Preparing Two Kinds of Outdoor Cookers: A Smoker and a Barbecue Pot

Lately I’ve been wanting to try smoked foods and indoor grilling, but I’m too lazy to prepare large equipment, so I plan to use a pot that works right on a household gas stove as a barbecue pot, which also lets me force the exhaust out through the range hood.

Checklist for Preparing Household Smoking Equipment

1. Smoking wood chips.
2. A medium-to-large stockpot, cast-iron pot, or Chinese wok.
3. A smoking grill rack.
4. Aluminum foil.

Smoking Wood Chips

Although there are ready-made products on the market designed for modern stoves, such as the “SOTO Household IH Smoker Pot ST-128”, the “SOTO Takumi Modular Warm/Hot Smoking Chamber ST-129”, or the Japanese Hasegawa-en Iga-yaki “Smoking Cooking Pot”.

But for beginners who aren’t sure whether they’ll keep at it, it’s better to first buy a pack of cherry- or oak-scented smoking wood chips (product reference) and try the handmade method for a taste. After all, even many camping and barbecue veterans find smoking a very difficult step (especially since getting fresh ingredients requires some knowledge and connections).

Stockpot (Cast-Iron Pot, Chinese Wok)

If you have a cast-iron pot that was trendy for a while in recent years, or a spare Chinese wok at home, both work very well and can be heated directly on a household kitchen gas stove. As it happens, I found a set of old medium stockpots from the CookPower brand in my family’s storage; the material is white iron, though I’m not sure whether it’s 304 or 403 stainless steel. It feels very light, probably because the pot walls are relatively thin. Although I don’t know whether it meets current food-safety standards, I don’t plan to let it touch the food directly, so safety shouldn’t be an issue. (Interestingly, I have no memory of this set of pots at all.)

The equipment needed for smoking and for grilling is actually somewhat different, but using this kind of stockpot as a grill is quite convenient: put in wood chips and cover it and it’s a smoker; leave the lid off and it’s a barbecue pot or grill.

So the current problem is how to find a suitable rack to use as a smoking rack and grill rack, with a material of at least 304 or 316 white iron (stainless steel); cast iron or titanium alloy would be even better.

Grill Rack

Since the walls of the stockpot are slanted, you only need to measure the diameter at the correct position, and a round grill rack of a similar size can easily fit inside the pot. For this CookPower set, the most suitable diameter is 26 cm, which can sit at the highest position inside the pot without affecting how tightly the lid seals (this point is very important during smoking).

One more reminder: remember to consider that the food won’t touch the lid once placed. If you want to try a technical feat like smoking a whole chicken from the start, you’d better just buy a large smoking chamber.

Later, on China’s Taobao, I saw a round titanium-alloy grill rack (product link), and its 26 cm diameter happens to fit that CookPower pot very well.

It wasn’t cheap either—about NT$1,120 per set—yet it looks rather rough, especially since the grill plate and base are only held together by seven or eight weld points. They’d have been better off making it snap-fit so users could assemble it themselves.

Round titanium-alloy grill rack

Also, Amazon Japan has a similar product (product link); the photos look much better than Taobao’s, though I don’t know whether it’s the same supplier. Surprisingly, it costs only NT$700 (excluding shipping).

If you need a 28 cm size, Amazon Japan has a rather high-quality grill…