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I’ve been so busy at work I didn’t have time to get into details. Just sat on the tarmac for 4 hours and they cancelled my flight so getting to stay another night in Austin by the airport La barbecue brisket was good. Real tasty I’ve never been there before but my friends claimed the brisket was better than Franklins. I thought it was great but I was on a conference call while eating so I didn’t order well just ordered a 1/2 lb of brisket but it was tasty and the black beans were spicy and delicious. Gotta go back and order more to try other meat Ive been to salt lick round rock before maybe 5-6 years ago and thought it was ok. Last night I went to the original location in Driftwood. The setup was awesome live music, BYOB cool atmosphere but I definitely make better brisket at home in my KK than what I ate there. Sausage was good, bison rib was good but overall food was “ok” again maybe I’m conceited but I feel like I could do better also ate at liberty bbq today in round rock had brisket and pork ribs. Pork ribs were tender, heavy rub, really tasty, brisket was good, above salt lick but below la barbecue. I didn’t take any pictures today because I met an old friend for a late lunch and had to turn my phone off to “unplug” from work. Have every 30 minutes of my day scheduled from 6am-6pm, getting 100 emails and 50 phone calls a day, so just wanted to catch up with my buddy who I hadn’t seen in 5 years and have a beer . My friend who’s from here who took me to Liberty told me I need to go to “the black” in Longmont for the best brisket. Will do that for future visits. franklins is on the docket for next trip in two weeks I told my customer I’d buy lunch for his team and we agreed to get Franklins to go next trip so will judge later. I gotta come to Austin every other week for the next 8 weeks or so so I’ll post more. It’s been a good 5-6 years since I’ve come to Austin so there’s a lot more BBQ places now my San Antonio customer tells me the best brisket is in San Antonio so I’ll try his recommendation next trip and add to this thread. One good perk about work travel is eating good local food so I’ll try them all over the next two months but honestly im feeling good about my KK briskets that come from my backyard in San Diego

Reviving this a bit to help out @KiwiIndo and @remi - I received my 32" KK over the winter and did some pizza testing this month. Our pizza background: we've made pizza several to many times a month for years now from scratch. It's fast if you plan ahead, you can vary the toppings based on the season, and if you make an extra, you have a solid lunch for the next day. We have a secret sauce recipe and use the dough recipe from Roberta's (yes the 00 flour is important). There are a number of good ways to get the dough ready, including making it ahead of time and letting it rise in the fridge overnight. Anyway, here is the real KK content: commercial pizza ovens run 700-800F. Why? The dough needs to get to ~400F via conduction from your stone and your sauce and cheese will continuously vent water vapor (boil) at 212F from convection and radiant heat. Conduction is much more efficient than convection, which allows you to have the two sides of the pizza reach these respective states at the same time - this is THE most important thing to cooking good pizza and allows you to keep the pizza in the oven/KK for as little time as possible. Here is what happens when you cook pizza on a KK based on time and temperature: You bring your KK up to 550F and properly heat soak the pizza stone: This is the equivalent of cooking pizza at max temp on an indoor electric/gas oven. It's fine and even good, but it's not the same as a professionally-cooked, wood-fired, brick-oven pizza. You bring your KK up to 700F, but don't maintain the heat long enough to get the stone to temp: This will result in too much bubbling. Your pizza will dry out and your cheese will scorch. The heat will penetrate the dough too much by the time it's cooked, resulting in a more dense and less springy crust. You bring your KK up to 700F and properly soak the stone for at least 45 min: This produces legitimately restaurant-quality crust without burning or bubbling away your toppings. The crust will have that slight char and crispy exterior with the correct chewy and open crumb of a professionally-equipped pizzeria. At this temp, it takes me exactly 5 minutes to cook two side-by-side pizzas on a 32" KK at 700F after a heat soak. It might vary a touch if you make your dough thicker or assemble your pizza too early, such that the dough starts absorbing liquid from your sauce, but get your timing down so you never need to check on the pizza mid-cook. Start with a very full basket and clean out any ash as others have recommended. To get to 700 is fairly easy with enough fuel and enough air - however, you really don't want it to run away from you; at 700 dome temps, accidentally touching grates etc. can produce hospital-level burns. Make sure you have a long-handled pizza peel. My most successful run last week had both vents fully open, plus the ash dump grate pulled out for extra air initially. I used the top vent to slow my ascent as I crossed into the 600s, and then once I was around 675, I closed the ash dump grate. You can then fine-tune from there. Here is an after shot of one of my runs last week. Note that one side of my KK seemed a little hotter than the other, and the crust on the right-hand pizza is a little over. I probably needed another 5-10 minutes to soak is my guess.

