Offset Smoker vs Drum Smoker | Smoke Lab with Steve Gow | Oklahoma Joe's®️

What makes a better BRISKET? An offset smoker or a drum smoker? Steve Gow from @smoketrailsbbq conducts an experiment to find out, comparing two briskets on the #OklahomaJoes Longhorn offset smoker and the Bronco drum smoker in both reverse flow setup and direct flow setup. Let’s find out if there’s a difference!
Drum Smoker Brisket Recipe
Ingredients:
Meat
10-15 lb brisket (Choice grade or higher)
Rub
Quarter cup course black pepper
Quarter cup kosher salt
Tablespoon Lawry’s Seasoned Salt
Wrap liquid
1/3 cup beef tallow
1/3 cup clarified butter/Ghee (or substitute with normal butter):
Technique
Trim brisket
Mix rub ingredients in shaker bottle, add small amount of vegetable oil to help mixture stay consistent
Apply rub to brisket, starting with back and sides, and finishing with fat cap
Remove grill grate and deflector plate from Bronco. Load Bronco charcoal basket with 4 chunks of wood, then fill with charcoal, and finally add 4 more chunks of wood to the top of the charcoal pile.
Light the center of the charcoal basket with a charcoal lighter, fire starter, or light a few chunks of charcoal in a chimney and dump them into the center of the charcoal basket.
Replace deflector plate and place a large water pan on top of it. Then replace the grill grate.
Place brisket on the smoker and foil the edges of the point and flat
Leave intake and exhaust damper wide open
When temperature is approximately 50 degrees lower than target temperature of 275, shut intake damper to almost closed (position 1). Exhaust damper should stay wide open.
Smoke at 275 for 12 hours or until all areas of the brisket probe at least 190 internal, replacing charcoal and wood chunks as needed if temperatures start to dip.
Wrap brisket in butcher paper with beef tallow and clarified butter
Place wrapped brisket in aluminum pan with quarter cup water added, foil top tightly. If aluminum pan is unavailable, wrap brisket with aluminum foil, ensuring liquid cannot leak from bottom.
Place brisket into holding device (holding oven, electric smoker, regular oven etc.) at 150 and hold for 15-20 hours. If using oven, check manual for instructions on how to adjust temperature down to attain 150 degrees - recommend confirming actual oven temps ahead of time with remote-graphing probe thermometer placed in a pan of water in the oven to ensure oven can hold meat at a steady 150 indefinitely.
Remove brisket from wrap, slice against the grain and serve.

[@chuckhansen5325]

Stop with the holding it in your holding box. Us backyard smokers don't have anything to hold our meat for 15 to 20 hrs. Actually we don't wanna hold that long. Do your videos with holding them the ways we do for just a couple to a few hrs. And let's see how they turn out

[@stvmassacre]

The tin foil was the problem with your drum smoker. Do it again and wrap it 4 hours in, leaving the top fat open to the heat. Your results will be much better. I have a cheap $100 bullet style smoker, and I get decent results using the foil boat.

[@W.Vanderbilt]

It appears that you may not have extensive experience with the drum smoker.

[@Kquan1]

I would suggest going fat cap down for a future video with the drum smoker. One advantage to using a drum is when the fat hits the charcoal its a unique flavor different from offset. I would even remove the water pan and just spritz more often to get the fat on charcoal flavor. Or stay fat side up but with less interference between the meat and charcoal basket i.e. water pan. There's no way cooking directly above coals is less smoky

[@scottgammel5771]

My experince with using a bronco for about 2 years now I would be to put your wood chunks in the ash pan and just one close to your fire when you start it. and lose the water pan. fat cap down and no foil on the ends. I also treat my drum like a pellet smoker cause the heat is coming from the bottom. I like to keep it at 225 at first and then bump it up to 250 after the wrap in foil boat. And if you use b@b logs stacked in there tight you can get through a whole brisket cook without reloading. Thanks for the content keep it coming.

[@charlesbirchfield5066]

Your biggest problem with the Bronco was you lit the lump coal in the center. Big no! No! Light from the edge so it will burn towards the center. Use starter blocks or cubes. But you are correct not all lump is equal. I use briquettes for longer cooks. As usual I love your videos. Mad respect!!

[@BestNCBBQ]

Would love for you to do a review on Lone Star Grills pellet smoker with half pellets/half wood chips that they sell. Cannot find information on whether the air flows over the grate or under the grate. Smokestack exit is below grate level which seems a little concerning as to how that would affect airflow.

