Smoke and Awe

If you have an oven broiler pan, I would suggest cooking it in the bottom of that and let the brisket's natural juices help tenderize it (or add some flavoring liquid from the start to help keep it moist). If it were me, I would cook with fat side down to render and flavor the juices, but that's not the generally accepted way. The pan is shallow enough that you will still get plenty of smoke. After 10 hours, cover with foil to finish.

Maybe worth a try to put in brining bag and then freezer if you're not planning to cook right away. Nice to know because sometimes I find good deals but have to put in freezer for later.

Our Home Depot has pecan chunks, so if yours doesn't, it will soon. I do like working with the pecan, new one for me.

Please share your horseradish chimichurri. I roasted tri tip yesterday on my Vision Grill and also chimichurri, but at dinner tonight my husband said, "Needs some horseradish." Your sauce looks nice and creamy.

Copying the recipe and I do have a question: Did you brush with olive oil before or after baking?

Yesss! Love this recipe. I've made no-knead bread quite a few times, but I like your instructions so I'll mix some up tonight.

Wow! Love the pictures, they are truly inspiring. I made a honey wheat loaf yesterday in my VG that had a smoky flavor from the lump charcoal and it surprised me. I was most interested in getting it baked without burning the bottom...I was successful in the baking, so will have to do this again soon.

I hesitate to jump in to this discussion as I'm a "girl", but here are my thoughts: Most of the flavoring from smoke comes in the first couple hours or so anyway, and if you go beyond that, it can be too strong. Besides, kamado grills are using lump charcoal which has a better flavoring all its own. I would certainly say not to use wet smoking material as it would take a higher heat to keep it smoking, wouldn't it? For me personally, I always cook in a shallow pan, which also allows me to keep the temp. a bit higher than if the meat was directly on the grate, so that helps with the smoke flavoring also. Plus I have the benefit of natural juices flavoring the meat as well, and even tenderizing it. The shallow pan allows for plenty of surface area to get the bark and smoke.

Yes, this is the next experimental cook in my VG, but I plan to set mine in a shallow pan so I don't lose all the good juices for basting. I hadn't thought of rolling like this, so I'll try your method.

I like to roast a chicken right in the drip pan with veggies, if desired, breast side down and aromatics in the cavity. Be sure to brine first, of course. If you use a fairly shallow and wide pan (I use a paella pan, carbon steel with metal handles), your chicken will get plenty of smoke, and if you want the breast browned, flip over about 15 minutes before removing from the roaster. You will want to use a heat deflector (for my small Vision Pro MSeries I use an inverted clay dish on the main grill) and a pizza stone on top of that, but I usually roast at 350 degrees. I'd post a picture, or you can visit Vision Grills Facebook pages for some of the chicken pictures there.

This string of comments answers several of my questions, one being how long to leave in the electric starter, and especially, about having the dome OPEN during start up. I think, though, that one wouldn't want to have the kamado come to temp. too quickly or it cannot absorb the heat and stabilize. So allowing it to come to temp. with the dome closed would be best, right? I think I understood that the dome is open only until the charcoal begins to smoke.