I Got A Pit Boss Pellet Smoker

I have always loved smoking meats, brisket, pork butt, ribs, chicken and sausage. I have also been very hard headed about how you cook these meats. I've been a purist, you had to do it on a stick burner (wood offset smoker).

Pit Boss 1100

Sportsman

But that has now changed. My wife has asked me several times to cook some BBQ during the summer. I’ve always said no, because it’s just too damn hot here in Houston. I will cook in the winter but it’s typically chicken, ribs and sausage, because the time it takes to cook a brisket or a large pork butt was too long, and I didn’t want to be up all night managing a fire.

Enter the Pit Boss. AKA the Backyard Crockpot. This is not a knock on this pit, I love a crockpot in the kitchen and now I have one in the backyard. What do we love about the crockpot - you set it and forget it!

Brisket for 18 HRS

Recently my wife asked for a birthday dinner of brisket and pork butt, and she wanted me to cook it not order it. Again, I complained that it is August here in Houston and 100* plus. She said she had the solution, a pellet smoker. While I was out of town for work, her and my son got me the Pit Boss 1100 Sportsman. When I got home it was in the garage and ready to be built.

Pork Butt

Pulled Pork

I’ve now done three cooks on the Pit Boss. The first was to break it in, I did some chicken qtrs and baby back ribs. The food turned out great, and I was impressed. The only thing that lacked for me was the amount of smoke flavor, it wasn’t as intense as I would like. The second cook was the birthday dinner for my wife, a 13 lb brisket and a 9 lb pork butt. This was that overnight cook, the “set it and forget it”, and that’s exactly what I did. I was very happy with this cook as well. We had the smoke ring that I want, the meats were tender but we still lacked to intensity of the smoke flavor. Cooking this overnight, setting the temp, loading the pellets, HELL YEAH, I’m sold. You the saying work smarter, not harder and this Pit Boss gets it done. My third cook was a 6.5 lb bone in turkey breasts. Again the Pit Boss did everything very well, except the smoke flavor.

So I absolutely love the Pit Boss smoker, it does for me the things I don’t want to do on a stick burner which is stay outside all day or stay up all night.

Now I need to learn how to intensify the smoke flavor. I’ve already done some research and have found a few options and adjustments to my cooking technique. I will post again and let you know if I’m able to get the flavor I’m looking for and how I’m doing it.