Gadgetry: Orion Cooker

Wow look at me two posts in one day.

Ok you can call me a shill if you like, I know I go on and on about my gadgets and toys. And I've been meaning to put up a post for you about my flaming inferno tower smoker cooker thing-a-ma-jig. So I present to you my quasi review/show off of the Orion Cooker. I swear these people should be paying me when I feature their products, not enough eyeballs I guess :)

The orion cooker is not technically a smoker. A smoker is a unit (be it electric or otherwise) that can sustain a low heat and create smoke. This device is a convection cooker that applies smoke. For my purposes it's a bit splitting hairs, however bbq purests would definitely *not* refer to this thing as a smoker.

As you can see this thing users coal, lots and lots of coal. In fact it's possibly my only complaint about this device is that it requires 15 lbs of instant light charcoal. Most of it goes along the bottom "gutter" and 20 or so briquettes go into the tower at the top. Why you ask? Well basically this creates a convection oven like heating in the actual container. (The whole thing is sealed). Using convection cooking and indirect heat you're basically cooking large quantaties of meat very very fast. The downside of cooking stuff really really fast is that once you are done and you open up the convection oven, you don't really have enough to power a second helping, but the coals are still really really hot and will burn for hours before it's cool enough to cleanup. I bet if you picked something that doesn't take as long (fish) and paired it with something that takes say a "medium" amount of time, you might be able to get thru 2 batches of cooking.

As you can see on this inside shot it has little posts that you can put near the top to hang ribs. There's a total of 3 grate brakets for you to cook 3 stacks of roasts, chicken, fish. They also have a turkey stand (see turkey post). The bottom pan is a drippings pan where all the juices (and lots of fat) melt off. Around the pan is where you put your wood chips.

Course there's the cleanup. If I can find a better way of dealing with the coals (maybe buy a bucket?) and cleaning the whole thing up (it's an ordeal with the scouring pads and the water hose). I think I would call this thing perfect.

Their marketing does not lie, literally I whipped up a batch of fall apart tender beef and pork ribs for several of my parties in 1 hour and 15 mins. Without exception the ribs are always a hit with all the tasters. Everything I've produced on this cooker has been amazing. Very juice, very tender, and it takes no time at all. The turkey from this thanksgiving was amazing and came out with that classic brown skin you always see in the pictures but aren't quite able to get because the oven bag screws it up.

Happy Eating!
Ironjack