tony b

Good one!

Good, but the black truffle salt that I just scored is even better on fries, so I'm guessing it would be on chips, too!

You've only scratched the surface! 😄

Now that colder weather is here (high on Christmas Eve is forecast to be 12F), I haven't hit a golf ball since late September. I am so envious of your weather in SD - just about perfect year round. All the beer festivals were cancelled this year, so it's been pretty boring year mostly, except for the derecho in August; but, I could have done without that excitement!!! And, my planned trip to Northern Italy was obviously nixed. With all the beer events being cancelled, including face meetings with my homebrew club, I greatly throttled back on my brewing. So, a lot of my diversion has been mostly cooking. Fortunately, I have a well stocked wine cellar and bar to keep me amused - ha, ha! Most of the cellar is older (10 - 30 year old) reds (Bordeaux, CA Cabs & Zins) and I still have a couple of cases of '90 vintage ports left (Grahams, Dows). But I mostly drink out of my "everyday rack" of younger reds (Pinot Noir, Cab, Syrah and Zin), rosés, and whites (Chardonnay, Viognier, Vinho Verde, and White Bordeaux). I am going to be sooo glad when 2020 is over!

Welcome to the Obsession. You're in for a nice housewarming present in the new home! Send us pictures! Definitely 2nd the idea to load up the shipping pallet with cocochar and coffee wood. Cheapest you'll ever pay for it and, as noted by @jonj, the ONLY way to get it in the US currently. There isn't a big secondary market for KKs or accessories, but occasionally someone will part with one. Just keep your eyes open on this Forum.

For those of us with older KKs, the upper latch is not adjustable (welded), even though it has bolts on it similar to the lower latch. So, you should confirm with Dennis whether your upper latch mechanism is adjustable before trying that one to avoid damaging it. Typically, adjusting the lower latch is sufficient to fix most problems. Nice suggestion on cleaning the gaskets periodically. I know that I'm bad about not doing it very often myself.

OMG! And I thought I had a problem! The kitchen fridge has the pullout drawer freezer on the bottom, with a big sliding tray in the top. There's a medium sized chest freezer in the basement for the bulkier things (racks of ribs, pork butts, briskets, whole chickens, etc.) And, if needed, I can always use the top freezer section on my beer fridge for the overflow (typically after a CostCo and Trade Joes run!)

OK, back on topic. Last night I did some chicken thighs, rubbed with Yardbird (fav for chicken). Direct, 325F, cherry wood chunks, main grate. Kept it simple. Risotto in mushroom stock, finished with Parm and truffle salt. Side salad.

I'm curious to hear what your structural engineers have to say.

Good news for sure! Glad it was the easier fix (latch adjustment).

If you're deep frying in oil, the blanch step is at 325F and the 2nd frying step is at 375F. If you're blanching in water, then just get it to boiling/simmer, you don't want a rolling boil or you can break up the fries as they go dashing about.

If the latch adjustment, mentioned by Robert, doesn't do the trick, then do the "paper test." Take a sheet of printer paper and place it on the bottom ledge where you've seen the smoke exiting. Close the lid and latch to the 2nd position. Now pull on the sheet of paper. It should NOT move. If you can pull out the paper, then you need to build up your bottom gasket in that area with some Permatex. It's a good idea if you have a low spot that leaks, to check all around the interface between the lid and bottom. If you're going to be doing a gasket build up, you want to find every spot and fix it.

Making me blush! 😊 My best homemade fries have always been in the deep fryer (double fried). I've had moderate success with doing them in the air fryer (I actually do better with pre-cut frozen ones). Keys are to soak the hand cut fries in water after you cut them to remove excess starch from the surface, and rinse. Then par-blanch them in boiling water briefly (they should bend but not break), place on a rack and let them cool and dry. Then lightly spray them with oil and into the air fryer on 375F until golden brown, shaking the basket periodically helps with evenness. YMMV

Consider it "wagged!" 🤣 There's a lot to be considered here - how was the concrete balcony re-enforced and integrated into the building structure (i.e., was it built to be heavy load bearing or just moderately so - basic patio furniture/a few people), are you planning on the KK being close to the building structure or out near the edge for ventilation (thinking cantilevered load)? The good news here is that it's a static load (not moving) and somewhat distributed by the 4 wheels (but a fairly concentrated footprint - 25% of the weight is borne by each wheel, which has a very small contact point - very high lbf/sq in), but it's concrete, which takes compressive loads well. Good to hear that you've reached out to the original designers for some answers. Good Luck!

