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Hi all,

I'm a new Amerique/Cookshack user, and have now done my first cook, a 5 lb butt. Cook temp. @ 225, Probe temp @ 200 (maximum available}. I've checked my cooker and probe temps for accuracy and they were within a couple of degrees. After 21.5 hrs. I pulled it at 193 deg. At the rate it was going, I think I'd still be cooking a couple of days later to get to 200. So now the question.

Is there some relation to cooker temp, amount of meat, etc., that relates to temperature the meat will get to? So many recipes call for a cook temp of 225, but honestly I'm not sure if the meat temp would get to 200 in a reasonable period of time. Since I want to be able to utilize the "Holding" feature, do I need to adjust my cook temps up, to be able to achieve my 200 deg butt?

Another interesting point is during my temperature tests, I stuck a bowl of water in the cooker with a probe in it, and the temp of the water stopped gaining after about 6 hours, 50 deg. cooler than the cooker temp??? There must be some sort of thermodynamics phenomenon at play here. Does anyone have the answer to that?

Thanks a lot for any input to a new user. I'm sure I'm over thinking it, but I'm one of those guys that love's to understand the process of things.
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It sounds like your cooking at the lower probe temperature. Could the cooker temp and probe temp somehow be reversed? User error or problem? If you don't have them reversed, call Cookshack. They'll get you up and running.

I would suggest placing a separate thermometer inside the cooker to verify cooking temperature, but you said you already verified the accuracy of the cooker and probe therms.
Thanks a lot for all of the input. I talked to Tony at Cookshack, and based on all of my temp checks, it sounds like all is working well on the cooker. It may have been a "stubborn " butt.

He did have one suggestion on verifying the operation with a simulated load, by using cooking oil as the medium to place the probe in. I'm going to give that a try. I'll let you know what I find.
Here is a thought from old stickburners.

They often flowed a lot of air.


Now,don't write this down,as some "New FACT".

A lot of the guys felt the actual cooker temp,needed to be about 60º+/- above your internal temp to move temps up smoothly.

This doesn't mean go change everything in life,just something to consider and see if experience ever supports it.

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