PK100 Smokehouse
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So bring this back up with a few more questions. I’m planning on doing 10lbs of the Walton’s “beer brats” flavored Smoked Sausage sometime in the coming weeks for an Oktoberfest party I’m having at my house. Was going to do these brats, some fresh made soft pretzels, beer cheese in on of those nacho cheese warmer things, and have a few Oktoberfest style homebrews on tap.
I’ve made one batch so far of the Blue Ribbon sausage on the MES40 and wasn’t super happy with the turnout. They were too dry and I think that’s because I didn’t know about keeping humidity at the time.
This batch I plan on using the 32mm clear collagen casings instead of the tubed hog casings for ease of use. I’m just going to twist them to the size I want using a ruler on the table, then cut them into individual sausages and lay them on the racks of the PK100. I’m going to use the water bowl method with sponges/cloth that Jon showed in his video to get the humidity up. For some reason, the extra bowl I bought from Walton’s for the PK100 looks way smaller than the bowl Jon used in the video. Did they change the bowl size?
So two questions,
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Do I have to change the racks around throughout the cook to have them cook evenly, top to bottom?
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What do you guys think about this thing for helping keep even temps?
https://www.auberins.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=14_29&products_id=850
armyguy When you cooked the Blue Ribbon Brats in the smoker did you add a cure and binder or just made them as a Fresh sausage? If you made them Fresh and then smoked them I’d imagine the reason they were dry was probably more because the fat rendered out instead of low humidity but I’m not certain of that. I have the Masterbuilt 30 and that thing is awesome, never more than a 2-4 degree difference from top to bottom. I do need to cut some sticks to hang sausage from as I usually just lay everything on the racks (that has worked great so far) but I want to see if there’s a noticeable difference in cooking time. I doubt it but I know appearance wise there will be as there won’t be the rack marks.
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armyguy When you cooked the Blue Ribbon Brats in the smoker did you add a cure and binder or just made them as a Fresh sausage? If you made them Fresh and then smoked them I’d imagine the reason they were dry was probably more because the fat rendered out instead of low humidity but I’m not certain of that. I have the Masterbuilt 30 and that thing is awesome, never more than a 2-4 degree difference from top to bottom. I do need to cut some sticks to hang sausage from as I usually just lay everything on the racks (that has worked great so far) but I want to see if there’s a noticeable difference in cooking time. I doubt it but I know appearance wise there will be as there won’t be the rack marks.
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On another note, going to throw a fresh rack of St. Louis on it today. Do you guys use a water pan when doing ribs?
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I think if you used small dowels to hang them - Like 1/2 inch. I think you could fit them hanging. Sorry, I do not have a pic, and usually do 12.5 pound batches in my PK100
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MCURRAN Yeah, it depends a little on the size of your casings and how close you can pack them in there but a 25 lb batch should be doable with minimal fuss. I know I have done them with 21mm and I am almost positive I have done them with 19mm as well.
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MCURRAN Yeah, it depends a little on the size of your casings and how close you can pack them in there but a 25 lb batch should be doable with minimal fuss. I know I have done them with 21mm and I am almost positive I have done them with 19mm as well.
Jonathon Thanks for the reply! I’m thinking this is going to replace my bandera offset that I’ve been using. Managing the temperate vertically in that unit is tough. In my last batch, I had 15 degree differences from the top of the stick to the bottom. They turned out okay, some really good, but some overcooked. I like the smoke flavor from the offset, but I’ll sacrifice that for a more uniform product out of the PK100.
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MCURRAN I can’t guarantee this but I’d be pretty shocked if you weren’t happy with the smoke flavor from the PK100
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