If you’d like to make your own charcuterie or smoked salmon then you can use the Egg to smoke meat using a ProQ Cold Smoke Generator.

This will allow you to smoke meats for up to 10 hours per fill. You can use different wood dusts and I find the ones from HotSmoked.co.uk to be the best. You can even try discount code MP10 to get 10% off.

To cure salmon I use a 50/50 mix of sugar and salt for between 4 and 6 hours on the salmon. The recipe is here.

To get into curing meats there are a number of useful books. I started after reading Tim Hayward’s book, Food DIY.

I’m not one of these people that worries about fat getting on the plate setter. However some people like to foil the plate setter.

If you do get fat on the plate setter, the easiest way of cleaning it, is just to burn everything off with the Egg set to 350°C.

See my page on setting the temperature on your Big Green Egg.

• BBQ Guru DigiQ DX2 – the one sold by Big Green Egg. This is now quite dated but it is very effective. I have one of these.
• Flameboss 300 – this is similar to the DigiQ but with the addition of Wifi and an app that lets you control the cook from your phone or a web browser. While it’s good it’s not as accurate in my opinion as the DigiQ but the Wifi means I would choose this over the DigiQ. I have one of these.
• HeaterMeter – this is one you build yourself (see HeaterMeter.com). You can buy all the components online and then 3D print a case and fan enclosure. It uses the Raspberry Pi that kids are using in schools. I’ve made several of these and use them regularly.

Kamado Joe are about to launch the iKamand but initial reports haven’t been very good. I’d avoid this one until version 2 comes out.

There is also a device called a SMOBOT that can be imported, it’s not available in the UK. It attaches to the daisy wheel and will control the temp without a fan. It’s proving very popular but Big Green Egg are launching a new style cap and it won’t work with that.

The stainless grid is used for direct cooks, especially for cooks where you don’t want the food to stick. I’d use it for:

• Sausages and burgers
• Chicken
• Veg

The cast iron grid is brilliant for searing so it’s main use is when you need to add sear lines to food such as:

• Steak
• Chicken breasts
• Fish (use wider bars on the back)
• Vegetables (use wider bars on the back)

For indirect cooks I always use the stainless steel grid.

• For steaks and chops where you might want to serve them medium rare this will take just a few mins – your’e aiming for an internal temp of 58°C
• For a shoulder of lamb it will take about 10 hours to cook to 88°C on an Egg set to 110°C.
• For a rack of lamb like we cooked you’re looking at about 18-20 minutes depending on the size, again you’re looking to measure the internal temp.

There are several different ways of cooking a steak and it will depend on the type and size of the steak.

• Normal thin steak – cook it on a searing grid at 250-300°C for a couple of minutes a side.
• Thick steaks over 1.5″ thick – I would do a reverse sear on one of these where you cook the steak slowly on the Egg until it’s 5°C cooler than you want it, you then fire up the Egg to 250°C-300°C and sear it at the end.
• Steaks where you want a crust – cook them in a very hot cast iron pan with a little oil or butter.

The best way is to try several different methods, and try them many times. It’s a tough job but someone has to do it.

There are several factors involved in creating a crispy base on your pizza:

1.  Roll your pizza base thin.
2. Make sure your pizza stone is nice and hot along with the rest of your Egg.
3. Less is more when it comes to topping and sauce.

However there is a great video that I mentioned. Let me know if you have more success than I’ve had (zero).

• Big Green Egg are launching the EGGspander system that will have a basket with handles that your plate setter can be put into. You no longer need the legs to support the next layer. It’s due shortly.
• There is a high temp glue called JB Weld that a number of the American Eggers have used very successfully.

• Hickory – good allrounder and not too bitter.
• Jack Daniels Chips – quite strong so good with red meats.
• Maple – mild to medium with slight sweetness so good with poultry and cheese.
• Mesquite – strong and spicy, great with spiced meat or poultry and oily fish.
• Oak – heavy smoke flavour but great with most red meats.
• Olive – light but very aromatic and so good with red meats, poultry and veg.
• Orange – citrus and tangy, good with fish and poultry.
• Pecan – sweet nutty smoke, good with desserts, game, meats and fish.

1. Fuel – lump wood charcoal
2. Oxygen – air
3. Heat

If you’re struggling to get the Egg lit and up to temperature fast it’s likely to be one of these three things lacking. Causes could be:

• Your charcoal is damp, make sure you always keep it inside out of the rain and dew.
• There isn’t enough airflow:
  • You may need to clean your Egg. I recommend taking the ash out of your Egg every 5 or 6 cooks using the ash tool and doing a total clean, lifting the ceramics out, every 12-15 cooks.
  • The charcoal you are using has too many smaller pieces, these will block the airflow.

It’s good practice to keep your Egg clean.

• Every cook – rake the left over charcoal from the previous cook and let it fall down into the bottom of the Egg.
• Every 5 or 6 cooks – clear the ash from the bottom of your Egg using an ash tool. If you are going to hoover it out, make sure the ashes are cold, I have a customer who set fire to her Henry vacuum cleaner because the ash was still hot the following day.
• Every 12-15 cooks – lift out all the internals of your Egg and give everything a brush down with a dustpan and brush.

I always light my Egg by putting a single lighter block into the middle of the charcoal and then covering it when lit with a couple of pieces of charcoal. Leave the lid open for 10 minutes and then pull the lid shut and open the top fully and let the Egg get to 180°C to warm up the dome. 

Now put in the plate setter and stainless grid and adjust the top and bottom to reduce the temperature, is the 110°C settings on my temperature guide. If the temp falls below 110°C then open up the vents until it recovers to 110°C.

Treat your charcoal as one of the ingredients of your cook.

Obviously some things could be done either way, sausages for example. It’s the same inside, sausages can be cooked in a pan or baked in the oven.

I always have a Thermapen handy to check the temperature. I also use the Thermoworks Smoke when doing longer cooks as I can leave this attached to the Egg and a probe in the meat. I can then monitor the cook from the other end (like a baby monitor).

When cooking pizza I prefer to have the plate setter feet up, the stainless grid on top and then the baking stone. The gap between the plate setter and the pizza stone will stop the pizza stone getting too hot and burning the bottom of your pizza base before the top is cooked.

Never wash any of the cast iron parts or the ceramic parts. Washing the cast iron will cause it to rust. Ceramic is porous and would soak up the water and could then cause damage to your Egg if it was heated rapidly, turning to steam.

To clean your Egg just turn it up to 350°C and it will burn off all the fats. Just wait until any smoke has stopped and you’ll find everything is clean.

I keep all my cooking surfaces and the metal daisy wheel inside the Egg, it’s the best place for them. You can put them straight in after a cook, even with the Egg hot.

Yes, you can cook a joint of meat faster at a higher temperature but the results may not be as good. For example, when I cook a 3Kg pork shoulder it may take up to 19 hours to cook at 110°C. However at 120°C the same piece of meat would probably cook in 12 hours. The difference in cooking at a higher temperature is that you will have more air flowing past your food and drying it out. I prefer to cook at 110°C, the results are better.