At first pass when you look at a Reverse Flow smoker you may ask what’s the big deal. Either way the smoke / hot air flow is passing past the item being cooked just once. While it may seem like marketing hype or unnecessary there is a science to it.
With standard flow smokers, the heated air travels from the fire box, past the meat or item being cooked just once as it moves towards it path of least resistance out of the smoke stack on the opposite end. This design will create an effect where the temperature closer to the fire box is hotter than the temperature on the opposite side of the smoker.
This drop in temperature can cause uneven cooking and requires more attention during the process. You may need to rotate the items being cooked from one end to the other at different stages to obtain the most even heating.
With a Reverse Flow Smoker like the Oklahoma Joe Reverse Flow Highlander the air flow will first pass under a metal plate or baffle and then route back over the meat still heating it by convection as it passes on its way to the smoke stack.
What makes this different is the heating of the plate or baffle as it is sometime referred. The metal will transfer heat along it’s length more evenly. The heat metal will then provide radiant heat up towards the meat along it’s entire length. This helps maintain a better regulated heating over the entirety of the smoker during the cooking process.
The overall amount of heat put in to the smoker doesn’t change nor does the amount of air flow passing over the meat. What changes primarily is the distribution of the heat. This improves the cooking process in terms of minimizing hot spots and requires less juggling of products from one end to the other. The revese flow smoker takes a bit more to build so as you can imagine you’ll typically pay more for one then a standard flow model. I think you’ll find that the value is worth considering.
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