jdbower

And the height including the clip (not depressed) is 1.4".

Re: conversion Slightly off topic, but coleslaw is a decent side however it's highly underrated as a condiment. I like a nice spicy slaw on my chicken sandwiches as well!

Thermodynamics are fun! Have you noticed any irregular burning in the basket? If for whatever reason the basket tends to burn unevenly finding the reason for that and fixing it may help. Also make sure the grill is heatsoaked first, letting it burn for a bit at high temps helps to even out the radiant heat from the walls. Another option is to try to move the deflector around to see if that helps. I'd imagine that back would make the most sense, but it also may depend on whether you've got standard front airflow or side airflow from the Guru. You can also try a second deflector on the lower grill at the rear to act as a baffle of sorts. Finally, where are you cooking the pizzas? It seems a lot of people cook them on the upper grill in the dome. I've been using the main grill and haven't noticed any hotspots but I'm using a 19.5" and my pizza stone size far exceeds my pizza size so that may contribute. I also only use the pizza stone itself for heat deflection, I don't bother with a secondary one since the temperatures are so high.

Nah, he's just married and bought the KK without consulting the wife. Any husband who's made a large purchase knows what it's like being a man who's been hit.

Also found here but I decided to repost on the forums for posterity. Cherry-pineapple sweet ribs with Zin-sational glaze From Chris Lilly, Big Bob Gibson BBQ Makes: 4-6 servings; prep time: 20 minutes; cook time: 4 hours INGREDIENTS • 2 slabs St Louis cut spareribs Dry rub • 2 tablespoons dark brown sugar • 2 tablespoons paprika • 1 tablespoon garlic salt • 1 1/2 teaspoons onion salt • 1 1/2 teaspoons chili powder • 3/4 teaspoon black pepper • 1/2 teaspoon red pepper • 1/4 teaspoon oregano • 1/4 teaspoon cumin Liquid seasoning • 1/2 cup pineapple juice • 1/2 cup black cherry juice • 1 tablespoon reserved dry rub mix • 1 1/2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar • 1 1/2 teaspoons minced garlic Zin-sational Glaze • 1 cup Red Zinfandel wine • 1 cup black cherry juice • 1/2 cup Rainier cherries • 1/2 cup blackberries • 1/2 cup granulated sugar • 1/2 jalapeno pepper, veins removed and seeded • 1 1/2 cup Big Bob Gibson Championship Red Sauce (substitute favorite BBQ sauce) DIRECTIONS Remove the membrane from the back of the rib. Combine rub and mix well. Reserve one tablespoon of rub for liquid seasoning mixture. Generously apply rub onto the front and back sides of ribs. Gently pat to ensure that rub will adhere. Preheat charcoal cooker to 250 degrees F. Place ribs meat-side up on grate and cook over indirect heat for 2 1/2 hours. Remove ribs from the cooker. Place each rib meat-side down on its own doubled aluminum foil square. Foil should be large enough to completely wrap rib. Mix the liquid seasoning. Pour 1/2 cup of the liquid over each rib. At the same time, tightly wrap and seal each rib with aluminum foil. Place back in cooker for 1 hour 15 minutes. While the ribs are cooking, pour the red wine and the black cherry juice into a saute pan and simmer over medium heat. Reduce the mixture to 1/2 cup (about 15-20 minutes). Add the cherries, blackberries, sugar, and jalapeno pepper to the mixture and simmer for an additional 5 minutes. Remove the fruit from the mixture, add the barbecue sauce and stir well. Remove ribs from cooker, unwrap, and discard foil. Brush the Zin-sational glaze on both sides of ribs. Place ribs in cooker for 15 minutes, or until sauce caramelizes. Edited to fix a typo and add a link to Chris' Book

Well, if you're happy with the grout color I'd probably leave it as is. If it does pop out over the winter you know how to fix it, since it's cosmetic anyway there should be no damage done if it needs to wait for next spring. My biggest concern with the JB Weld is that it may come up as a gloss black instead of matte, maybe if the grout pops out you can also try mixing in some powder (graphite?) to even out the texture and just apply it to the top surface rather than digging out the old stuff?

Some of it depends on the flavor you're going after as well. In Jersey often the best pizza wasn't the stuff right out of the oven, but the pie that's been sitting on the counter aging to perfection for who knows how long and then popped back into a piping hot oven for a few minutes. Sometimes I'd order a pie the day before I wanted it and keep it in the fridge so I could reheat it one slice at a time on my little oven pizza stone. Obviously some toppings work better with this than others, but real NJ pizza is great with just cheese

I believe it's a support for the gas burner option.

