Old Country BBQ Pits PECOS | The Second Cook

[Music] so [Music] all right today i'm going to show you my second cook on the old country barbecue fits pecos and give you an update on a few things [Music] now my last video i showed that i put a level lock gasket on the underside of the cook chamber door but was still having some leakage from gaps inside the cooker for those who are not aware the pecos unlike the brazos i believe is built with strips or slats of metal inside the cook chamber to keep the door from falling through the problem here is that one they only spot weld these pieces in two if they are bent and the welds are sloppy which in my case i got both you are left with gaps sometimes big gaps where the heat and smoke can easily escape even with the door closed and a gasket installed now the smaller leaks can be sealed up with some food safe sealant like this rtv 450 but not on the larger ones as i found out so what i decided to do was scrape off the existing sealant clean it well with some dish soap and alcohol cut some fire black gasket in half and run a strip of it down the entire gap these gaps and imperfections are definitely something else you want to look for if you haven't yet purchased one of these cookers i also showed in my last video that the three-inch telltrue analog thermometer i bought could not fit in the pre-drilled hole so for kicks i picked up an old country barbecue pits thermometer because it has to fit right i mean it's made for the cooker no it doesn't so whichever you buy you'll need to get a 7 8 drill bit and the mounting kit if you go with a teletroop which is what i'm using temporarily to make it work until i get the drill bit of course great level installation is best but this one for me is just for reference oh and lastly i decided to replace the factory fire grate with this cast iron grate which i got from trotter supply for just 25 bucks it certainly will help the fire breathe better retain hot coals and allow ash to fall below it also will outlast this cooker to start today's cook i'm using some bnb lump charcoal a chimney full of it and a single split to get a nice coal bed going for fuel again i'm using some bnb cherry splits which are a bit big so they need to be broken down [Music] supposedly these b and b splits are kiln dried and some folks tell me that means it's less smoke flavor i don't really care though they like quick they burn pretty clean and i for one think meat should be kissed with smoke not smothered in it anybody can do that before i get to the cook i wanted to run a test with probes on either side of the cook chamber to see how different the temps were at great level as you can see while the pit came up a temp these temperatures were different by about 20 degrees right to left with the hot side being at the firebox which makes sense i know this can vary but it's not that bad not bad at all now on the recommendation of some viewers and other users of this cooker i'm going to drop in the old fire grate and use it as a tuning plate i'm not sure which way you're supposed to put it in here but it seems to me it fits best upside down all right so surprisingly using the old grate as a tuning plate has increased the difference by about 50 degrees right to left with the hot side now being at the stack crazy some folks told me that you need to adjust the old grate a bit until you find the sweet spot i don't know though i think i can happily live with a 20 degree difference for this cook i just decided to leave it in place speaking of cook i decided to do something simple today double smoke a ham all this really means is reheating a pre-cooked ham to 140 degrees in a smoked environment to add a bit more smoke and some color pretty easy as for flower management well today i'm working on just lowering the swings in temperature i think this was my big problem during the last cut the swings had to be greater than i thought which meant the actual average temperature was much lower than i'd aim for this would explain why it took so long now every cooker has swings even charcoal smokers and pellet grills believe it or not but in offsets they are greater today i'm just trying to slightly overshoot my desired temp and catch it as it descends to keep those swings small as possible so the average tent will be where i want it and this is a good cook to experiment on because all i'm doing is reheating the ham a precise pit tip is not required and even though at times i closed the door on the firebox when temps got a little too high for my liking i'm definitely getting that running an offset especially this size is all about the size of your fire not the amount of oxygen you restrict it like you would in a charcoal smoker in the end the ham turned out great nice color too and i must say i think i'm getting the hang of this thing but before i get to that brisket i do have one more test to run you all stay tuned thanks for watching man that video is awesome you should like it you know what there's another video right here you can click on to watch that one too don't forget to subscribe you

Channel: RaleighSmoke

Views: 33,119

Keywords: old country bbq pits, pecos, brazos, old country, bbq, barbecue, bbq pit, smoker, smoking, meat, grilling, aaron franklin, cook, ham, smoked ham, double smoked ham, charcoal, wood cooking, cooking with wood, smoked, cooker, offset, stick burner, texas bbq

Id: 2M7CjGi_w2E

Length: 5min 39sec (339 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 04 2021