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@MsTwiggy Welcome, great looking KK and those cooks look wonderful. I would fill up the basket with lump. After the cook is done and you shut the vents down the fire soon goes out and you will have lump left for your next cook. You will just need to stir it up and top it off with more lump. Remember once the cook is done and the fire is out set the lid clasp so that the dome is not squishing your gasket. There are two settings for the dome one is tight for the cook and the other for resting between cooks. It relieves the pressure on the gasket which will make the gasket last a lot longer.

Hello, I am posting here to introduce myself and show off my new 23 Ultimate. I live in Seattle WA and thus far I have made pork ribs, roti chicken, and a pork butt. The food has been very good!!

Looks awesome! Hope it was as good as it looks. I’ve not heard of Blues Hog before. Coco char is a really great charcoal. For my taste, it works better with the addition of wood chunks to get a smoke flavor. You might experiment with it and others. Some brands I’ve used and had success with are Komado Joe, Jealous Devil, and Fogo super premium (yellow bag)…..not necessarily in that order. The only lump I recommend anyone avoid is Cowboy. It’s the worst in my experience. You may be doing this but I suggest lighting a grapefruit sized portion of lump just a little bit north of middle. Again, I’m sure others will chime in with some other helpful recommendations. Best of luck.

I made this up last year, and forgot about it.. Whatcha think, worth building/selling?

Welcome to the Obsession, @MsTwiggy! All good advice from those above. Not much that I can add. I primarily use Jealous Devil as my go-to lump these days. I have a local shop that carries it, so I don't have to deal with shipping costs, like with Kamado Joe (Amazon) and Fogo. Both are good lumps. If you want to check on any major lump charcoal, I highly recommend going to naked whiz's website. He tests various brands for quality. He's well respected. The Lump Charcoal Database -- Naked Whiz Charcoal Ceramic Cooking He thought that Blues Hog was a good charcoal, btw. His only major complaint was that there was too high a percentage of "small" pieces in the bag that he tested (66%), which is quite high. If your bag was similar, then that could have been a source of why your cook didn't last longer, as obviously small pieces burn up faster. Review of Blues Hog Premium Lump Charcoal -- Naked Whiz Ceramic Charcoal Cooking As far as I know, there's absolutely no harm in overloading the charcoal basket. Good luck with the brisket and post pics! One of our key "rules" on this Forum - No pictures, it didn't happen!

Welcome to the forum. Nice grill. And your cook pics look great! What lump you are using? I own a 32 BB so I can not speak to the limited cook time at such a low temp. But it does seem out of the norm to me. Concerning your question about adding more charcoal…I wouldn't see a problem topping it off with a little more lump like you described. Dennis told me once that there is nothing you can do to damage the firebox with wood or charcoal. Not a lot of help, but I’m pretty sure @tony b as well as others have the 23. So maybe they can chime in with some info. Welcome again. I know you’re going to love your KK.

Super Bowl Sunday (Yaaa Chiefs!) means wings! Dry Rubbed going on the KK. Done! Sauced (classic Buffalo) and plated with fries (sriracha ketchup) and veggie plate (horseradish ranch), with a Southern delicacy - Chiggers in the Grass (celery stuffed with pimento cheese and pimento stuffed olive garnish). Not to be confused with Ants on a Log! Ha, ha! Andy Reid rocking the stache! LOL

Tell that to this tile cooked brisket !!!! It melts in the mouth like butter. I put 10 pounds of it in a batch of Super Bowl chili today 😁

Yes, the photos are dated. It's the exact same logs, but we cut them into smaller pieces so you don't have to break them up.. MUCH better for airflow/high temps.

I use the big ceramic heat deflector. If it takes longer to heat up the KK or uses more fuel I haven’t noticed, and couldn’t care less. We argued about this in another thread as I recall. I like that big block of radiating thermal mass in there. And if you actually use it a few times and then use foil a few times you will see that foil can allow some scorching. There’s no way in hell a couple thousandths of an inch of aluminum can provide the shielding of that huge paver. Y’all told me foil would work, why you thought it would work, I tried it, and my briskets got a little scorched. Well, there’s one way to find out and that’s to do it both ways a few times. I have. And I’m sticking with my big ass stepping stone. The only downside is it’s a little heavy, oh heaven forfend! I like it so much I ponied up the dough to buy a spare. Y’all send me yours…

All, I found a simple fix to a problem I was having. When I first got the KK, it created a beautiful seal. The first latching position would already make a pretty good seal, and I could feel the second latching position really pull it tight. Over the years, I had to push it to the second position to have it even feel closed at all, and I could see that there was even still a crack to leak air. I was going to mess around with replacing the silicone seals or replace/bend some of the metal parts in the latching system, and then I finally realized that you can simply loosen the two bolts on the lower part of the latch, shift the plate down, and tighten the bolts back up. Presto, the KK seals as tight as it did brand new. The plate had probably just shifted a bit over the years. I'm embarrassed it took me this long to figure it out. Just in case this helps anyone else out there, I thought I'd post this. I recall a thread about this long ago, but figured it might be a helpful solution for someone else too!

I bought my KK back in May 2006 I believe, so it's bang around ten years old. It's been sitting in the same spot, out in the crappy miserable Seattle weather the whole time; taking a beating year after year. Rain, snow, hail, moss, even the occasional tree-hugger... She's cooked many Thanksgiving and Christmas Turkeys and Hams, countless smokes, sears and oodles of pizza. It just dawned on me that something must be seriously wrong. My tiles are still intact, the damper spins open and closes perfectly, the lid hinge is still meticulously balanced. In fact it looks like and functions like I bought it yesterday. I'm so confused. Shouldn't it have died a horrible MK death by now and look like a sad naked mole rat? Cheers to @DennisLinkletter for making one of best purchases I've ever made!

Thank you to all for your replies! The bolts on the upper and lower parts of the latch on my 23 do not have room to make adjustments. I tried tapping with wood, per Dennis, and that did the trick. Eric

It took me a while to figure out what the prongs at the bottom were for and then I noticed the screw at the bottom and realised it is a bit like a vertical roti. I would like the frame and the ability to hook meat onto the top of the frame. My current adaptation when cold smoking ham is to use the half grate. This frame would improve on clearance and allow you to hang bigger joints in the KK. Below are a couple of hams, brined in beer and molasses for a few days and then cold smoked.

42" Teak Lid Removal Handles. It's big, it's heavy how ya going to lift that lid?

If anybody ever sees an owner posting and it does not say "Owners" under their Icon in blue.. please let me know and I'll upgrade them. This is a closed to the public area with posts about owner specials, new products in development and posts about use and maintenance etc.

If you are having problems getting to temp there are only a few factors.. One your charcoal might be less than dry also.. This will slow things down greatly and can be determined by feeling the exhaust for moisture/steam.. Two fuel and airflow.. You might just need to light more charcoal.. If things are really damp in there as this moisture turns to vapor this instant high humidity could also hinder things from taking off.. This is a perfect time to use my favorite BBQ accessory.. The cheapo hairdryer.. using one guarantees the charcoal you do have burning will get up to high enough temps to ignite all the charcoal around it.. once you have the entire bowl of charcoal burning this will absolutely vaporize any moisture you have in your Komodo. It might also be a good idea to do one hot cook before retiring your KK for the winter season.. this will burn off any drippings that are the nutrients for that mold growing in there..