If summer is BBQ season, then definitely fall is the season for food smoking. The air is a lot cooler, and more importantly, the has less humidity (water) in the air (unless you live in Florida). This allows for surface of the protein to dry while it is being smoked. You will see a noticeable difference when smoking fish, sausages, jerky, whole turkeys, whole meat proteins for sandwich meats, corn beef, pastrami etc, etc.

TIPS:

Always allow what you are going to smoke to get up to room temperature before it goes in the smoker. This tip should be considered for year-round. The reason for this is so the protein can cook evenly. If protein is somewhere close to freezing in the center, like it just came out of the freezer. As the outside cooks and forms a crust “bark” it will insulate the center of the cut and the heat will no longer penetrate. This is commonly called the dreaded stall.

For cooking/smoking turkeys (one of my favorites) again, let it rest on the counter before cooking/smoking, try making your brine and find a fresh bird that is not all ready injected and brined with whatever that you don’t know. My go to brine is 11/2 cups table salt, 1 cup white sugar, 1 cup brown sugar and 1 can on condensed coconut milk. Heat up about 8 to 10 quarts of water, add the sugar and salt, stir until it all dissolved and remove for heat allowing it to chill. Coconut milk is full of potassium and that is a magical ingredient to enhance the turkey’s natural flavor. Put it into a blend with another quart or 2 of water and blend. Place the turkey in a brine bucket or large enough cooler, add the brine and coconut water to the bird, allow the bring to do its thing for a minimum of 1 but I try for 2 days. Drain, rinse, and pat dry. Add your favorite seasoning or rub at this point. I usually smoke/cook at 225 F until the bird gets to an internal temp of about 150/155 degrees F. 6 to 7 seven hours for a bird under 20 pounds. I brush butter and turkey dripping all over the bird regularly while cooking/smoking.

Smoking anything above 240 is rather useless, at that high a temperature the heat makes the air and smoke to rise way too fast to do any good.

Smoking is a low temperature slow process, lets keep it that way. Wade