myself888

Thank you all for this conversation! We have always used our deflector, but my husband was just questioning its necessity tonight as he was preparing our KK for an overnight low and slow. I found this info just in time. 

I bought the Smartfire for my husband's birthday gift a couple weeks ago. Everything works great! Instead of punching out the ceramic plug in the front, he drilled a 1" keyhole in the rear vent plate. Not sure if everyone has a rear vent. When we bought our KK, we purchased it with the gas burner (never used), so it has a rear vent. Below is a link to the piece of piping he used. He added a cap for when he is not using the Smartfire. He and my son ran a test cook (no meat, just a basket of coals) and it performed well, so the next day we went on a hike all day while cooking pork shoulder. It was nice to be able to check the app throughout the day to see that things were stable and the meat was making steady progress.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07MXXYMSW/?coliid=I2B0B3Z6GW3PB1&colid=W2YAI4BADZ8B&psc=1&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it

I've only ever made dry yeast bread and have wanted to learn the whole sourdough style, so I just purchased the Tartine Bread book and made my first sourdough starter and bread. I followed the recommendation to use a dutch oven (more steam) in my regular oven. This worked well and produced beautiful boules (see photo). I'd like to try baking inside my KK and wondered if anyone has pictures of successful KK loaves. Does the KK hold enough steam inside (similar to the dutch oven technique) to produce the crackly crust?

I'd like to try cooking with the coconut charcoal. Anyone in the nearby area willing to sell a box? Once I'm convinced, I would then like to see about sharing a shipment. Let me know. Annie

I've been reviewing some recipes for pork rillettes (potted pork). All the fat rendering and such made me think that the process of making a pork butt/shoulder on the Komodo should pretty much give the same results. I always have a drip pan full of rendered fat and my shoulders have great flavor. Am I over simplifying this by thinking that I should be able to chop up my pulled pork, add back a small amount of the rendered fat and voila! Rillettes?

The Bag Solution

This is so NOT a "green" solution, but it's super easy and works for us until we can find a better more planet friendly option - I'm not quite ready to start making my own soap.

Just tape the bag in place and brush the ash out the hole from the inside. Be sure to brush the bottom side well so you don't drop all your ash when you remove the lower strip of tape. Then just tie the bag closed and drop it in the trash.

Yes, that is our rib rack doing double duty as a grill grate stand.

My husband often cooks, then vacuums large batched of ribs. He comes home for lunch, so he'll just drop a vac bag into a pot of boiling water and make a quick salad or slice some tomatoes. We've had no problems so far. Of course, they're never in the freezer for more than a couple weeks max. I don't know about long term storage. He does this with beef too - TriTip, Flank steak, etc.

I'm very interested. Let me know if you end up liking it.

I'll take one please...

I just read a cool idea. For my quick cooks - like grilled chicken breasts - I am now using the side burner of my useless gas grill to light my charcoal chimney. It took like two seconds and I just dumped the coals into the basket, tossed on another handful and the grill is just about ready to go.

We just received our gas burner for the KK and hooked it up to our natural gas line that previously supplied our stainless gas grill.

We've already had the grill up to 400* in test mode (took about 45mins). I plan to place the heat deflector in the middle area of the grill and cook a honey whole wheat sandwich bread. I'm using a standard loaf pan on the main grate.

Anyone out there cooking in a KK with natural gas? Any advice you can provide regarding connection, air flow, max temperature ranges, etc. will be appreciated. My concerns are sufficient air to the flame and avoiding soot and gas flavors.

How far should the bottom damper be open? How high should the top hat be open? I want to ensure air flow but don't want to lose all my heat.

Rib Bummer!

Instead of making our own rib rub, we bought one. I don't know if we did something wrong or if we just can't handle as much salt as the manufacturer assumes people must like.

The entire 3 pack is inedible - even after rinsing them twice and sticking them back on the KK for another hour.

What a disaster.

Here is what we did: We rubbed the racks and put them in a cooler overnight, then followed the standard low and slow procedure - full basket, heat deflector, main grate.

After temp stabilized at around 235*, we placed the three racks on the main grate and left the ribs to cook. After about 3 hours we cut a rib to taste and discovered that we had a little ribs with our grilled salt.

Oh wow, that's beautiful. You can poke me in the eye with that cactus anytime!

Re: First KK Turkey - DAMN!

...Whipped-up some Mad Max Gravy that was superb. Not overly smokey' date=' great flavor, I could eat that stuff straight...[/quote']

Mmm, gravy... [Homer drooling]

I've been known to order eggs, bacon, and a bowl of biscuit gravy at the local diner (no biscuit thanks) and eat it like a nice sausage chowder.

Hmm, just figured out what I'm going to do with that package of frozen sausage in my deep freeze!

Love them butts

...Your plan sounds good...but why not just put it on early AM the day you plan to serve it? Nothing like letting your quests get a smell of the smoke when they arrive!...

Good recommendation. We put the butts (plus some brisket and beef shortribs) on this morning and cooked all day. Guests arrived and we pulled the meat off right in front of them. Lots of oohs and aahs. LOL, talk about drool! No pictures - wild animals snarling and drooling scared me too much. Thought I'd lose my hand and the camera!

I forgot about the injection, but the food was so tasty - and the best part is that the low and slow imparts so much good flavor that we really don't use very much rub or salt. I served the pulled pork with Portuguese sweet rolls and BBQ sauce. And here's the fun part, I made homemade chocolate pudding - haven't had that since I was about 5 years old.

