quedog Posted May 20, 2011 Report Share Posted May 20, 2011 Alice arrived this afternoon!!! I told my 8 year old daughter that she could name her, she chose Alice because of her blue color. We have a back porch that is about 2.5' above the side walk. I had planned to build a ramp and use a winch to get her up on the porch, but my wife found a better way. We lost several trees in the storms that hit the Southeast a couple weeks ago. We were talking to the tree guy one evening and she asked if bucket truck could lift the grill onto the porch. He jumped at the chance to show that it could: The crate was narrow enough to fit between the stair rails so we didn't have to lift her very high. She was off the ground for about 30 seconds. The guys were so curious about her that they hung around and help unpack her. They were impressed. She is working on a dry run now, sitting at about 350: I've got a big ole pork butt to break her in with in the morning. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobvoeh Posted May 21, 2011 Report Share Posted May 21, 2011 Re: Alice is HERE!!!! Fragile, must be Italian!! Nice work getting the tree guy to help you out!! Good luck with the pork butt. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quedog Posted May 21, 2011 Author Report Share Posted May 21, 2011 Re: Alice is HERE!!!! Fragile' date=' must be Italian!![/quote'] Man, I wish I had thought to use that line. I watch "A Christmas Story" every year. I managed to get my lovely wife to go for the KK (which she thinks is beautiful) but I don't think she would go for a leg lamp. I am really impressed by the ease of controlling the temperature of the KK. I started a small fire and have slowly let her get hotter over the last few hours, following Dennis' instructions. She is up to about 500 now and very stable. I was afraid that the transition to the KK from my kettle grill would be a little rough because I am used to building big fires but so far this has gone really well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bri134 Posted May 21, 2011 Report Share Posted May 21, 2011 Re: Alice is HERE!!!! Fragile' date=' must be Italian!![/quote'] Excellent quote! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DennisLinkletter Posted May 21, 2011 Report Share Posted May 21, 2011 Re: Alice is HERE!!!! Fragile, must be Italian!! Too Too funny... Congrats on getting her up and running.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdbower Posted May 21, 2011 Report Share Posted May 21, 2011 Re: Alice is HERE!!!! Alice, eh? Hopefully you don't light with propane and have the flame go out. Otherwise when you relight it will be "Bang, zoom, straight to the Moon!" At least you'll soon be saying, "Baby, you're the greatest!" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quedog Posted May 22, 2011 Author Report Share Posted May 22, 2011 Re: Alice is HERE!!!! At least you'll soon be saying' date=' "Baby, you're the greatest!" [/quote'] I'm already saying that. The first run went very nicely today, I know you guys say that if there are no pics it didn't happen, so here it is: It was about a 10.5 lb pork butt, stayed on for 12 hours with no major problems. I had to work today so I wan't around to baby it and the temp coasted a bit higher than the 225 I was shooting for but not enough to worry about. The wife says it is the best butt I have ever cooked, but I think I can do better still. The biggest difference we noticed from the old kettle setup was a lack of a funny aftertaste that seemed to accompany everything cooked low and slow on the kettle. My theory is that the kettle holds much less fuel and burns through it much faster so you have to ad fuel at least every couple hours. Every time you add a new load of fuel it goes through a cycle of volatile compounds and impurities burning off as the charcoal heats up. Over the course of a long cook it adds an off taste to the food. Since the KK only goes through that cycle once at the beginning of the cook and most of the compounds may evaporate before the food goes on the food tastes much cleaner. What do you guys think? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DennisLinkletter Posted May 22, 2011 Report Share Posted May 22, 2011 Re: Alice is HERE!!!! The biggest difference we noticed from the old kettle setup was a lack of a funny aftertaste that seemed to accompany everything cooked low and slow on the kettle. My theory is that the kettle holds much less fuel and burns through it much faster so you have to ad fuel at least every couple hours. Every time you add a new load of fuel it goes through a cycle of volatile compounds and impurities burning off as the charcoal heats up. Over the course of a long cook it adds an off taste to the food. Since the KK only goes through that cycle once at the beginning of the cook and most of the compounds may evaporate before the food goes on the food tastes much cleaner. What do you guys think? I understand your logic and most of it is sound but in your KK you are not lighting all the charcoal, in fact for your 225 you have less than a tennis ball worth of charcoal.. If the off taste is charcoal related, it's because of the additional volume of it that you need to burn to finish a 12 hour cook. If a KK can go 85 hours @ 235º on 16 lbs of charcoal each lb goes 5.3 hours.. 12 hours you are burning about 2.25 lbs compare that to the volume needed in your kettle and you will see that you have much more smoke running thru the kettle.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hashbrown3 Posted May 22, 2011 Report Share Posted May 22, 2011 Re: Alice is HERE!!!! Fragile' date=' must be Italian!![/quote'] Excellent quote! Hah! thats hilarious. "It's a Major Award'" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnnyboy Posted May 23, 2011 Report Share Posted May 23, 2011 Re: Alice is HERE!!!! The biggest difference we noticed from the old kettle setup was a lack of a funny aftertaste that seemed to accompany everything cooked low and slow on the kettle. My theory is that the kettle holds much less fuel and burns through it much faster so you have to ad fuel at least every couple hours. Every time you add a new load of fuel it goes through a cycle of volatile compounds and impurities burning off as the charcoal heats up. Over the course of a long cook it adds an off taste to the food. Since the KK only goes through that cycle once at the beginning of the cook and most of the compounds may evaporate before the food goes on the food tastes much cleaner. What do you guys think? I'm curious, were you using a heat deflector/drip pan in both kettle and KK? Could grease have been dripping on hot coals in kettle causing a off taste? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Syzygies Posted May 23, 2011 Report Share Posted May 23, 2011 Perdue Petrol Could grease have been dripping on hot coals in kettle causing a off taste? That's interesting. There's a characteristic aroma to "chicken cooked on Weber" that one doesn't get, even cooking direct without a drip pan, on a KK. I don't miss it, rather I cringe now when I smell it coming off a Weber. The KK can be used more like an oven, less like a broiler, and greater distances lead to less rendering and sputtering fat flame-ups. The trick is to get enough rendering for crisp skin, but we've been managing fine... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quedog Posted May 24, 2011 Author Report Share Posted May 24, 2011 Re: Alice is HERE!!!! Hey guys, thanks for the replies regarding the taste. I have some ideas that may be fun to discuss further, but I think I will start a new thread in a different area. I've gotten us a bit off topic for this one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
