Wake up and light the smoker, because succulent pulled pork and fall-off-the-bone ribs come to those who wait. The Smokey Mountain Cooker™ smoker has two cooking grates for smoking multiple items at once, and dampers that adjust easily so that you’re always in control of the heat—and your feast. The durable cooking weber kettle bbq grate is easy to clean, retains heat, and is hinged for easily adding charcoal while grilling. To my childhood mind, firing up a Weber charcoal grill had existential significance. It felt like an important, manly task because in my home, like I’m sure in many homes across America, my dad was in charge of it.
Spark your passion for charcoal grilling with the Kettle that started it all. Toast to the authenticity of charcoal grilling, classic design, and taste loved around the weber portable grill world—the Original Kettle. Its ultra-durable, porcelain-enameled lid and bowl retain heat, while the dampers can be easily adjusted for precise temperature control.
This way I find I take more time to get it perfect and end up catching some smaller details you would otherwise miss by jumping all over the place. First off I would like to introduce the kettle being used in today’s demo. This is a no date stamp red MBH kettle that I found on craigslist in early January. It’s clearly seen better days and at one point the previous owner even decided to “eye ball” some rattle can paint onto a few areas to cover damage. Thanks to the Age Guide we know this particular kettle was made sometime around 1978.
Allow the kettle to get up to temp and then try to work the vents back and forth slowly. The heat should eventually unstick whatever is leftover and leave you with a fully functional damper. Wait for the kettle to cool slightly and then carefully wipe off any grease that came free and is visible from the underside of the kettle. The severity of the interior cleanup depends on a lot of factors and is almost a roll of the dice. Sometimes you will find a kettle with horribly solidified ash in the bottom, and other times you’ll get lucky and end up with a quick and easy cleanup. This time I was fortunate and this was only about a 4 out of 10 on the nastiness scale.
Essentially you want to repeat the exact same process on the exterior of the kettle as you did the interior. Start with your razor scraper to remove any heavy weber portable gas grill debris, and then follow up with the steel wool lubricated with soap. The first thing I suggest doing is completely dismantling the kettle if at all possible.