Harvard engineering students devise BBQ smoker
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Harvard engineering students devise BBQ smoker
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Re: Harvard engineering students devise BBQ smoker
#2If you don't want to build your own, the green egg is a really solid ceramic smoker/oven. expensive but the results are consistently good.
Re: Harvard engineering students devise BBQ smoker
#3If you don't want to build your own, the green egg is a really solid ceramic smoker/oven. expensive but the results are consistently good.
It's actually in the background of the last photo. Looks like they were comparing to the competition.
Re: Harvard engineering students devise BBQ smoker
#4If you don't want to build your own, the green egg is a really solid ceramic smoker/oven. expensive but the results are consistently good.
Strangely the article doesn't mention it, even though there's one in the photo.
Re: Harvard engineering students devise BBQ smoker
#5I wonder if they used the "Texas Crutch," i.e., wrapped the brisket in foil after ~4 hours.
The upshot of the Texas Crutch technique is: after about 2 hours on the smoke, the internal temperature of a brisket will plateau for 6-8 hours before climbing toward its final temperature. According to experiments by Greg Blonder[0], this stall is caused by evaporative cooling: once the internal temperature reaches a point where the energy lost to evaporation balances the energy gained from the (low---225-250 Fahrenheit is the "right" temperature for a brisket) ambient temperature, the internal temp of the meat will stay put until sufficient water has evaporated.
Some call this cheating, but in my experimentation the "crutch" produces significantly tastier results because of the difference in juiciness. As additional evidence here, I'll note that every BBQ place in Austin whose brisket is good to great---Franklin, La Barbecue, John Mueller Meat Co., and even Rudy's---wraps their briskets in foil. (Edited to add: I didn't mention Black's and Kreutz's because I'm not 100% sure that they do, but I vaguely recall that they do.)
One worry might be that the meat doesn't absorb as much smoke after the foil is applied, and this is indeed true. One can trade off additional time in the smoke for more evaporation. After about 4 hours, the meat isn't going to absorb much more flavor from the smoke, so that's a great time to wrap it.
In fact, at that point you may as well make your life easier by transferring the meat to an oven (ideally, a convection oven to avoid hot spots) and finishing it off. It may feel wrong, but in my experience the results are superb.
Re: Harvard engineering students devise BBQ smoker
#6I wonder if they used the "Texas Crutch," i.e., wrapped the brisket in foil after ~4 hours. The upshot of the Texas Crutch technique is: after about 2 hours on the smoke, the internal temperature of a brisket will plateau for 6-8 hours before climbing toward its final temperature. According to experiments by Greg Blonder[0], this stall is caused by evaporative cooling: once the internal temperature reaches a point wh…
As soon as the meat reaches ~130f, it's not going to absorb any more smoke.
Re: Harvard engineering students devise BBQ smoker
#7If you don't want to build your own, the green egg is a really solid ceramic smoker/oven. expensive but the results are consistently good.
Strangely the article doesn't mention it, even though there's one in the photo.
Re: Harvard engineering students devise BBQ smoker
#8I wonder if they used the "Texas Crutch," i.e., wrapped the brisket in foil after ~4 hours. The upshot of the Texas Crutch technique is: after about 2 hours on the smoke, the internal temperature of a brisket will plateau for 6-8 hours before climbing toward its final temperature. According to experiments by Greg Blonder[0], this stall is caused by evaporative cooling: once the internal temperature reaches a point wh…
As soon as the meat reaches ~130f, it's not going to absorb any more smoke.
Interesting. There seem to be conflicting opinions here. Referring again to Blonder[0], it seems that one can improve smoke absorption by mopping consistently. Personally, I'm usually pretty aggressive with the mopping, that is, every 45 minutes to 1 hour.
[0] http://www.genuineideas.com/ArticlesIndex/srasmokeringmoist....
Re: Harvard engineering students devise BBQ smoker
#9I wonder if they used the "Texas Crutch," i.e., wrapped the brisket in foil after ~4 hours. The upshot of the Texas Crutch technique is: after about 2 hours on the smoke, the internal temperature of a brisket will plateau for 6-8 hours before climbing toward its final temperature. According to experiments by Greg Blonder[0], this stall is caused by evaporative cooling: once the internal temperature reaches a point wh…
As soon as the meat reaches ~130f, it's not going to absorb any more smoke.
Could you explain why? Is it a property of the meat?
Re: Harvard engineering students devise BBQ smoker
#10I love kamados, but if one is really concerned with temperature control I don't see how one could beat a water bath for cooking with a separate smoking step.
Also, while interesting, that hyperboloid profile has significant disadvantages compared to the more traditional ovoid used by the BGE and clones: more difficult to manufacture, internal stresses, smaller cooking area, more weight, etc. Good engineering practice would need to account for those. I don't expect a news article to address any of this, but I would be interested to hear what was considered in class.