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I haven't made a meatloaf in ages so ....

A few months ago I finally bought a ThermoWorks Signals / Billows setup. Needing to clear the freezer of a 19 pound package of pork butt (which was taking up a lot of space) and having house guests to help eat it, I decided to try an overnight cook using the controller / fan to check it out. After three days of thawing, I separated and trimmed the two bone-in butts. I marinaded one overnight with Wicker's Marinade, then rubbed with Wicker's dry rub. The other I rubbed with a 50-50 mix of KC Butt Spice and Bad Byron's Butt Rub, using duck fat as a binder. Butt Number Two (number one was very similar in size and fat content): KC Butt Spice/Bad Byron's Butt Rub over duck fat binder: Both were refrigerated until placed into the KK23, set at 225° and heat soaked for 1.5 hours. The double drip pan was used and smoke wood was a mix of cherry and apple wood chunks. The meat (33.5°F) was added to the KK at 8:00 pm (which was under a tarp as we were expected to have 2 - 4 inches of rain over to coming 24 hours). Adding 19 lbs of cold pork to pulled the smoker temperature down to about 140° and it took about 1.5 hours to get back to 225° with the Billows fan (I had choked it down for the KK using the accessory damper since the Billows cfm is ridiculously high for a KK). Billows fit into the KK Guru port using the Billows accessory snout: Billows damper setting I used to tame the cfm (via inspection mirror), which turned out about right: Since dinner was not to be until 23 hours later, I decided to not wrap the butts at the stall, but to instead see how the KK/Signals/Billows setup worked for a long cook (without any intervention on my part). Plus, I didn't want to get up at 0' Dark Thirty to wrap them. Butts at 45 minutes in: Left (green probe) is Wicker's Marinade; Right (yellow probe + toothpick) is KC/BB dry rub The Billows overshot the 225° setting in the initial push to return the KK to temperature by only 10°, then was within 5° of the set 225° temperature throughout the 19.5 hours of the cook. I was very impressed with the consistency. Here is the graph at 9:00 am, 13 hours into the cook (the slight dip in pit temp at 6:00 am was to check the results after the overnight smoke): Temperature readings at 13 hours: The butts continued to leisurely accrue internal temperature throughout the day, reaching high 190°s by around 2:00 pm, at which time I bumped the set temp up to 250° to get a bit more temperature differential to push the butts to 203°, which was to be my pull target. The Wicker's butt reached 204° at 3:10 pm (19 hours in the smoker) while the KC/BB butt reached 203° at 3:30 pm (19.5 hours). They were wrapped in foil and a towel, then placed in a cooler for a three hour rest until dinner. I didn't get any photos of the finished butts in the KK as it was pouring rain then and the activity was a bit frantic. Here are the results. Left is KC/Bad Byron Rub; Right is Wicker's Marinade & Rub: Partially chunked up / pre-pulled. Notice the internal color difference between the dry rub (left) and marinade (right - more intense and deeper into the meat) versions. Bark was about the same on both. These are not the entire butts; just the amount for dinner (19 lbs of pork butt is A LOT of pork butt...). Plated at 7:00 pm, 23 hours after the meat was placed into the KK: In summary, I found the KK/Signals/Billows combination to be very satisfactory. It was my first use of a controller & fan combination and while I probably won't use it often, I will likely use it for future brisket and pork butt overnight cooks. I will probably do the normal butcher paper wrap to cut down the time in the future as well (I typically do so but wanted to experiment with the new gear). There was no lack of moisture in the pork without the butcher paper crutch. I was impressed with the low temperature variation of the Signals / Billows combination after the system stabilized. With the large cfm of the Billows, I was concerned it might repeatedly overshoot the set temperature but this was not the case. Other than the first return to temperature after the cold meat was added to the KK, the temperature variation was 5° or less. I set the Billows diffuser to almost closed, and fortunately it seemed to be about right. The KK was miserly with the use of its charcoal (FOGO Super Premium - large chunks). I started with a full basket and 1.5 hour heat soak, then a 19.5 hour cook at 225°, followed by a run up to 350° for 2.5 hours waiting to grill the corn and mushroom. At the end, I still have over one-half basket of charcoal left. As I have mentioned before, I am not a huge fan of pulled pork but this certainly was a moist and tasty result. Between the marinade and dry rub versions, I preferred the marinade version. As for the guests, the preference was evenly split between the two butts among the carnivores (the vegetarian had no opinion about the pork, but pronounced the EVO/Balsamic grilled portobello to be superior).