We hate seeing when folks sell theirs, unless it's to upgrade, ala tekobo!

It's a riff off of the PICO Brew idea. I backed it as a Kickstarter. It's called BeerMkr. Very small batches - just over a gallon. Check out their website: BEERMKR - Automated Countertop Craft Beer Brewing Believe it or not, this is my very 1st all-grain brew, after being a homebrewer for over 25 years! I originally got into it thinking it would make a good pilot system for trying new recipes without having to commit to a full 5 gallon batch. Then COVID hit and all the beer events where we share homebrew all dried up (literally!), so I stopped brewing 5 gallon batches because I was having a hard time drinking this much by myself without overdoing it before I burned out on it (I prefer variety.) Plus, I wanted to do more take out from the local breweries to help them survive. So, the idea of single gallon batches took on new importance for me.

Yeah, you're brisket has a lot more "tail" on it than here in the States.

Believe it or not, that's too much! Just barely off the seat. I sit there and wiggle it until I can just barely see some smoke coming out.

Tonight was a pre-marinated pork loin (roasted garlic & black peppercorns) that I amp'ed up with more roasted garlic powder and fresh cracked pepper. On the main grate, direct, with hickory & apple wood chunks, started the loin at 250F and let it creep up to 350F (target) over 30 minutes. Pulled at an IT of 135F. Rested for 10 minutes. Plated with melting potatoes with a hit of truffle salt (heaven!) and a side salad. Lovely Pinot Noir to go with!

Being IT challenged here, I won't comment on your theory about dueling devices (I have a very similar story to tell* on a different set of gear yesterday!); but, I will wholeheartedly second Robert's advice on setting the top vent almost closed and forcing the Guru fan to do all the work. Plus, set the fan outlet damper to at least half closed. I've had windy days mess up a Guru controlled cook before; because once the grill temp goes above the Guru setpoint, you're screwed! The Guru basically shuts down as a controller at that point and the KK is on its own after that. * I was trying to synch up a new piece of brewing equipment with its controller app on my phone (android). The brewing device has its own WiFi to connect to the cloud, but only works on 2.4 GHz connections. My home WiFi has both 2.4 and 5 GHz connections. So, the brewing equipment was getting stymied by the 5 Gig signal. So, I finally figured out how to disable the 5 Gig signal, let the brewing equipment synch up to the 2.4 Gig signal, then re-establish the 5 Gig network in my house. This was done over a very frustrating 2 day period! So, I know exactly how frustrating this stuff can get. Fortunately, I didn't lose a batch of beer because of it, unlike you losing that gorgeous brisket. Hopefully you can salvage something out of it??

If I know you, you'll be hitting it out of the park within a week on all 3 grills! That's a fact!

Very nice.

Don't they all?? LOL!

You're my kind of Santa! 🎅

OMG, I'm in a total meat coma! Dinner was a 1.5 lb Prime NY strip. Direct, lower grate (given how thick this steak was, I didn't want to try cooking it on the sear grate!), mesquite and post oak chunks. Rubbed with Gunpowder and Raising the Steaks. This thing was so massive that it took 25 minutes to get to Rare (125F), flipped it every 5 minutes. So, I was totally glad that I went lower grate, as trying to cook this on the sear grate would have been charred on the outside and Black-n-Blue on the inside. Plated with roasted spuds w/Peruvian green sauce (and a dash of truffle salt), sauteed mushrooms and chimichurri for the steak. A very lovely Conundrum red wine. Side salad as the palette cleanser - bleu cheese notwithstanding!