha sauce 2 tsp lemon juice 1 tsp sea salt 1 tsp fresh ground black pepper Smash about 3/4 of the Blueberries, saving the rest for later. Add the remaining ingredients. Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer. At first it will have a red color. After simmering for a while it will turn to a nice purple/blue color. Stir in the remaining Blueberries. Continue simmering until the desired consistency. A pulled Chicken sandwich. Served on a Kings Hawaiian sandwich roll with a seeet/tangy Blueberry BBQ Sauce. Just enough heat to balance the sweet. Fresh sliced oranges and kiwi with a side of summer slaw (vinegar based)

We had an accident at work at the end today that I had to attend to. Currently 2 hours from the house and can't leave for another hour or so. The tasting might have to wait until tomorrow.