Mrs. Poochie: "Oh Poochie, that rub down and massage you gave me was so wonderful. All I want to know is why you stopped so soon?" Poochie: "Because I found the TV remote"

I'm glad I came back to find this thread. I had some slightly tough hogget chops and remembered the Indians' use of papaya and other ingredients to tenderise meat. It worked out really well and, not wanting to waste my papaya, I used it on a chicken drumsticks and hogget chops. Here are the chicken drumsticks on my 16KK. I used the recipe for chicken tikka from the Ranjit Rai book recommended by @Syzygies above. They have a neat trick, which is to freeze your chicken for 15 minutes before putting it on the grill. This is to stop the potentially sloppy cream and yogurt marinade from falling off before it gets a chance to cook. It worked a treat and the chicken was very tasty. I cooked the lamb chops a couple of days later and they were much more awkward to skewer. This is where the trompo king might come in handy. I don't have one so I threaded my chops onto this prongy piece of kit that I bought from a tandoor seller. At first it all looked very precarious but as the meat cooked and firmed up it all worked out just fine.

Getting set here. I made up a new batch of marinade yesterday. I previously tried to "whisk" the achiote and made a huge mess of myself and the kitchen. This time I chopped it up and stuck it in the blender with the rest of the sauce. The blender had to work hard to process it all but it did a good job and the marinaded meat is now waiting in the fridge. Hope to get it on in about an hour and a half. When I told our friends that I would be making al pastor they were very pleased. They said their son's girlfriend would be impressed with his "connections". Not sure how cooking al pastor gets you up the social ladder but I'm not complaining!

Finally some real spring type weather here in the northeast so i had to make some chicken wings !!!!

Yep, achiote paste is worse than turmeric for staining everything it touches!

I did not make any adjustments to the vents while the chicken was on. I forgot to mention that there wasn't any wind to speak of at the time. I, too started out with a grapefruit-sized amount of charcoal. I realized that the temp wasn't going anywhere and added more. I think maybe a small jackfruit-size amount would yield a more fruitful experience.

Hi Randy. By the time I received my KK I had read the manual five times over. I took the note to "light a grapefruit volume of charcoal" to mean literally that. I only "loaded" my KK with that grapefruit volume of charcoal and then wondered why my first cook, chicken wings, didn't go well due to a distinct lack of heat! I think that beats forgetting to click the second latch on your KK so don't feel so bad. On your first question, my answer would be: it depends. I don't bother to wait for heat soaking on hot and fast cooks. I get the fire going, and, usually after half an hour max I am ready to grill a steak. Heat soaking for a roast chicken might take an hour and I judge that by the fact that the temperature on the dome thermometer rises rapidly when I first start the fire, drops as the initial flame subsides and rises again until it reaches my target temperature. Heat soaking for a pizza, to make sure that the dome reflects as much heat as possible, usually takes at least 1.5 hours. I'm not sure about the answer to your second question. I expect my KK to hold a fixed temperature once I have set the upper damper at a particular number of turns and the lower damper open to a particular setting. Did you fiddle with either after you put the chicken in? Others may chime in with a more informed view on this one but I have not noticed the temperature dropping and then staying low for say, more than 10 minutes after putting the food in.

@jeff, you're a good sport.

I guess that shows how long I've had my KK! I'm pretty sure I had to cut mine but now my confidence in that has taken a hit.

I never heard of Smoking Dad or Smoke North pits. Just gave them a quick look. Seem nice, though I did not see anything large enough for me. Do they not have an air intake, just the Firebox door opening? I will have to spend some time checking both out. There are a lot of good pit builders now a days. I like BBQ pits by JJ as well. And of course there is always Jambo.

It's here!!!!

@tekobo I haven’t made this since January 2022 and I’ve been itching for it. I believe I’ll make it this weekend as a point of reference I was able to go down to my spot in Tijuana last month for the first time since 2019 and I may or may not have eaten 7 adobada tacos

Jonj, you just made me want to do a pork butt with the Billows. Dinner looks lovely as does the pulled pork.