PICS--Smoked Cheese

That looks great. I recieved my Amaze-N-Pellet Smoker this week and plan on smoking some cheese tonight in the FEC100. I've read where you can acheive the best taste by vacuum sealing the cheese for a few weeks prior to eating it. Have you tried doing that? I'm not sure that I have the patience to wait that long! Nice job!

I vacuumed sealed 2 Gouda and 3 chedder saving one of each for current consumption (let me check my math. Yep. That's correct). I, too, couldn't wait. Tastes great.

Don't place any cheese above the A. S. cause even that slight heat will discolor and slightly melt the cheese. Place the A. S. in a corner on the bottom grate with the cheese placed around it on the above and bottom grates.

You won't get the grate marks with clean grates. I clean my grates every 2nd or 3rd time and didn't think about the marks on the cheese.

Halfway through the smoke, consider rotating and flipping the cheese for more even color and flavor. I flipped, didn't rotate. Funny, the bottom of the cheese will be lighter if you don't flip them, meaning less smoke on the bottom.

Also, the cheese on the bottom grate gets less smoke than the cheese on the top. This affect will be more prevalent in your smokers versus my smaller Elite. The A. S. won't put out as much smoke as the Cookshacks so it doesn't fill our smokers as well with the exhaust hole acting as a release valve preventing heavier smoke at the bottom side.

Fill your top grate with cheese (placement as suggested) working down. Unless you're smoking a large quantity of cheese, you won't even need your bottom shelves.

Thank you for the advice. I think I'll try putting the AS on the bottom of the FEC close to where the firepot is. That area is covered by a drip shield that should prevent any direct heat to the shelves above. Since it's in the 30's here today I shouldn't have to worry about too much heat buildup in the FEC.

I'm thinking I could place some foil over the exhaust and poke a hole in it to keep more smoke in the FEC. For this first batch I'll probably just leave the exhaust alone and adjust if needed on my next cold smoke. Thanks again. I'll let you know how this first batch goes.

Of course if you place the A. S. in the corner of the top shelf, the heat wouldn't matter, and you'd have use of all your shelf space. I should have thought of that earlier.

How does the AMNS work? Is it lit by match? How much heat does it produce? And which model do you folks use?

I use the Amazing Smoker tray. Fill it with sawdust and light it with a torch lighter. It will raise the ambient temperature in the smoker a few degrees.

And it will stay lit for a long time? Interesting.