I bought something like that, MacKenzie. But it's an insert that fits into a steamer pan. It looks like a pan that Al Capone shot a bunch of holes.

Well @tekobowhen you take your trip to Mexico and stop by my house I’ll likely make you my brisket 😀

I recognised Salt Lick from your photo @Troble. Here is mine from 2015. I did not have a KK then and didn't have much to compare the food with. I enjoyed the meal, liked the BYOB aspect and it was easier to get into than Franklins. Maybe next time I am in the US I will have the patience to wait in line to try their brisket.

Just in case it rains the day before or the day of delivery, I'd get some OSB...Oriented Strand Board...to place on the bare ground. Even if you think your ground it rock hard, the weight of the smoker will make those pallet jack tires sink. You can get the OSB at Home Depot. If you ordered a 32" the crate is 46"x46" and about 5 feet tall. It may not be that tall if the lid is in a separate crate, but if you ordered a lot of goodies with it, they'll be stacked on top of the big crate. You can easily cut the clear wrap and remove a bunch of boxes to lighten the load before you (hubby) moves it. The 32" itself is about 3 feet by 3 feet if that'll help you get by the AC unit. Best of luck to you, husband and son and hopefully the delivery guy getting it where you want it. Don't be bashful asking the delivery dude to help you move it. That pallet jack is worth its weight in gold.

Greetings all, Thought I'd share my Used (but like new) 32" Big Bad - Terra Blue I found this Beauty about 20 miles from my house, what are the chances of that!? I Found a unique trailer to rent that lowers to the ground for easy loading! I used leftover Maple Plywood from some shelving I did ( talk about lying down the red carpet lol). It was actually fairly easy to roll around and had my father guide It to the trailer as I pushed, It has some nice heavy duty casters thankfully. I love to tinker with things and I critique the build quality of everything and this Big Bad Is VERY well made. I'd say It would last decades haha I'd say she Is practically new with ~5 cooks! Going to fire her up soon. Honestly, she Is a little big for me and had been eyeing smaller sizes but I had to jump on the chance to snag this rarity; but I'm optimistic and will her use full potential (Unless someone has a smaller KK they want to trade haha).

The pavers could work if you're on solid perfectly flat ground. You'd also have to have them spaced for the pallet jack wheels which is typically 27". If the pavers shift or create a crack for the pallet jack wheels, you may have a problem. Since a sheet of plywood or OSB would be flat on the ground, it won't be load bearing. So you use two sheets and while the pallet jack crosses from sheet one to sheet two, grab sheet one and put it in front of sheet 2 and so on. I'm not saying the pavers won't work but I think it's more risky than a flat piece of wood. Once again, good luck to you and I'm sure it'll go just fine.

I think it's supposed to arrive on the 23rd. I have to check again to make sure. I am pretty good but my husband is the one who wants all the details. Probably because he is the one who will have to move it into place. Hahaha. We have a narrow side pathway it needs to come down and then past the large AC until and over the dirt where the lawn still needs to be installed. Our oldest son is 25 and can help with this but it's gonna be tight. Hahaha!

I like these steamer pans two and they are also good for sous vide. I have a couple of false bottoms, different sizes that I use for heat deflectors too.

Tony- jury is out on the wisdom of using the Ghost Pepper. Probably make sandwiches or tacos with the pork tomorrow night, will report then.

The Webstaurant store is awesome!

The Salt Lick is on my bucket list of BBQ spots. Bobby Flay says it's one of his favs. Unfortunately, didn't make it there on my only trip to Austin. Just another excuse to go back there!

Another dish fixed in a pan. I used my doubled half size steamer pan. Doesn't sound right, does it? I grilled the chicken thighs first, then put them in the other goodies. Put a lid on it and cooked it for 3 1/2 hours at 275-300. The last picture of the clean pan was showing that when you double the pans, nothing sticks. I rinsed it in hot water and rubbed it with my hand before it gets a serious wash. Anyway, the meal came out very flavorful. The extreme closeup of the served food was because my plate was so messy it was embarrassing.