What am I doing wrong with my charcoal?

I've been using real hardwood lump charcoal as opposed to the uniform preformed stuff from Kingsford. Supposedly, hardwood charcoal should burn hotter and last longer than the man made variety. And yet, this does not seem to be the case. Not only does it not last longer than the brickettes, it seems to burn out in almost half the time. I'm lighting my fire in a charcoal chimney without benefit of lighter fluid. Is it possible the fire is actually burning too hot? If so, is there anything I can do to correct the situation.

I don't know where you got the idea that "real" charcoal would burn hotter and last longer but I have always heard just the opposite and it makes sense. The hotness, and especially how long it lasts, is a function of the density of the charcoal. The "uniform preformed stuff from Kingsford" (or, cheaper, from Wal-Mart) is uniform because it's compacted under pressure. It starts out as every bit as "real" as what you are using but they mash it under high pressure into the uniform shape you see. But this process also makes it denser and, hence, probably hotter-burning and certainly longer-lasting. Where the "real" stuff you are using may have an advantage is in TASTE. Hickory charcoal should impart some element of hickory flavor, mesquite charcoal should impart some mesquite flavor and so on. I have no idea what wood goes into the Kingsford stuff and it may very well be some inexpensive softwood which would not burn hot and not last long if they hadn't compacted it tremendously.

What can you do to correct the situation? Not much except do what most people do: burn the brickettes (the cheaper the brand, the better) and add some of your expensive hardwood charcoal or, as most people do, some moistened hardwood chips, for flavor.

Or you can keep doing what you are doing. It's the old fashioned way--before they invented and marketed brickettes--and it's arguably still the best.

How far is the fire from the grill surface?
If you decrease the distance between the heat and the meat you can use less charcoal.
And as every solution causes new problems, you will have to monitor closely to avoid damage from flare-ups.
You can deal with flare-ups in several ways.
1. Water-filled spray bottles will control flare-ups, but put ash on the meat.
2. Stand there and watch the fire, move the meat away whenever there is a flare-up and move it back once the fat burns off. As the meat cooks the amount of dripping fat will decrease and allow you to relax, drink a beer, play catch with your kids, or do whatever you please.

There's actually a chart in the current issue of Cook's Illustrated (p. 14) that graphs the difference between lump and briquette charcoal.

For grilling purposes (uncovered), they both hit over 450 degrees within 5 minutes. However, the lump charcoal plunged precipitously from that point: after about 35 minutes, the temperature of the lump coals was under 50 degrees, while it took the briquettes over two hours to get to that point.

For barbecuing purposes (covered), the briquettes actually got up to 500 degrees within five minutes, as opposed to the lump charcoal, which stayed at 450 degrees. However, while the lump charcoal made a less steep decline (400 degrees after 40 minutes, 50 degrees in about 100 minutes), the briquettes didn't hit 50 degrees until 250 minutes later.

Cooks Illustrated's recommendations, which are actually what I've been doing all along: use lump charcoal for grilling steaks, burgers, or anything else that doesn't take long, but if you're doing low and slow cooking and you don't want to futz with heat control all the time, use briquettes.

I think it does burn hotter for a short time. I'm always happy with the results when I use the chunks for steaks (or oysters)

I quit using lump this year. It's expensive and doesn't work as well. The older I get, the less I worry about being purist for just the sake of it. I just don't see any advantage to lump charcoal.

I agree, S. Hillbilly. I use charcoal to start my smoker and then use oak or hickory for the rest of the time. Briquettes are ok for burgers, etc.

quote:

Originally posted by pdxyyz

The preformed charcoal is not every bit as real as hardwood charcoal.

The preformed charcoal is made up of sawdust and, guess what, ground up coal.

Which is why the preformed charcoal burns hotter and more uniformly.

Correct about the difference in composition between the two (preformed was invented by Ford during the Model T days as a way to use up waste sawdust). Main advantage of hardwood charcoal is for barbecuing or smoking where you need to add charcoal during the process. Briquets give of a very acrid coal-y smoke when they're getting lit, meaning you really need to get 'em fired up outside of the pit.

Thank you one and all for the input. Clearly some of the information is less accurate than the rest. However, there's enough here to work the problem through. I'll definitely check out Cook's magazine. I think one possible solution is a mix of the two varieties. As for lighting the brickettes outside the kettle/smoker, that is a given under any circumstances. If nothing else it was good to hear I'm not the only one who has experienced this situation. Thanks again all.

quote:

Originally posted by pdxyyz

The preformed charcoal is not every bit as real as hardwood charcoal.

