Well, I've done pork butt a few times, as well as sausages, (brat and Italian) but today was my first attempt at ribs on the Excel.
Dumped about 4 pounds of Kingsford blue in the charcoal bin, and about 2 pounds of mesquite chunk, filled up my chimney with blue, and 20 minutes later poured it on top of the stuff in the charcoal basket.
Took my last 97cent/LB Fry's rack out, cut itin half, rubbed it with some Famous Dave's ribrub, and pit it on the lowest rack, right above 4 quarts of HOT water. Covered everything up, opened the lower vents to about 1/2, and dropped the sense probe of my Maverick 901 through the upper vent, (since the sensor has a bend in it, only the business end went in) and watched. Stayed between 225-250 most of the time.
For the first 3 hours, temps were VERY easy to control, nothinglike my semi-retired Weber kettle. After 3 hours, I pulled the ribs, sauced themup with a semi-scratch sauce. Wrapped them and back in for 2 hours. Pulled them and un-wrapped them, for the final hour.
OK, I'm used to boiled ribs falling apart, after they get the 15 minute sauce burn, but not ribs that were smoked the whole time.
Next to the old Kettle, this smoker SMOKES!! I'd be checking the kettle every 10 minutes, this one, it's more like every hour.
Oh, if you're interested, here's the sauce recipe.
1 package Target Chipotle and pineapple salsa.
about 1/2 can beer
about 6 ounces Sunny Delight (Any OJ type juice will work here. I just happened to have SunnyD. I've even used Tampico.)
2 bottles store bought BBQ sauce. (This time I used Sweet Baby Rays honey chipotle & hickory brown sugar. Iget what is on sale, and Fry's had them for 88 cents.)
5 or 6 breakfast sausages
Salsa in the pot. Add beer, OJ, and sausages. Simmer until thicker than the salsa was. Add BBQ sauce, and simmer until your thickness is reached.
Some time ago, I cooked up some breakfast sausages in BBQ sauce, for snacks. Inoticed that the sausages gave the BBQ sauce an interesting flavor, and have been doing that ever since. Sometimes I just eat the sausages as a snack, but this time they went in the foil, when the ribs did.
No, not my first rack, just the first rack on the Excel.
Sorry, no camera, so no pics.
steve