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Steak Grilling Question
Panthur:
Ok, so i grilled 2 rib steaks last night. Everything went great EXCEPT for some reason once I threw the steaks on the searing grate the amount of smoke pouring out of the grill was totally unreal. It poured out heavy smoke the entire time. So much smoke we had to close the windows on the patio doors on the deck. Could hardly even see the grill for smoke.Not sure why.....never seen that much smoke in my life before from a grill. There never was a fire or anything though, just severe smoke. The steaks did have a nice outer edge rim of fat and they were rubbed down with olive oil and spice ahead of time ( same as i have always done on the Weber gas grill ). Anyone ever have this happen before ? BTW, the steaks did turn out great though. ( I grilled them at 450 on the searing grate. )
SmokinKat:
Hey Panthur-- sorry I'm just seeing this about the heavy smoke!! It's not terribly common, but can happen when the firepot gets overloaded with pellets, and there is too much fuel and not enough oxygen to burn correctly.
We most often see this scenario when the grill doesn't have enough air flow for the pellets to burn properly, and the Pellet Boss recognizes the grill isn't at the temperature it's supposed to be, so it adds more fuel. But if the pellets aren't burning properly, the additional pellets will smother the fire further, resulting in the pellets smoldering and creating that billowing white smoke you saw. It sounds like yours corrected itself, but sometimes the white smoke will be followed by a rather loud BANG when the pellets ignite fully all at once.
We first recommend cleaning all of the vents (they can get clogged with smoke and gunk over time). Since your grill is pretty new, they might be fine, but it's worth checking out. The ones going into the warmer/smoker box are somewhat hidden behind the triangular grease shield on the right side, and are most often overlooked, so make sure to check those guys too.
Second-- do you foil your flame zone area? It's just fine to do that for easier clean up, but you want to make sure that the foil does not interfere at all with the air holes around the outside of the Flame Zone set up.
Here's a picture of a well-foiled pan-- you can see the outer perimeter is free of any foil, so the air can flow freely as it's supposed to. (The second picture is showing how to poke holes in the FZ pan to allow the direct heat when you want to sear stuff.)
Lastly, do you have a wind baffle on your grill that looks like this:
If so, we've been recommending that customers remove those unless they are in a REALLY high wind area where wind might be blowing directly into the grill. We've actually stopped sending them with the grills entirely now, since we've found the airflow is much improved (as well as the edge to edge temperature control) WITHOUT the baffle in place. There should be just a few nuts/screws to remove to take that off, and should help improve the airflow and temperatures overall.
Oh, and one other factor can be the pellets being used-- occasionally some foreign material can get into the batch and will bind up even the strongest auger. If the auger were to temporarily jam, that can also cause an over-fill of pellets. Also, if the pellets have absorbed ambient air moisture over time and aren't burning as hot as they should, the Pellet Boss will keep dumping pellets to try and get the grill up to temperature, and can potentially overfill the pot because the pellets aren't burning well.
I'd suggest checking the vents, take off the baffle, and make sure if you're using foil that it isn't blocking any vents in the Flame Zone pan. Let us know if you see the white smoke happen again, and we can do a little more troubleshooting, but those things should alleviate the issue!
-- Kat from MAK :)
(katrina@makgrills.com, 503-623-1234)
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