The Weber BBQ
Merry Christmas one and all! Ok, on this Xmas morning I've steamed the turkey in the oven over a tray of chicken stock, the turkey covered with foil....in preparation for putting out in the Weber. Now, a question to all you fine Chefs, and for some reason I haven't been able to get this info on Google re; Weber vent settings??? At the bottom of the Weber you have the 3x cleaning slides with the handle ok, and at the top the vent. What settings should I have these on, at the moment I have to bottom 3 slots wide open, and the vent holes at the top is only open a wee bit, say a 1/4 inch? Advice would be much appreciated, I'm thinking the bottom ones need to be open to allow oxygen to get in and keep the beads glowing, and only open a wee bit at the top to keep maximum heat in the cooking/oven area. Am I on the ball?...or way off the mark? Cheers and Beers....might have a couple of tinnies today, Coopers oughta do the trick.

dunno??? go gas bbq with hood mate as long as it cooks and tastes great i never had a feed today between putting up trampolines and basketball hoops bugger ant way have a good one merry xmas

Went off the gas when I tasted a mates bolar roast over charcoal beads.....huge difference mate. Mind ya he used a whole container of chicken salt on it.

Paul, Is this what you are after? :- Place the turkey breast-side up on the top grate. Set the lid vent and the three bottom vents 100% open and leave them that way throughout the entire cooking process. Cook the turkey until it measures 160-165°F in the breast, 170-175°F in the thigh. Depending on the turkey and weather conditions, this may take 2-1/2 to 3 hours. Start checking internal temperature at the 2 hour mark. There's no need to baste the turkey during the cooking process. You may wish to rotate the turkey 180° after 1 hour for even cooking, but this isn't usually necessary, either. I found it here :- http://www.virtualweberbullet.com/turkey4.html

Bingo!, thanks Cliffy, I struggled to find settings but obviously didn't dig deep enough. I got the that trick of pre-steaming over chicken stock off the net, works a treat and it turned out beautifully moist and deeeelicious. Mate the lime rind in the stuffing did it, working it's way out into the meat and getting rid of the wild flavour...if that's what you're trying to do? And the smokey bacon pieces also added a nice flavour as well. Was funny watching the oldies punching each other out fighting over the parsons nose hahaaa!

Hey Paul !! sounds to me ya wasted ya time being a dibby, trust me you would'nt have been out of place in a set of cooks whites. Myself these days I buy the Turkey Roll and everyone gets the white meat. Then I've always reckoned Turkey is overated ,just give me a charcoal cooked chook and thats my lot. Sounds nice that stuffing, mind you I loved the flavour of the forced meat stuffing that we had in the Turkeys in Pussers, now I'm hungry, better get back to the cricket, we are batting - yahoo ,

Mate I spent a lot of time down in the galley helping out on Derwent and Swan. This here wannabe Cook nearly changed branches when they announced they were fazing out WM's. But instead I took my discharge, went out into civvy street and went feral. Can't remember much about the NSW hippie communes HAHAAA!!! Used to help out one particular Cook when were sailing or anchored up FNQ way. Many a time helped out with tips for cooking fishies the crew had caught when the Skipper used to drop anchor and make a pipe to throw the lines over. Heaps of shark flake, sweetlip snapper, etc etc.. I had to show one cook how to fillet shark to avoid pricking the ammonia sac....contaminating all the other meat. Learned the lesson from an old fisherman when I was a sprat on the Wallaroo Jetty SA.

G'Day Paul , been a Weber fan for years now . Child Bride and I still laugh (didn't then) over my first huge snafu with it . Our engagement party , heaps of people coming , I say "I'll do a big leg of pork in my new webber , that way we can keep the oven to heat up smally eats " Come the day , come the Melbourne weather , so decision made (mine) to flash -up webber in the 3 car garage (negs cars) . So I work out this lump of pig is going to take about 4 hours to cook , flash-up coaly thingoes , 25% more for pork , add u-beaut hickory sticks, oil pork all over , lay on rack and cover , set bottom fully open and top open just a crack ....Bewdy , we're cooking!!! Now the thing is with webbers , you don't lift the lid for a look - see , so after 2 hours I'm getting a little worried that I can't hear cooking noises , so I have to have a shoofti , bloody hell !! Coalie things have almost gone out !!!! Panic !!! Time to do the fishes and loaves thing. Thank the Man for micro-waves!! What went wrong ? Using the webber in the shed , wasn't enough air circulating around it and the coals just slowly died out . Plus the size of the pork leg sucked a lot of heat out , was too cold coming straight from the fridge . Best of all , no-one noticed a thing , everyone ate their fill and the Child Bride still loves me 16 years later .

Hahaa!!! yeah had that happen a few times Jaffa, bloody thing going out on me. I used firestarters for the beads on many occasions, and then come down to the fact that some brands/types of beads just don't cut it and stay alight no matter how much oxygen? So I always use the slightly more expensive beads which must be soaked with kero or something to keep em alight? Geez had a clean shave lighting up this baby, didn't have any firestarter white stuff, so splashed on a bit of Shellite I use for my zippos. Let it soak in a bit, 30 seconds later hit it with a spark from my lighter and VOOOSHHHH!!!! I could hear the family laughing their heads off in the background. And I wasn't joking about the 'clean shave' bit, my cheeks are smooth as a babies butt.

mmmmmmm
I bet you that roast on the webber tasted good. I love bbqs but webbers are better for roasting cause they get so bloody hot. I remember when I went to England and one of the chefs I worked with had a bbq and he had a webber. He was cooking up a storm but the snags and prawns were a bit charred. Everyone had a good time but he was asking if this was the was Aussies had bbqs I said no and that everyone has gas bbqs or wood fired bbqs.

Ah lovely charcoal grill....magic! One thing I find essential on any meat in the weber is Chicken Salt. The variety that has a few other herbs, garlic, paprika etc., in it as well. The smell is dynamite, and the pork crackling is well, heaven?

mmmmm pork crackling the stuff my boss pulls off the roast pork is scrumptious after I cut it into bits for her and pop it under the sally to finish it off and it comes out popping its little head off.

Thats it Smiddy , you've got the trick for the bestest crackling ever . Remove from roast and give it a few minutes under the grill or Salamander ...Yummy , melt in your mouth , but still crunchie crackling .

All this talk about Webers with vents and settings etc reminds me of this %$#^&* thing of an oven we had at the 'Tross. It was a Fan Forced Gas Oven and I think it was an experimental thing back then. In the whole time I was there I saw it only used about a dozen times and each time it blew up, blasting the doors open and the flames shortened the sets of anybody with one. (and that was just the wrans) :P The Main Galley Cooks called it the 'Windy Oven'. Did they persist with it over the years ?? wtf

Stuff that!...sounds as dangerous as this Pressure Fryer I was tried to slap together to make Southern Fried (KFC) chicken. Not a Pressure Cooker using steam, a Pressure Fryer using Oil, ummm! the release valve on the one I made didn't work and yep, it blew up.