The preformed charcoal is made up of sawdust and, guess what, ground up coal.

Which is why the preformed charcoal burns hotter and more uniformly.

It has some of those ingredients, yes, but it's principle ingredient is wood charcoal. The amount of sawdust is small (look closely at a briquette and you can see it) and, besides, many people use wood chips for flavor anyway. The added coal makes a significant difference in how long and uniformly it burns as Cook's Illustrated noted. The other ingredients below are in small amounts:

quote:

Kingsford ingredients

Kingsford sends a form letter in response to consumers' questions about the ingredients. According to the form letter sent in August, 2000, Kingsford contains the following ingredients:

wood char (i.e wood charcoal)
mineral char (I believe this is coal, perhaps pre-"charred")
mineral carbon (I believe this is coal dust)
limestone
starch
borax
sodium nitrate
sawdust
Purpose of ingredients

There so many ingredients because the addition of each requires another to offset its negative affect. For example, in order to make the briquets easier to light, sodium nitrate is added. But then limestone is added so that, when the briquettes get started, they have the typical light-ash color.

Here are the purposes for each of the ingredients:

wood char: for heat
mineral char: also for heat
mineral carbon: also for heat
limestone: for the light-ash color
starch: to bind the other ingredients
borax: press release (i.e. so it doesn't stick to the compacter)
sodium nitrate: to speed the ignition
sawdust: to speed the ignition

Depends on your definition of "real" I guess.

BT-

Thanks for the additional info. So now I guess we need to put out the call: Does anyone know of any long burning, steady heat providing charcoal that lasts longer than natural lump charcoal but doesn't have all the nasty additives of the mainstream preformed brickettes? Does such an animal exist or do I just settle for either the quick burn-out of natural wood or the infusion of coal and limestone into my meat via the preformed variety?

Coal contains more organic compounds (mostly hydrocarbons and many carcinogenic) than any other naturally occuring substance. I would NEVER want to cook over coal.

You think you have "charcoal" problems. My Brother in Law just asked me what was wrong with his gas grill. He decided to replace the lava briquets this year, and each time he has grilled, the new ones catch fire and then burn up to nothing.

He didn't realize there is a difference between lava briquets and charcoal briquets.

I suggested he just use the gas burner to start the charcoal and then shut it off and cook over the coals.

quote:

Originally posted by BuddyRoadhouse

BT-

Thanks for the additional info. So now I guess we need to put out the call: Does anyone know of any long burning, steady heat providing charcoal that lasts longer than natural lump charcoal but doesn't have all the nasty additives of the mainstream preformed brickettes? Does such an animal exist or do I just settle for either the quick burn-out of natural wood or the infusion of coal and limestone into my meat via the preformed variety?

Build a fire pit and get some small logs burning.. After they are sized and heated to your preference, toss them in your grill...

BT... Nice layout letting us know all that goes into the Kingsford.. They had a story on Kingsford on the Food Network Memorial Day weekend showing the manufacture process. I'm guessing the Wood Char they mention is the mulch (as they call it) thats left over from furniture, skid, home building, wood makers leftovers that they recycle... I like charcoal, but it has me wondering now... Probably have to stick to dried hardwoods...

Actually, most lump charcoal is made from that stuff too, UncleVic. A lot of brands, you can see that they're partially-burned pieces of tongue and groove, stuff like that. Wood's wood.

quote:

Originally posted by Lucky Bishop

Actually, most lump charcoal is made from that stuff too, UncleVic. A lot of brands, you can see that they're partially-burned pieces of tongue and groove, stuff like that. Wood's wood.

I hear ya there... But alot of wood used for building is infused with glue... Thats what makes me shudder...

quote:

Originally posted by SouthHillbilly

Coal contains more organic compounds (mostly hydrocarbons and many carcinogenic) than any other naturally occuring substance. I would NEVER want to cook over coal.

Lord have mercy! Not only have lots of people cooked over coal in times past but somebody here recently waxed poetic about coal-burning pizza ovens and I got grief for suggesting wood-burning ovens might serve.

What, after all, is coal but compressed vegetation (i.e wood, leaves etc) and mud/silt that got mixed with it. The first stage of coal formation is peat and peat fires have been used as the main source of heat for, among other things cooking, in parts of the British Isles for generations.

