Charcoal

[ckreef]

All this strange lump sorting. Way to much work and worry.

With RO I always dump straight from the bag. I usually dump from the bag until it's empty, smalls, fines, dust and all. The only exception to this is if I'm doing a long low and slow in which case I won't dump the very bottom of a bag. 

 

[tony b]

I'm as lazy as they come, Charles, but this just seemed to make sense to me and I'd been thinking about doing it for some time now. Especially after going through several bags of RO and seeing all the dust & fines building up in the bottom of  my charcoal bin and ultimately in the bottom of the KK. Once you build it, it literally takes a couple of minutes to sift a whole bag and you don't end up with all that stuff in the bottom of your grill, which you eventually have to clean out and dump anyway. So, as I look at it, it's the old "Pay me now, or pay me later, but in the end, you're gonna pay!" Much rather deal upfront than later, which involves dragging out the shop vac from the garage and hauling it up to the deck to clean out the KK. Hoping this will lead to less vacuuming out of the KK, since it takes a while to build up enough ash if you use good charcoal. YMMV

[Shuley]

On 5/26/2017 at 2:24 PM, tony b said:

@billg71 - Nope, I had the same issue with the Fogo. Kept a screwdriver and a rubber mallet in my charcoal bin to break up those huge pieces. For folks that haven't seen it, I'm talking pieces the size of cantaloupes or a head of iceberg lettuce, not baseball sized, which is the standard that I use for "large."

@Jon B. - I was in the local Ace Hardware store today and guess what? They had a box of the Black Diamond ($20). So check your local Ace store. I will likely go back and get it when I get through my last box of your kind gift. I just opened it, and I think the size of the pieces was similar to box #1.

In fact, today I built a wooden box frame out of 1 x 1's with 1" wire mesh fabric stapled to it to screen my charcoal. I just empty the bag on top of it, give it a little shake and all the dust and tiny pieces drop through into a Rubbermaid bin. The usable pieces stay on the top and get put into my charcoal bin; the dust and smalls in the other Rubbermaid tub get dumped. 

IMHO $20 per box is too much. I got mine for $10.99 per box. I would definitely say there is not 20% that I can't use. And I have gone through a lot of boxes!!  I can't really estimate but I feel like there is less dust per box compared to bagged products I have purchased. Maybe vendor matters more though?  Maybe some places are more gentle with their boxes?

[cschaaf]

23 hours ago, tony b said:

I'm as lazy as they come, Charles, but this just seemed to make sense to me and I'd been thinking about doing it for some time now. Especially after going through several bags of RO and seeing all the dust & fines building up in the bottom of  my charcoal bin and ultimately in the bottom of the KK. Once you build it, it literally takes a couple of minutes to sift a whole bag and you don't end up with all that stuff in the bottom of your grill, which you eventually have to clean out and dump anyway. So, as I look at it, it's the old "Pay me now, or pay me later, but in the end, you're gonna pay!" Much rather deal upfront than later, which involves dragging out the shop vac from the garage and hauling it up to the deck to clean out the KK. Hoping this will lead to less vacuuming out of the KK, since it takes a while to build up enough ash if you use good charcoal. YMMV

I can see that. If I had a charcoal bin, I think I'd sift first too. In my yard, it's easier to store the lump out in the shed and carry the bags back and forth.

I also don't bother with a shop vac. I can have the KK cleaned out using my KJ ash rake faster than it would take me to walk to the shed and dig out the vac.

It's a good reminder that every set up is different and the way that works for you is the best way.

 

[mguerra]

Royal Oak from Wal-Mart is my go to. Since I always clean out with a shop vac, I just dump straight from the bag, no sorting. I tried some Rockwood and seemed to have a lot of chips and dust, more than RO. Sometimes I put a bed of coco in the very bottom of the charcoal basket and throw RO on top of that. Frankly, I don't care what I use, because anything cooked on lump charcoal is great, to me. Whenever I see some lump I never tried before, I grab a bag.

[DennisLinkletter]

On 5/25/2017 at 5:10 PM, ckreef said:

I do a lot of high heat cooks and grilling. Coco char is not a good choice for those types of cooks. 

 

 

Coco actually burns very hot (Naked Whiz gave it 5 stars for heat)  and because of it's density you can put MUCH more charcoal in the basket and cook hot longer without refueling. 

That being said just figure on burning what you put in because once heated over 400-450º what is left over the next day crumbles easily, you can't stir it or be rough with it but that's not the end of the world or reuse it carefully..

 

Naked Whiz KK CoCo Review
Maximum Temperature 
The maximum temperature we were able to obtain with this charcoal was 978°F which is very high even for lump charcoals. This charcoal will definitely get hot enough to do anything you could want to do in a ceramic charcoal cooker.

[DennisLinkletter]

BTW  To get more Coffee flavor from the char, I've asked them to send me larger pieces. The largest pieces are the  least carbonized.  We just re-purposed one of the medium sized bandsaws in the factory for sawing down the larger coffee chunks.  This will give us manageable sized chunks with more smoke flavor.
This charcoal won't be there for a while cause we just shipped a container.

[tony b]

2 hours ago, mguerra said:

Whenever I see some lump I never tried before, I grab a bag.

Check out your local ACE Hardware store for the Black Diamond. It comes in a box. A tad pricey, but great distribution of mostly medium sized pieces, with not a lot of smalls or fines. Lights easily with the torch, burns well, with not a lot of ash or heavy smoke. 

[mguerra]

will do.