Time to get serious about a new smoker.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Think of it as returning the favor.

I'm not following your last sentence. Seems like a straw man. P

It does indeed seem like a straw man - of your making. I am trying to understand the logic of your new "pellet grills are OK - just not Traegers when it comes to flavor" double-down. Help me understand.

Traegers are built for the mass market. They use thinner metal and less insulation to keep the cost down. There are lots of pellet grills out there with stainless steel, thicker metal, more insulation, bigger hoppers, higher top-end on the temps, etc. and they are wonderful. But I have never heard of anyone making the argument that there is a flavor difference between pellet grills.

[Green Monstah]

We aren't on the same page. I think your rush to defend (or offend) caused you to misunderstand. I don't have anything against any pellet cooker. This whole thing started because I made a harmless crack about augers and boards. I think my BBQ is better than the food I've eaten from a Traeger, but that could be many things. I mentioned my own bias, but it could also be that the person cooking didn't do it well.

Shoot, I said if I could turn back time, I'd probably get a Traeger.

My issue is with your statement that there's no difference in food from your two smokers. Its sort of like saying there's no difference between salt lick and franklins. Two very different t methods. Both delicious, but definitively distinct.

[Jeff Lebowski]

We aren't on the same page. I think your rush to defend (or offend) caused you to misunderstand. I don't have anything against any pellet cooker. This whole thing started because I made a harmless crack about augers and boards. I think my BBQ is better than the food I've eaten from a Traeger, but that could be many things. I mentioned my own bias, but it could also be that the person cooking didn't do it well.

Shoot, I said if I could turn back time, I'd probably get a Traeger.

My issue is with your statement that there's no difference in food from your two smokers. Its sort of like saying there's no difference between salt lick and franklins. Two very different t methods. Both delicious, but definitively distinct.

Moving the goalposts yet again.

You are the king.

[Green Monstah]

Moving the goalposts yet again.

You are the king.

Still #1.

Scroll up and re-read, amigo.

You've actually exhausted my willingness to argue an obscure point. Congrats.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Still #1.

Scroll up and re-read, amigo.

You've actually exhausted my willingness to argue an obscure point. Congrats.

Unlike you, I own both types of smokers and use them both regularly.

Differences in flavor come from what type of wood you are using and how much smoke you are laying down. If I want more intense smoke flavor (with either smoker), I simply wait longer before foiling. Of course, you have to be careful, because with either smoker it is easy to get too much smoke. In both cases, I typically foil after about 4 hours with butts and brisket. Sooner with ribs.

[All-American]

Question particularly for you Traeger owners. How comfortable do you feel leaving the house while something is cooking? I wouldn't hesitate to leave the oven in the kitchen on if I were making something that took several hours and had a quick errand to run. Do you feel the same way about your Traeger, or would you be nervous leaving it running if nobody was there to keep an eye on it?

[Pelado]

Question particularly for you Traeger owners. How comfortable do you feel leaving the house while something is cooking? I wouldn't hesitate to leave the oven in the kitchen on if I were making something that took several hours and had a quick errand to run. Do you feel the same way about your Traeger, or would you be nervous leaving it running if nobody was there to keep an eye on it?

As long as the hopper is sufficiently filled, just fine.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Question particularly for you Traeger owners. How comfortable do you feel leaving the house while something is cooking? I wouldn't hesitate to leave the oven in the kitchen on if I were making something that took several hours and had a quick errand to run. Do you feel the same way about your Traeger, or would you be nervous leaving it running if nobody was there to keep an eye on it?

No problem at all.

[All-American]

Results from the first cook:

[Donuthole]

Results from the first cook:

Good thing Costco has a great return policy!

[Surfah]

I've never baked in my smoker.

[All-American]

I can't tell you how disappointed I am right now.

So I turn the grill on and set it to smoke. It's not a minute or two before the smoke really starts going. I set it to high and shut the door while I prep the chicken and some potatoes for sides. By the time I'm done with the rub, I can see that the volume of smoke has gone down substantially-- a good sign, I think, given what I learned the last time about higher temperatures and lower smoke. I put the chicken on the grill, close the door again-- and notice the digital thermometer display is blank. I tinkered around a it to see if I could get it to come to life before I called customer service.

Fifteen to twenty minutes later, I had a guy on the line who told me to start unscrewing the grill off the bottom of the hopper. Once I moved enough things around, I needed to snip some of the plastic cable ties to loosen up some of the cords beneath it. That takes quite a bit of time, though-- the grate doesn't come all the way off, so you're having to wiggle around quite a bit just to get your tools close enough to make the cuts. Once that's done, I undo three of the connections-- a purple wire, a red wire, and an orange wire. Then I replace a fuse in the fuse box, plug it the orange wire, and flip the on switch. The screen lights up-- so we're on the right track. Then I put in the red wire-- still going strong. In fact, at this point, the unit starts smoking again, even before I connect the purple wire. The guy on the phone then gives me the diagnosis: a faulty heating element (fed by the purple wire) had likely blown the fuse. The good news is that the grill still works, so long as I manually start the fire, until the warrantied replacement part arrives in the mail in the next few days. Lovely, right?

But then I go to put the panel back in its place, a spark flies and the machine goes dead again. Another fuse, I think. By now it's clear the chicken isn't happening, so we yank it out of the smoker and put it in the oven instead. But by the time we got to way past dinner time, the interior temperature couldn't get past 120. Given that it spent almost an hour in the lukewarm oven while I was on the phone with the helpline, we take this as a sign that we shouldn't eat the darn things anyway and trash them. Hence, Culver's butter burger.

One home depot run later, I have a replacement 5 amp fuse to go in the place of the second fuse. Only this time, replacing the fuse has no effect at all. What I had hoped was just a burnt fuse appears to have been quite a bit more significant-- I suspect I managed to fry the circuit board altogether.

And the sink in which I thawed and rinsed the chicken? Turns out it grew a new leak. So we now have chicken water all over the kitchen floor. Not Traeger's fault, but it doesn't really help my mood much.

[Jeff Lebowski]

lol.

Sorry, that's so bad it's kind of funny.

Did you not crank it up during the seasoning phase?

[All-American]

lol.

Sorry, that's so bad it's kind of funny.

Did you not crank it up during the seasoning phase?

I sure did. It even went past 450 at a few points. Couldn't have worked better.

[smokymountainrain]

Sitting on the edge of my bed reading that and chuckling to myself. Like JL said, so bad it is indeed funny.

Best of luck with all that, AA.