Finally, the ever present wine:

Vallado Douro d.o.c. 2007 Vinho Tinto [Portuguese Red Wine]

St Francis 2005 Sonoma County Syrah

The Works 2004 Howell Mountain Zinfandel

St Francis Sonoma County Old Vine Zinfandel 2004 Tres Viejos

Paradise Ridge The Convict Zinfandel Rockpile 2006

Esmeralda Valley 2002 Syrah Calaveras County Chatom Vineyards

Rotisserie Diagram

Is there a diagram of what parts go where on the rotisserie?

Click to view larger image

What are the springs for?

Greetings from Northern California

HI Arthur,

Welcome to kk ownership. The people on this forum are so friendly and helpful, you'll think they're right next door. In fact, I like many of them BETTER than some of my neighbors.

Imaginary Mahi Mahi (forgot to take pictures!)

Hubby brought home some new charcoal (Frontier) and it is soooo much

better than the BGE stuff. Much less dust and larger heavier chunks. They

took a bit longer to light, but were much easier to smother when I was done.

Plus the price was half what we paid for the BGE bag from California Backyard - I know, everything is over priced at CA BYd.

Anyway, attempted some grilled mahi mahi. I got a nice flame and some hot coals going and dropped them onto the sear grill. Turned out very pretty - I love grill marks. Placed a couple thin slices of Meyer lemons from the backyard on top. Hubby loved it, but I felt it was a bit too smoky for my taste. The Mayo Family Pinot Gris made it all worth while.

p.s. - Prior to cooking the fish, I needed to cook up some beet greens I had

leftover in the fridge, so I sauteed them in a grill basket while the coals were heating up. Oh my gosh they are so smoky and fantastic! I will stuff these and some avocado slices into a couple nice warm corn tortillas for lunch tomorrow. And since I work from home, I'll enjoy a yummy Blue Moon brew along with them.

Wahoo! I love horseradish. I grew up on any red meat with HR!

And I can't eat sushi without copious amounts of wasabi in my dipping sauce.

Thanks for the tips. I guess I'm going to order that book on Amazon right now.

Naturally, there is no comparison to a good low/slow pulled pork butt;

however, I like the loin idea as another option - especially since I love

vinegar with meats. Heck, I make chicken salad sandwiches with leftover

dry breast meat, so why not cut out some calories and make a nice

pulled pork sandwich with a vinegary slaw.

Since it has been frozen, it won't make great steaks anyway, so brining may

be called for.

Just for kicks, I might just thaw it out and inject it with something that

resembles your vinegar and the Lilly injection solution.

I found your post from last year with the pictures - that sealed the deal. I'll

post my experiment soon.

We have this 7lbs Kirkland boneless pork loin in the deep freeze and would

normally cut it into thick steaks for grilling; however, I just saw a comment

from Jeff about doing a low/slow pulled pork loin and decided to ask for advice.

Rub or not?

Brine or not?

Inject or not?

Same basic low/slow technique?

-225* to 235*?

-How many hours?

All advice welcome.

Resisting--- Injection--- Joke---

Being new to the BBQ scene, the injection idea sounds interesting.

We have a monthly knitting (ladies) and guitar (gents) group and it's my turn

to host. We were so pleased with the butt/shoulder we made last weekend,

we decided to make it again for this dinner.

Let me know if this sounds like a good strategy. Inject and rub on Monday

night (refrigerate), cook overnight Tuesday, and serve on Wednesday night.

Or should I inject just prior to placing the meat on the grill?

Re: corn meal?

Corn meal in the eye is superior to an eyeball punctured by a cactus spine! Had to fix that one with super glue. Worked pretty good' date=' too. Patient got their vision back.[/quote']

Hey Doc, you weren't specific. Was the super glue for the cactus spine or the eye?

Anyway, no imaginary pizza for us. We like the real thing. Here goes...

We had a tough time getting the kk to a high temp. We used a full basket of BGE lump (many small pieces, lots of dust) and struggled to get 600°. I use a very high hydration dough, so the hotter the better. I'd like to reach 700° minimum.

Today my husband brought home a different brand of lump from Lowe's called Frontier (nicer looking chunks) and we have a gas burner on order from Dennis. Maybe some combination of the two will help? Suggestions welcome.

By the way, our grill setup was this...

full basket of lump

heat deflector on basket handles

main grill

upper grill standing on tall handles

pizza stone (not the kk one)

Volunteer

Here, I'll do it...

Make a pork butt!

We used Cruzmisl's tutorial (link below), but didn't follow it exactly. Our butt tasted great and it was a ton of fun doing something we've never done before.

http://www.komodokamado.com/forum/viewt ... =pork+butt

If you're not into pork, try a brisket.

http://www.komodokamado.com/forum/viewt ... ht=brisket

Puff of Air in your EYE

I am assuming that you are starting with a ball of dough? Here is how I do it...

• -Dust your counter with flour......

Once its topped and ready to cook, lift one edge, blow a puff of air under it and it will be ready to slide right off onto the stone......

One of the best pieces of advice I have yet read is this "puff of air" that Firemonkey suggests for moving your raw pizza to the grill. It works great! Unfortunately, I was still using flour and corn meal because my dough is so wet. I wanted to SEE how this worked so much that I got blow back from the peel and an eye full of flour/corn meal.