[@ShortArmBBQ]

I have a bronco and wrangler offset and the offset makes a slightly better brisket but the bronco can be set up for set and forget which is a win. With a fan on the bronco you can use Char-logs and get 12+ hours easy and keep the exhaust wide open and get more air flow.

[@dansmith8512]

Loving the videos. Keep them coming. Could u flip the brisket upside down (atleast halfway through id imgine) to get the top cooked more

[@isaacpena9590]

I'm a backyard smoker and always hold for 10 to 15 hours and people think my stuff 🔥 js if u are bout that life than u have to be 💯

[@narrowjay0]

I really enjoyed your video. I'm in the process of making a UDS so I'm checking out a lot of videos. One day I'll move up to the offset. Have a good one!

[@CoolJay77]

Great video. The Bronco seems easy and convenient to use, and the brisket turned out looking great.

[@j.j.clingman4083]

Definitely awesome video buddy!!! I actually have never ever smoked anything ever until about a month ago after I thought having my regular gas 6 burner grill with a big side sear burner, a rotisserie burner, and a side burner for side dishes and well it is over 15 years old and I definitely got a lot of griff for spending way too much on a grill buy a couple buddies of mine but at a regular price of around 2,000.00$ but able to pick up there very last one after several months of trying to get them to drop the price because I definitely did not want to spend any where close to 2,000.00$ for a grill but after going in for two months every weekend and asking them if they would drop the price they finally did and I was able to get it for 600.00$!!! Pretty good I’d say since one of my buddies would end up buying a new grill every other year and at roughly 200.00$ a pop well he is the one that has spent way more than I have ever spent on a grill!!! 600.00$ split up into just over 15 years is definitely dirt cheap!! So anyways I ended up getting a Oklahoma joes 3/1 smoker,charcoal, and a gas grill and I had definitely been wanting to try and get some amazing taste of some good old smoked meats in my mouth!!! Well the first thing I tried was a couple Dino beef ribs and well for how long they took and not noing exactly what I was running for a temp they turned out ok but I new I could do better!!! After getting a lava lock grill thermometer I found out that when I thought the smoker was getting too hot at 300 by the temp on the thermometer that came with the smoker and it was off by 100 degrees or a little more it definitely helped out by turning my next amazing item that I smoked witch was a nice big brisket!! Oh and it turned out so wonderful and my dad and grandma and grandpa even asked if there was extra for them to take home!!! My next item was a pair of baby back ribs and those were by far the best ribs I have ever had for sure!!! My wife even said so also!!! This weekend I’m doing another pair of baby back ribs again also because the wife definitely wanted some more of them for sure!!! And for next weekend it will be a nice big pork but with the bone in still!!! I’ve never done one before but I’m definitely excited to try some good old pulled pork sandwiches for my birthday this weekend!!! I definitely love my Oklahoma joes smoker other than how the doors didn’t shut nice and even and left a gap for smoke to leak out everywhere!! But after installing some smoke seal it’s definitely not perfect but has definitely helped!!! I wasn’t sure if I would even like smoking meats but I definitely do and try to every weekend now!!! Well awesome video once again buddy and remember keep up all the hard work buddy!!!!

[@Harleyforever20]

What I really like about this comparison is that, you used choice grade brisket. In my opinion, true BBQ spirit is about buying on a budget and making the best out of what you got. I have watched other people doing videos where they spend a considerable more money on much higher grade meats and sometimes, it doesn’t turn out that great.

[@Jeffdoeswhat]

I need to add a drum smoker to my smoker/grill collection.

[@sosuckafree86]

I been waiting for this video. Been mastering the drum smoker, but I just purchased an offset to master

[@christianbureau6732]

Thanks for all these great video, learn something each time. What about “backyards” tricks vs Pro ticks? Cheers

[@BigChuck525]

I always enjoy your videos. It's always about the amount of smoke. I'm curious as to how much smoke do people really want. I think as cooks we can get used to the smoke and keep wanting more where others may want less. For me it's a balance of smoke, the meat flavor and seasoning. A blind taste test with multiple people would be interesting.

[@aaronthomas2023]

“Scotchy, mmmmmm”. 😂😂😂. Man I dunno why but that had me rolling!

[@lyleswavel320]

Thank You