Brinkmann Electric Smoke N Grill Recipes
Smoking turkey on a Brinkmann water smoker may not be your thing but for millions of people it is. And probable half of those million have problems maintaining a proper fire and turning out a good piece of meat on that 39 dollar hunk of metal. I have recieved email after email that could be correctly labeled cries for help and folks. I have heard your cries and am going to try and help you a bit here. As many of you know. I am more of a story teller so let me tell you what I did and perhaps you will learn something about smoking a turkey on the Brinkmann water smoker or the ECB (el cheapo Brinkmann) as some endearingly refer to it. I own a couple of old rusty Brinkmann water smokers but they do not get used much.
They are some of the ones I started on years ago and have long since been abandoned for more shiny and expensive units that seem to work a lot better and have a temperature guage with actual readings instead of the 'warm, ideal, hot' readings so prominently displayed on the lid of the Brinkmann water smoker. The Challenge This past weekend we drove to Austin, TX to visit some relatives and I was asked to smoke a turkey. However, the only smoker available was a repainted Brinkmann water smoker. I have always felt like I could smoke anything in any type of unit and make it turn out really good but after being used to a really nice unit you get a little 'rusty' kinda like my old units out behind the house. I figured what the hey. I will just have to make it work so I got my 10 pound bag of 100 percent hardwood lump charcoal, my, some mesquite chunks, some apricot chunks, some Bartlett pear chunks, some newspaper, a lighter, my digital probe meat thermometers and my cooking gloves and went to work.
Find and save ideas about Brinkmann gourmet electric smoker on Pinterest. See more ideas about Electric smoker grill, Electric smoker recipes and Smokers. Cooking manuals and free pdf instructions. Find the outdoor cooking product manual you need at ManualsOnline. I highly recommend a digital probe meat thermometer to monitor the temperature of the meat while it smokes. These thermometers have a probe(s) that stays in the meat while it smokes. The probe is attached to a braided metal wire that runs through the door or an opening to the unit outside of the smoker.
Aquiring the Turkey I could not find a 'minimally processed' turkey so I was forced to purchase a turkey that was already 7% full of some broth/saltwater solution. Normally I would brine a turkey that was labeled 'MINIMALLY PROCESSED' but I would not do that with this one as it was missing the label and for me that is not ideal. Getting the Coals Ready I stuffed the bottom of the with 2 pieces of old newspaper and then poured it full of lump charcoal. I lit the paper and after about 10 minutes it was ready to pour into my charcoal pan. I felt like it needed another chimney full so I did another batch and poured it in. Leaked M0d Auto Spreader Tool there.
I then placed the water pan in its position just above the charcoal pan and filled it about a quarter full of water. Turkey Takes Center Stage At 9:30 am I placed the grate in its position on the top of the smoker body, set the salt and peppered turkey on the grate breast side up and covered it with the lid.
The 2 chimneys of lump charcoal were giving my temperatures of 245 degrees so I opened the door to let some heat escape. Make a note of this. I did no modifications to the smoker at all other than to place some chicken wire on the bottom of the charcoal pan so the ashes could fall down without smothering the coals.
On a Brinkmann water smoker that has had no mods done to it. The effect is different than on normal smokers.
Because the charcoal pan is several inches below the door, opening the door allows heat to escape and therefore cools down the fire. To heat things up a bit you need to close the door some or even all the way to all all of your heat to travel up to the grate area without escaping out of the doorway. The charcoal pan is about an inch and a half less in diameter than the smoker body and therefore creates a 3/4 inch gap all around the charcoal pan that allows for more than enough airflow. On the same token, the lid on the brinkmann does not fit tightly. There are gaps that allow for more than enough updraft to allow the smoke to escape.