Smokin Wedgie - Stainless Steel - BBQ Pellet Smoker Box

I recently bought a Smokin Wedgies and a bag of wood pellets to try my hand at smoking meats, etc. Some of the Amazon reviewers have said the cost of the pellets be high (especially in hopper fed grills) but I think I have come up with a way to use get a lot of smoke for your buck. The Wedgie sellers say that a full Wedgie (1 pound of pellets) will provide 2 hours of intense smoke. The pellets I bought were $36 for a 40 pound bag of mixed hickory and fruit woods, 90 cents per pound or filled Wedgie.Unless I am cooking ribs, a whole chicken or brisket, etc. (long cook items) I need to cold smoke quicker cooking items like burgers, steaks, fish and sausages in order for them to be exposed to the smoke for long enough without being overcooked. After a lot of thought I came up with using the terrific little Weber Smokey Joe portable charcoal kettle (which I happened to have among our camping gear) for cold smoking the food before transferring it for cooking it on the gas grill. My healthier wife is a longtime vegan so I am usually barbecuing for one. The little Smokey Joe seemed perfect for the job and it also provides great control over the air inflow and outflow. And it provides an easy way to smother the remaining smoldering pellets for another smoke. I found a disposable 12 inch aluminum pie plate in my kitchen and attached a makeshift knob to the center of it so that I can easily install it as a lid over the Wedgie in the bottom of the Smokey Joe to kill the fire at the end of smoking. It also fits snuggly against the sides of the round charcoal kettle. It worked perfectly and, I suspect, more efficiently than simply closing the vents on the Smokey Joe (less oxygen to be used up).I started my first attempt at cold smoking with the Smokin Wedgie filled only about 3/4 full (for some reason). I smoked 1/4 pound homemade burger patties right out of the freezer (letting them thaw while smoking), with baked beans and buttered, seasoned raw onions for 1 3/4 hours and then smothered the fire with the pie plate lid. The next morning I checked it and found it had, no doubt, smothered quickly. I had burned less than 1/3 of the pellets in the Wedgie. AND I OVER-SMOKED the food (particularly, the beans were a little too strongly smoked)! I think I could get away with using pennies worth of pellets for a cold smoke like this one.FYI— The Smokin Wedgies was installed in the very bottom of the charcoal kettle, under the grill but off center. The weather was hot, in the 90‘s. Next time for this meal I would smoke the beans no more than 30 minutes and the frozen burgers about an hour so they would have time thaw while smoking. For unfrozen burgers and sausages, maybe 30-40 minutes max. At one point I aimed my infrared thermometer at several spots on the grill and it read a little over 100° on the average. However one edge of one of the burgers which sat directly over the smoldering zone was very slightly cooked (part of the onion bowl was too warm to hold a finger on). For a long cook like ribs in a cool zone of a gas grill I could use the Wedgie directly on the gas grill for a long time. ALSO, I reeked of smoke afterward and into the evening. I recommend changing into some kind of a “smoking outfit” before lighting the pellets (at least the shirt anyway). I got blasted with smoke whenever I lifted the Smokey Joe lid. Perhaps turning on a small fan before lifting the lid would direct the smoke away from me. I suspect that the smoke inside the tight little Smokey Joe may be more intense that a larger, more ventilated chamber of a full size grill, perhaps shortening the smoking process in the Smokey Joe.2ND ATTEMPT—I cold smoked a 1 inch thick top sirloin steak (seasoned with salt and pepper) fresh from the butcher, for 40 minutes using the same batch of leftover pellets from the previous smoke, ash included. Today I checked the Wedgie and found about half of the original load of pellets remaining unburned, after two uses! I love that kind of efficiency! I could get 2 or 3 more cold smokes out of this 70 cent load of pellets. The steak was well smoked and still quite raw (warmed to only 85° during this smoke). I let it sit on the counter for 30 minutes until I was ready to sous vide it in a water bath at 122° for 45 minutes. The 2 hours or so that the beef was unrefrigerated, in the temperature danger zone (between 40° and 140°), is not long enough for spoilage. I believe the criterion for crock pots coming up to temperature is 4 hours max in that zone. Besides, the smoke probably provided a further layer of protection from spoilage. Anyway, I put the steak in the sous vide bag with 1.5 tablespoons butter and 2 teaspoons Frank’s RedHot original sauce. Then I grilled it at very high heat for 8 minutes, turning for crosshatched grill marks every 2 minutes. It was perfectly rare with lovely dark grill marks!Before investing a thousand bucks into a hopper style pellet grill plus accessories and lots of pellets, not to mention the necessity for continuous electrical power), it may be worth it to first invest 85 bucks or so in something like this to see how you like it. If you are a fan of smoked foods and efficiency, I think this may be all you need, more than you need really. But if not, you can always use the Smokin Wedgies as well as the pellets with your new $800 pellet grill. You may have to eat the $30 Smokey Joe or store it with the camping gear. And then again, if cooking for a family larger than one, you may need a bigger charcoal kettle and pie plate.

I would give this 5 stars but there is a learning curve to this thing and hear me out. If not properly used you will have terrible smoke or flame ups or both.1. When packing the wedgie fill it evenly to the top do not over fill it. I use Lumber Jack pellets and they burn very well in this unit. Make sure your lid is sitting flat.2. When lighting there's no need to light it from both ends in fact I have good smoke production for 4+ hours lighting a single end.3. the holes meant to start it give you a good idea where to start but if you are just pointing your torch at that hole you're going to be disappointed. you need to start a good corner on FIRE and let it BURN for a good 45sec - 1min before you extinguish it. I use the little tumbleweeds and just set the corner of my wedgie on it and let it go while i start the grill.4. Keep it away from direct air flow on pellet grills and away from the walls. So take care of where you are placing this that your drip pan or something is protecting the bottom from too much air, this will cause a flame up (think of how your fire pot starts, heat + air) and i like to center it on the bottom rack on the side furthest from my stack and use my top 2 shelves for smoking, bottom in a pinch.5. KEEP IT AWAY FROM YOUR FOOD. the box it self gets VERY HOT from burning pellets inside. i loaned this to someone to test and he literally burned one end of a rack of ribs because he had this thing directly under that sideOtherwise this is a very good unit. This last time around I ran it while I smoked a brisket at 180 for 8 hours over night. I don't know when the box finally ran out but it was too hot to touch when I refilled it in the morning. I set the smoker back up at 275 to finish it off and the box was producing good smoke the entire time even after I wrapped it and well after it was done (4-5 hours). I purposely left it in to see how much longer after I wrapped it would go, I stopped caring "long enuff"...