New Smoke Frieeends!

[D'sSmokinBarrels]

Hi all,

Ive been on this forum quite a bit and used a lot of advice from it, but for some reason only now have I decided to join. I think its a great site and its been really helpful to get advice from a UK point of view, the guys in the US seem to have it so easy and all on their doorsteps!

A friend and I began smoking last year after visiting Grillstock in Manchester, the festival was slightly disappointing if I'm honest (food wise), but we watched a few demonstrations from the Weber guys on a Smokey Mountain and it got us very interested and excited.

I have dabbled with smoked BBQ food before when I lived in Canada (this was also when my love affair with Franks Hot Sauce started 'I literally put that stuff on everything') and was lucky enough to become a judge in the Canadian BBQ Championships held at Dustys Bar & BBQ in Whistler in 2009 (it was a stroke of luck I got drafted in but thats a whole other story).

Since then we've been smoking as much as possible and absolutely love it. We started on a bog standard large charcoal BBQ using the indirect methods and snaking coals but since then I've taken on a little restoration project on a Braunfels Black Diamond Smoker (Offset smoker) I picked up off Ebay and I've having so much fun in the process, even thinking about the next smoke makes me tingle with excitement!

Anyhow, thanks again for all the really good advice I've got from the masses and years of experience on this site. And if theres one big thing I've learnt...the internet is gold for learning new things!

Before the restoration: https://imageshack.com/i/n1nh3fj
After the restoration: https://imageshack.com/i/n6uy7u2j

(I've added all the mods you can think to inside the chamber also)

[BBQFanatic]

That rocks. Can you send some pics of the inside? How well does she hold heat and how often do you need to top up the firebox??
Sent from my Lumia 820 - WP8.1 device

[JEC]

Hello, impressive rebuild and journey there, look forward to hearing the story of falling in to judging some day.

I love Franks hot sauce too, although I picked up some of this Sriracha, Hot Chili Sauce when I was in the US, it's becoming a bit of a sensation over there

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B0002PSOJW?pc_redir=1405012771&robot_redir=1

Lots of story's about the factory gassing everyone in the local neighbourhood too which adds to status too

[D'sSmokinBarrels]

Hi Both,

Thanks for the warm welcome. Ive added some pics of some of the process of renovation, Ive realised that I haven't got any photos of the chamber mods, but its just the basics, baffle, lowering the chimney stack and I made an aluminium convection plate, couldn't afford a steel one just yet. I still need to make a fuel basket but it seems to be working out alright at the moment without one.

https://imageshack.com/a/fnAz/1

JEC i'll have to try the Sriracha sauce it sounds awesome!

BBQFanatic, she holds heat really well to be honest, now I've sealed her up. The last cook I did, I smoked some ribs using the 3-2-1 method and I went through 3/4 of a small bag of Aussie Heatbeads and some Oak and Hickory so not really bad but not as good as other styles of smoker I would imagine.

One of my friends bought a suckling pig last week so I'm now trying to work out the best ways of smoking it at the moment, really dont want to ruin it!

[derekmiller]

Don't smoke a suckling pig, you will spoil the delicate flavour. Salt and pepper rub and BBQ gently

[D'sSmokinBarrels]

Hi Derek,

Thanks for the input. Yeah it has been niggling at me as to wether to smoke it or not, my friends so excited about it, but I'm rather dubious and not sure if I should hire or buy a basic rotary spit for it and build a little temporary fire-pit instead. I'm going to trawl through the site now for other opinions on the subject, I would be devastated if he wasn't pleased with the outcome.