Ironically the fast food place I mentioned brined their cut-up chicken for 18-24 hours before cooking. Of course there's a difference between a slow rotisserie bird and 16 minutes in a pressurized deep fryer...

I don't have much to provide except for the source of all knowledge, but pheasant brings back scary memories for me. I used to work at a misplaced fast food place in Jersey whose tagline was "Tender as Quail! Tasty as Pheasant!"

Good job! Aesthetically I think I'd consider painting just the spring section black on a black cooker to help break up the stainless wall of the lower draft door, but I'd leave the nub and the shaft stainless. I think Rustoleum has a high temp spray paint that would probably be perfect, assuming, of course, that the spring is still removable. But then again there's a good reason I'm not a decorator and my wife picks out my clothes so what do I know about taste! Either way a nice looking solution and glad things stayed cool for you.

Here you go.

Speaking of which, have you tried them bacon-wrapped? That may help you out a bit as well.

There are only a few times you need to touch the dampers. When you first start it up I put them wide open. Once it gets close to temperature you close them down to about where you think they should be (just cracked for low and slow, but you'll quickly get a feel for this), the one newbies forget is after a few hours when it's heat-soaked and the walls stop stealing the energy from the fire you'll probably need another adjustment, and then just shut them down when you're done. Except for those times the KK's pretty stable, but I still like my gizmos so I use my Stoker nearly all of the time. However, a little extra time to research whether you're a Guru person or a Stoker person never hurts.

I like that idea! Sadly it looks as though I'll be testing out my new cover today - looks like rain. And unlike the KK I'm pretty sure the burner will rust if I forget to cover it.

A wise choice, but you know what they say about beggars and choosers

It seems like most people put the deflector on the charcoal basket. This probably creates the most even deflection since it's lower down, but I tend to use the lower grate. My reasoning is more laziness than anything technical; I can bring the cooker up to temps with the heat deflector in place and more easily launch some smokeables into the fire just before I put the food on without removing anything. Since I'm still happy with the results I figure that's all that matters I always leave the liner on, the theory is that it will help smooth out hotspots and protects the deflector - plus if you ever drop the deflector and it breaks it's still useful if you put the pieces in the liner. I put the drip pan on top of the deflector to protect the surface a bit, but I also use the deflector as a pizza stone so it's not exactly spotless.

I found it a bit annoying to move my wok burner in and out of the garage between cooks, lugging it plus the propane tank plus the wok itself was enough of a chore I frequently considered just doing things inside. When my wife became enamored of brats with fried onions I figured it was about time to send an email to JohnnyBoy. After a few measurements I've now got another matching cover that protects the burner as well as hides the propane tank and even the propane lighter for the KK. It's got a handle on the top for easy removal and JB even thought to add some Velcro straps that can attach to the legs (unlike the KK, the burner's shape could allow the cover to blow off if the wind hits it right). Thanks for another top-notch job! The outdoor kitchen is still a work in progress, a plywood patio isn't exactly matching decor, but that's a project for next summer Here are my beauties all hidden away:

I guess for some people BBQ is a sauce and not a cuisine. Or religion...

To add a bit to FM's description, over a long enough timeframe the temperatures of the cooker and the meat will equalize. For example, shoulders are often cooked at 220F and pulled at 195F, not much lower. I had a cut finish in the middle of the night unexpectedly and pulled it out at 205F and had I left it for the remainder of the day it probably would have been at least 215F. In general, tough cuts like briskets and shoulders are done at low temperatures (~220F) to high internal temperatures (~195F). Poultry and roasts are medium temperatures (~325F) to lower internal temperatures (~150 - but it depends a lot more on the meat since a beef rib roast is good at 135 and chicken is best left to 160 at the breast). Steak is done at high temperatures (~500F) until they just stop mooing. Of course, sometimes breaking the rules of thumb also yields tasty results, other times it yields salmonella.

It also could be a self-perpetuating problem. Every time you open to adjust the probes you let out a lot of heat which first regroups in the dome (creating a large discrepancy) but once you let it sit for a while to type out a forum post the heat has a chance to even out a bit. Why the first blip happened is anyone's guess, it may have even been a quirk of the cool Guru-blown air somehow circulating to the pit probe to reduce the effective temperature. Whatever the reason, glad to see things are back to normal!

