British BBQ Society Forums

I cant seem to find anywhere that sells chunks of wood in bulk. Any ideas anyone?

Also I was reading some American pit masters use nothing but wood, what is people's views on this?


Ben

http://bbqsmokingwood.co.uk/
Paul Gouldon doubtless he can supply any quantity of wood you require. He is very well thought of on here.

Cheers Keith. I'll have a look later when I wake up.. home time for me now.

Backyardsmoker wrote:Also I was reading some American pit masters use nothing but wood, what is people's views on this?

I watched the first episode of that BBQ Pitmasters TV show on Netflix the other day and one guy put shed-loads of charcoal down and a few bottles of lighter fluid, turning everyone else's noses up ...but he ended up doing really well in the competition.

I suppose it's just whatever works for you and tastes nice. Sourcing a nice chunk of meat and all the preparation seemed to be far more important.

I'll ask about in the next few days. My father-in-law uses chunks for wood for something that is more of a heater than a BBQ. I doubt it's anything fancy though but he has loads of it.

Backyardsmoker wrote:Also I was reading some American pit masters use nothing but wood, what is people's views on this?

This will depend on the type of BBQ that they use. on the competition circuit in the US a lot of people use large offset trailer smokers like Jambo or Yoder smokers and these are stick burners, so they will mainly use wood (although a lot of them will use charcoal to start the fire). The way that these pits have been designed and built allows the fire to burn really clean and when you see these guys cooking they'll have very little smoke coming out which is why they don't over smoke the meat.

Although there are just as many teams out there cooking on other pits that use charcoal as their heat source and just add chuncks of wood for flavour.

I would really love to have an offset smoker and use only wood. when I started on the journey to build my own smoker, I was originally going to build a Big-Baby double barrel smoker, but after a while I realised it was going to be a challenge getting hold of enough wood to use it regularly. Just yesterday, I was thinking (more like dreaming) of having a piece of land big enough to grow my trees just to fuel an offset.

Lol kzn I have the same dreams. Next time we buy our kameeldoring and sekelbos I'll let you know.

4 of us bought a ton of wood a few weeks back.

PeanutZA wrote:Lol kzn I have the same dreams. Next time we buy our kameeldoring and sekelbos I'll let you know.

4 of us bought a ton of wood a few weeks back.

Do you buy it for fuel, flavour or does it serve both purposes?

Fuel mostly. African hardwoods burn for ages and create the perfect hot stamina coals you need for periods of serious grilling.

For South African's a braai is more of a social event than the actual cooking of food. These hardwoods allow us to congregate around a fire while it gets ready for cooking. The wood does impart a delicate and very enjoyable flavour into the food, but nothing near as powerful as American BBQ smoking.

Once the food is cooked more wood goes on the fire and the 'kuier' starts in earnest.

kwazulu wrote:I would really love to have an offset smoker and use only wood. when I started on the journey to build my own smoker, I was originally going to build a Big-Baby double barrel smoker, but after a while I realised it was going to be a challenge getting hold of enough wood to use it regularly. Just yesterday, I was thinking (more like dreaming) of having a piece of land big enough to grow my trees just to fuel an offset.

That's exactly the reason that when i was looking to buy a new comp' smoker i didn't go for a stick burner as although they look cool and cook very well, there isn't anyone who can sell the right wood to use it properly. I know someone who bought a Jambo and he has to use woods like ash and chestnut which wouldn't be my preferred woods.