Fast Eddy FEC100 BBQ Smoker by Cookshack
Being a bit of a gadget guy (okay, being a major gadget guy), you can probably understand that I like to incorporate technology wherever I can. Besides being into tech, I’m also somewhat of a BBQ fan. I own four BBQ grills; a Weber Summit 6 burner Gas Grill (my main workhorse), a Weber Performer Charcoal Grill, A Big Green Egg, and for my smoking needs, A Fast Eddy FEC100 Smoker.
I’ve been a big fan of smokers for many years. It began with a Brinkman water smoker (one of those grills that looks like R2D2), then moved to an offset smoker (otherwise known as a “stick burner” which looked like one of those 55 gallon drums turned on its side. It had a separate compartment for the fire and the meat would sit in the main cylinder. Many traditionalists will tell you that this is the only “true” way to smoke, but it can be a bit labor intensive. To keep a constant temperature in the smoking compartment, you need to feed logs into the fire chamber every couple of hours. This is fine if you are smoking something that takes a relatively short amount of time such as ribs, chicken, or a roast which are usually done in 4-6 hours, but it can become a bit of a hassle if you want to smoke something that takes a lot longer like a Pork Butt (12 hours) or a Beef Brisket (up to 16 hours). Essentially, when using a stick burner for an overnight smoke, you need to plan to not get a lot of sleep while the meat cooks. Additionally, as I live up in the Northeast, weather can play a major role in my smoking process as most stick burners are made of relatively thin metal and if you want to smoke a brisket when it’s 20 degrees F outside, you are going to be feeding in a lot of wood.
Since I’m a hardcore BBQ guy, I grill and smoke year round, so I needed a solution that had some insulation built in so as not to have to burn a small forest just to keep a consistent temperature for 16 hours. Back in early 2008, I began my search for a better smoker to replace the cheap offset that I had. I looked at a number of options and in fact summarized the players at the time on The Mind of Men Blog. You can get the details of that search here. I finally decided on the Fast Eddy FEC100 Smoker, primarily as it could be shipped to me relatively cheaply (some of those heavy-duty stick burners would have cost in excess of $800 to ship to me).
The Fast Eddy is one of the new generation of Smokers that is based on the technology that Traeger pioneered. Namely, the smoker uses pellets – much like the pellets that the current crop of pellet stoves and fireplaces use. Pellets are simply short tubes of pressed wood about an inch or so in length. They used to be made primarily from the sawdust left behind by sawmills, but as pellet stoves gained in popularity, that supply was not enough and now pellet companies grind up whole trees to make the pellets. The pellets used by smokers are different from pellet stoves in two main ways. First of all, the machinery that makes the pellets requires a fair amount of lubrication and while the pellets intended for stoves are made on machines oiled by standard petroleum products, pellets bound for cooking purposes are made on machines that are lubricated using food grade oils. This is an important distinction as you should only use food grade pellets in anything you plan to eat later on. The second main difference is that BBQ pellets come in a variety of woods such as oak, hickory, cherry, pecan, etc. so that BBQ aficionados can choose woods that compliment the meat that they are smoking much the same way that the stick burners use logs made from specific woods.
The Traeger mechanism consists of a thermostat, fans, and an auger that feeds pellets into a burn cup as needed. The fans and the auger speed are what maintain the target temperature. You simply dial in your desired smoking temperature, tell the grill how long to run for, push the start button and sit back. The computer control takes over and you can go to bed, mow the lawn, or go live your life while the smoker takes care of the cooking for you. While Trager makes some mighty nice smokers themselves, I was attracted to the FEC100 for a couple of reasons. First and foremost, the FEC100 is very well insulated all the way around meaning that no matter what mother nature throws at you, its going to be able to maintain a fairly consistent cooking temperature without burning through a ton of wood pellets. Furthermore, the computer that controls the FEC100 is one of the best in the business and you can rely on it to do what it needs to do every single time. Secondly, the FEC100 is friggin’ huge. You can cook for a small army or you can cook for just your family. Granted, most people are not going to need to smoke five or six port butts at once along with a couple of briskets or racks of ribs, but its nice to have the option when you need it.
If you are into a competition BBQ , you can rest assured that the FEC100 is fully sanctioned by all of the major BBQ sanctioning organizations as while it does use electricity to turn the auger, spin the fans, and run the thermostat, the actual heat is provided by burning wood pellets, so it is legal for competitions whereas cookers that used electricity or gas to provide the heat source are not. Many top BBQ teams use FEC100′s in competition and FEC100 users are winners of top BBQ competitions such as the Jack Daniels Invitational, and the American Royal.
As a home BBQ guy, you might think that the FEC100 is a bit of overkill, but when you consider the advantages that I just mentioned, you can see that it has a place in the upper echelons of the home BBQ chef as well. It’s price of around $3,500 delivered may seem a bit steep, but when you compare it against some of the top stick burners and consider the shipping charges, you see that it is priced competitively. Plus, its “set it and forget it” functionality makes it stand head and shoulders above any stick burner that I’ve ever looked at.
On top of this, Cookshack, who distributes the FEC100 is a top notch company to deal with. Your FEC100 will come bundled with a goodie bag containing rubs, sauces, and 40 lbs of pellets to get you started. Their customer service is also superb. I once had a problem with my FEC100 and called at 4:50 P.M. on a Friday afternoon during the summer. After a very short wait, I was put through to one of their tech guys who troubleshot the problem in about five minutes and had me up and running almost immediately.
No fair review of this smoker though would be complete without a discussion of some of the minor problems that I did experience with the smoker. The first problem was that the smoker simply shut off one time. After talking with Cookshack tech support, we determined that the high temperature sensor had been tripped. While the smoker is rated to cook at up to 450 degrees F, it does have a sensor that will automatically shut it off should something go wrong and the temperature get too high. The simple solution was to hit the reset button, which is annoyingly inside the computer control panel and required removing some screws to get at it. The Cookshack tech acknowledged that this is a problem and that he had suggested a small redesign that would move the reset button to a more accessible location. I don’t know if that change was ever made, but even if not, it is a minor nit to pick at best.
The second problem that I experienced was when the main fan went dead. It was a pretty simple fix – the fan is mounted on the outside of the smoker and easy to change simply by removing 4 screws, but I learned from that experience that I should have a backup fan sitting on the shelf as it would be a pain should this happen during a smoke – you are essentially dead in the water without the fan. I would recommend ordering a second fan from Cookshack. If your fan dies, they will replace it for free, but it might take a week or so to get the new one.
The final disadvantage of the FEC100 is that it does run on 120V AC, so you do need to have electrical power handy if you are going to use it. There are of course solutions for using it in the field such as deep cycle batteries, but unless you are going to do a lot of cooking away from AC power, this is probably not going to be much of a problem for you.
So, how to get it? Well, if you are lucky enough to live in BBQ country, you may very well have a local distributor in your neck of the woods. If not, I can’t speak highly enough of The Charcoal Store. The owner, Dave Naas is a great guy who is very knowledgeable about smokers and has owned a used a number of different ones himself. Being in Minnesota, he has the same weather issues that I have and he uses his FEC100 year round – even during the coldest time of the Minnesota winter. Dave spent a bunch of time with me on the phone answering my questions both before and after the sale and provides stupendous customer service.
All-in-all, I’ve owned my FEC100 for more than 2 years and have been delighted with the consistent results that I get every time I use it. I’ve smoked all kinds of meats in it and even cooked a pizza or two (that 450 degree maximum setting does come in handy from time to time). I highly recommend it to anyone who likes BBQ and tech.
BBQ, Cookshack, FEC 100