Depending on configuration there can be a bit of a discrepancy between the grate temp and the dome temp. First thing to worry about is placement of your Guru probe. If it's too close to the meat that will bring the effective temperature down significantly, but if it's too close to the edge it may bring the temperature up a but if you're using a heat deflector. The heat flow tends to be along the sides of the cooker and then it gathers in the dome where the temperatures are a bit hotter. BBQ Guru also sells a probe tree that can raise the probes (even Stoker probes ), I would say an ideal location should be about 1/2 the height of the cut. If you're using the main and upper grill maybe hanging the pit probe just under the upper grill would be a good median? Obviously you may also want to try calibrating the Guru pit probe to see if it's close to target. I had moisture get into the plug end of one of my Stoker probes and while it was damp inside it fluctuated between -150F and +1200F - that one was easy to spot... Assuming that the Guru probe checks out and is properly placed then your meat should be cooking at the temperature the Guru probe reports. If not, you can drop the Guru temp until you get the dome temps you want, but this may be reducing the grate temp too much in the process. For me, I ignore the difference between the Stoker temp and the dome temp and I stick with what the Stoker says since it's closer to the level of the meat. But typically I'm only maybe 20-50 degrees off depending on the state of the heat soak. If you're using a food probe to see when the meat is done you don't need to worry about overcooking, it may finish sooner than you expect if the temperatures really are off or later if you correct for an issue that didn't really exist.

I had been using makeshift peels for a while now (sliding pizza off a plate or a cookie sheet) but I finally decided it's time to get serious. Rather than a traditional peel or making my own I decided to go with a Super Peel as previously mentioned in this thread. At a $35-40 street price it's a bit more expensive than many standard peels, but it's also got the surprisingly elusive flat bottomed shape I was looking for. My thoughts were that even if the "Super" aspect turned out to be not so super at least I'd still have a decent peel - albeit one with a slot cut into it. The peel itself is pre-assembled and made from 1.5" slats of maple. The texture is nice and smooth and care is similar to a butcherblock - wipe clean with water (but don't soak it) and occasionally rub with mineral oil. The end is slightly beveled to make picking stuff up easy. The Super part is a canvas-like material. There's a small pocket at the end where a wooden slat is inserted; this slat acts both as a holder for retaining clips as well as a handle for moving the canvas around. To assemble the peel simply push the slat up through the slot in the peel from the bottom. Wrap the canvas around the peel overlapping the slat. There are two nylon clips that slip over the end of the canvas and attach it to the slat. Don't over-tighten the canvas otherwise it won't slide right. The canvas installs and removes quickly and it's machine washable (but they recommend air drying or low heat tumble dry and it may require ironing to look pretty afterwords). Using it takes a bit of practice. With the slat near the front of the peel, place the edge of the peel against the edge of what you want to pick up. Instead of the natural instinct to pull back on the slat you should hold the slat in position as you push the peel underneath. This will cause the canvas to slide around the peel and the peel to move under the object - pulling back on the slat would cause the canvas to pull the object onto the peel and this can cause pizza dough to stretch. Practice a bit with random objects to get the gist of how it works, but I would not recommend trying it with your cat (they don't like it much). I tried it on a pizza tonight. First I rubbed some flour into the canvas (as recommended) and sprinkled it with a little cornmeal to give the dough a little extra crunch. I rolled out the dough on the counter top and then manually transferred it to the peel. After putting the toppings on you simply put the pizza where you want it to go and keep the slat in the same spot as you pull back the peel. What was once a tough job with some sticky dough became a trivial occurrence. They recommend removing the canvas to pick up the pizza to help keep the canvas clean, and once it's done the pizza shouldn't stick so it's not an issue. So far the pro is that it's trivial to move even very sticky dough from the peel to the pizza stone. The con is that I feel as though I should wash the canvas after every use. Super Peel sells replacement parts so you don't need a whole new peel if you break the canvas belt (the belt is $6 including shipping). In a pinch or for something that will stain the belt you can also use wax paper or other improvised materials. And, of course, if you don't like it you can use it as an ordinary peel. My current opinion is that if you're in the market for a new peel this is a great choice and so far I'm happy with my decision. If you've already got a peel and you have issues with dough sticking to it you may want to consider an upgrade. But if you've got a peel and you know how to use it I don't think you'd be missing anything.

Having them parallel to the ground may not always be the best functionally even though it's nicer aesthetically. By having them angled slightly to the edges the excess juices shouldn't run down the side of the cooker but harmlessly off to the sides.