Yoder Newbie
TLDR/BLUF: Finally made the decision to upgrade to a Yoder 640, from a 22’ WSM that I bought slightly used about 9 years ago. Picked it up this past Saturday, break in smoke Saturday night and put it to work Sunday in preparation for a 30 person dinner Monday evening. I’d consider myself an intermediate backyard smoker, but knew I was taking a lot of risks for such a big ‘event’. Smoked 2 briskets (20 & 16 lbs), and four chickens. Extremely happy with my purchase and lots of compliments in the end!
Some takeaways for me: didn’t plan to smoke 2 different size briskets, but I doubted if the 20 pounder would have enough, and picked up the 16 pounder. Risk #1, challenge accepted. Opted to start the 20 pounder first and the 16 90 minutes later, hoping to have them finish relatively close to the same time. Didn’t happen. Big one finished about 2 1/2 hours before the smaller one. Don’t know if placement mattered, but the 20 pounder was too big for the upper shelf. BTW, the 20 pounder would’ve been enough as we have lots leftover.
Risk #2 was cooking fat side down for the first time, as the interwebs and Reddit seemed to prefer it when smoking on a pellet smoker. Didn’t notice much difference from previous smokes but I’ll try fat side up next to compare.
Risk #3 was trying the foil boat method for the first time on the 20 pounder. I think it helped keep a better bark, but it seemed to soften quit a bit when wrapped in foil for holding.
Risk #4 was deciding last minute to not fire up WSM for the chickens, as the briskets finished sooner than I planned for. Didn’t know if this would be too much for the Yoder in terms of grease build up and spill over, without cleaning up after the briskets. No problems at all.
Other random stuff. Experimented with Chat GPT for timeline generation, which was helpful. Still ended up serving about 25-30 minutes late just because. Used ceramic chicken holders instead of the standard typical aluminum can holders. Worked really well.
Again, love the Yoder, looking forward to many good smokes. Feel free to throw spears, offer ideas or what you would’ve done digging this case.