Pellet grills can come with all sorts of features, from electric starters to WiFi connectivity to a seamless switch from direct flame grilling to offset smoking. More basic are features like a grease management system, an ash collector, and a hopper that opens to release pellets. At first look, pellet grills are solid appliances that can weather the elements, but their construction can vary. Stainless steel holds up better over time than carbon steel and powdered steel as it resists corrosion. If you’re considering longevity, stainless steel is also the ideal material for grill parts, from grates to grease trays to fire burn pots.
Sometimes, I just want to grill some food quickly with the wood fire taste that’s unachievable with a gas grill. Sometimes, I want to slow-smoke food and control the level of smoke imbued without being tied to the pit for hours. I might (hypothetically, of course) want to give a frozen pizza a wood oven taste when making one from scratch isn’t an option. The two series within this collection provide long cooking times for true low-and-slow BBQ.
That’s the beauty of a smoked turkey, it’s a more casual approach to a bird that is often prepared for formal occasions. This smoked turkey recipe can be enjoyed any time of year; winter or summer, it’s a delicious and easy dish to prepare. While the Z Grills 700D ($500 at Home Depot) offers consistent heat, making it suitable for baking or smoking, its upper-temperature limit of 450°F doesn’t translate into a good sear.
Put a small sheet of foil above the heating element to make clean up easier as well. Use a small piece of foil to allow air to easily flow from the bottom of the smoker up and out of the top. Kamado grills, an oval-shaped Japanese style of charcoal grill defined by its heavy-duty ceramic body and deep base, aren’t as well-known pit boss pellets as their more traditional counterparts. In hindsight, we got a little too much charcoal burning before we started smoking, which generated more heat than we needed. We managed the heat better when smoking the brisket and were able to hold close to 225 for the five hours it took to smoke our smallish cut of meat.
It was a snap to clean and was one of the least expensive models we tested. While these smokers get low ratings I don’t entirely blame Pit Boss. There are inherent problems with electric smokers in general such as difficulty generating enough smoke at the right temperature, slow heat up times and difficulty maintaining temperatures in cold weather. Many of these problems will be become magnified when the smoker has an analog control system that must be manually adjusted to adapt to different weather conditions.
The combination of sweet and salty works so well with the smoky flavor created by the Pit Boss and the rub creates a nice crispy, caramelized skin that locks in the moisture of the turkey meat. This added butchering step really helps to provide you with the best holiday turkey results. By spatchcocking a turkey you can really shave down on the amount of time needed to cook it. By a rule of thumb, an oven-roasted turkey that was spatchcocked would take about ⅓ of the required time to cook. With a more level surface space, the breasts and the thighs can cook and finish at about the same time instead of one before the other.
Made with a striking copper color and hammertone finish, they have an automatic prime function that ignites pellets using a fan-forced draft and 300-watt igniter. You can also take advantage of their 10 temperature presets, start-up and cool-down cycles, and control knob with an external heat indicator on the front panel. Pit Boss Copperhead smokers are outfitted with four swivel caster wheels so you can move them around your outdoor area as needed.
We went with a smaller-sized 5-7kg young turkey, and the total smoking time was 2.5 hours. Sure, the quality could be a little better, but the structural strength of the smoker is more than adequate. While I didn’t have any way of testing this smoker with pit boss flat top external temperature probes, the smoker seemed to stay pretty close (within 20°ish F) from what I set it at. The latch in the back of the smoker at the bottom for draining the pellets could have been done much better, poor design and quality of that.
Of all the grills we tested, only the Yoder model yielded dark grill marks. The Yoder produced a good amount of smoke in all of our tests, though this almost understates its exceptional performance in our long smoke test. The smokiness it gave shoulder was just right, without any of the astringency that typically indicates over-smoking. The time it took the Yoder to reach temperature (less than 12 minutes) and recover heat outpaced most models reviewed here. Its circuit board design responds to abnormal circumstances, such as temperature drops from loading cold meat or opening the door frequently.