British BBQ Society Forums

Interesting...I never had much luck with the paper technique, always produces a lot of smoke and struggles to light so I always use a 2"x 1" square of the cheapest white firelighters I can find. The kind you break off from the slab. The BigQ etc individual ice cube sized ones always seem to blow out in the wind.

Sainsburys own brand firelighters seems to be the most for your buck and ive never had a problem with them.

Im not a scientist/physicist but I cant see why a bit of rust would change the way the device works, surely its flame lights lowest center coals, heat rises and so heat from lowest coals lights coals sideways and above?

I did see an american program where the cook added a few drops of cooking oil to the paper before putting it underneath the starter. Think it was Alton Brown from Good Eats. Never tried it tho.

The thing for me prior to scrubbing the rust off was that the chimney starter was taking longer for the flames to get to the top. No idea why

Folks,
I still maintain it is an absence of witchcraft, voodoo perhaps, I shall dance around mine at the weekend with a shamanic rattle and see if that does the trick.......you fellows with your science and wire wool no good shall come of it say I.........

Cheers
Tiny

Tiny, I for one would find it useful if you could video this and post up a link

Cheers

Tiny I take it you are using either the James Fenimore Cooper or Edgar Rice Burroughs BBQ help guides rather than the J.M. Barrie one I prefer.

I used to use the oil papers I'd oil the grills with on the previous BBQs but until this weekend had no problems with the bag the charcoal came in. They burned well and for long enough until Sunday

RobinC wrote:Tiny, I for one would find it useful if you could video this and post up a link

Cheers

Me too

I think it's time to send an owl to HP.

The few drops of veggie oil on a piece of kitchen roll works really well, it has the added bonus of very little ash residue compared to the rolled up newspaper. I would use the oil every time if I could but the wife grumbles like anything when I reach for the bottle of oil and try to sneak outside

Agreed but it doesn't answer the initial question of why the recent lack of performance