Old timers advice on wood chunks still sticks with me

I was at a competition in Kansas City two years ago, just watching the pros. This one guy, maybe 70 years old, saw me staring at his smoker setup. He walked over and told me to stop using those big chunks of hickory, said to break them into thumb-sized pieces instead. I tried it on my next pork shoulder and the smoke flavor came out way cleaner, no bitter taste. Has anyone else gotten a simple tip like that from someone at a comp that totally changed their cook?

2 comments

2 Comments

clairebaker22d ago

That thing about thumb sized pieces" works but he wasn't totally right about the reason. Big chunks don't cause bitter smoke. The bitter taste comes from dirty smoke, which happens when the wood smolders instead of burning clean. I've run big chunks for years and never had bitterness when I let the fire breathe right. The real tip is keeping your fire hot enough to get thin blue smoke instead of that thick white stuff. His advice about breaking them down probably helped you because the smaller pieces fit better and burn more even, not because big chunks are bad. I've seen guys win with whole logs split in half, so size isn't the enemy, bad airflow is.

riley_bell22d ago

Man, reminds me of when I tried cooking with green wood once. Never again.