Have you any idea of the "organic compounds" found in wood? For that matter, human beings are made almost entirely of "organic compounds" and water. "Organic" chemistry is the chemistry of the carbon/hydrogen/oxygen/nitrogen molecules of living matter. But you are right that coal has more organics than wood per unit volume because coal is denser than wood, having been compressed (diamonds, by the way, have even more--oh, the horror!).

Coal does indeed have some carcinogens and burning tons and tons of it in a power plant produces enough toxics and pollutants to be of concern, but in the quantities burned in a BBQ you should probably be most concerned about tarry byproducts of combustion of EITHER wood or coal.

In other words, if you are worried about your health, I wouldn't eat BBQ because that smoke we love to taste can kill us all.

If you aint cooking with Kingsford,you aint cooking.

This site has some interesting info.

http://www.nakedwhiz.com/lump.htm

When I cook steaks at home, I always use lump charcoal primarily because it does cook at a higher temp when it comes out of the charcoal chimney that I start it with. I have checked it before and found the temps to be in the 800-900 range. With briquettes, I can't get the hear over 550.

If I do use briquets, it is not Kingsford anymore. I now use Nature-Glo which is made by Royal Oak. It has less ash than Kingsford and not so many funky smells with it.

Just my observations.

John

I am in the market for my first smoker and am trying to determine which one charcoal one to buy. Reading this thread on the uncertainty of charcoals maybe its best to get an electric. Is charcoal really that tricky to manage? I aspire to be a weekend warrior, not a competition winner.

For the money get a Weber Smokey Mountain. Once you learn fire/temp control, you can load the WSM and go 10 or so hours without having to fiddle with it.

And you can take it anywhere. Electric will always have to be somewhere that has power. If your power goes out, you won't be able to cook on it. With a WSM you will always be able to use it.

quote:

Originally posted by Raine

For the money get a Weber Smokey Mountain. Once you learn fire/temp control, you can load the WSM and go 10 or so hours without having to fiddle with it.

And you can take it anywhere. Electric will always have to be somewhere that has power. If your power goes out, you won't be able to cook on it. With a WSM you will always be able to use it.

What about the Brinkman 810-5301-C for the novice?

quote:

Originally posted by Raine

For the money get a Weber Smokey Mountain. Once you learn fire/temp control, you can load the WSM and go 10 or so hours without having to fiddle with it.

And you can take it anywhere. Electric will always have to be somewhere that has power. If your power goes out, you won't be able to cook on it. With a WSM you will always be able to use it.

I agree. The Weber Smokey Mountain is awesome and easy to learn to use.

And, I recommend using briquettes instead of lump charcoal with this smoker. The lump burns too fast.

Brinkmans like driving a Geo Metro, or Fiesta, etc
WSM like driving a Lexus.

I e-mailed Kingsford from their web site.
I asked them if it was true that they used coal in their briquettes and what the ingredients "mineral char" and mineral carbon" were.
Here is their response:

"Thank you for contacting us about Kingsford Regular Charcoal. We always appreciate hearing from our consumers.

The formula for our charcoal is proprietary.  I apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

Again, thank you for contacting us."

I'm done with Kingsford. Switching to the natural stuff.

quote:

Originally posted by tsores

I am in the market for my first smoker and am trying to determine which one charcoal one to buy. Reading this thread on the uncertainty of charcoals maybe its best to get an electric. Is charcoal really that tricky to manage? I aspire to be a weekend warrior, not a competition winner.

Charcoal is not that hard to manage. I think what you need to keep in mind that with Kingsford, it seems to ba a "crowd" mentality due to all the advertising and the fact that it has been around so long. As I stated in my previous response, I prefer the Nature-Glo briquettes because there is less ash left over and it seems to give a cleaner burn. Every so often when I would use Kingsford, I would some off odors when I would open my WSMs. That has never happened with the NG.

Plus, once you get to know your WSM, you can easily get 14-18 hours of burn from one load of charcoal. This makes it easy to smoke items such as pork butts overnight.

John

quote:

Originally posted by RibDog
[ As I stated in my previous response, I prefer the Nature-Glo briquettes because there is less ash left over and it seems to give a cleaner burn. Every so often when I would use Kingsford, I would some off odors when I would open my WSMs. That has never happened with the NG.

Hey RibDog, where can you buy Nature Glo? Would you recommend it for smoking a whole chicken, or quickly grilling burgers and dogs, or both?

"you can easily get 14-18 hours of burn from one load of charcoal."

Wow, please do explain.