Here at Beans, Bullets, Bandages & You we are all about dual purpose devices, and the Orion Smoker certainly fits into that category. This is a product we can use in good times as well as if the Stuff Hits The Fan (SHTF).
In this case, we are trying out our (Mammy & The Man Of The House‘s) joint Christmas present to each other – An Orion convection cooker and smoker.
The Cooker/Smoker Is Entirely Propane & Electricity Free
We wanted non-electric, non-gas cooker and smoker in under $200 price.
We chose original size; it will easily cook and smoke 4 racks of ribs; 15-20 brats or sausages. That’s plenty for family of 2-4.
Here are the specs of the smoker strait from the Orion website:
- 1 Poultry Stand and Lifting Handle
- Stainless Steel Ash Removal Tray.
- Deep Drip Pan
- Pre-Drilled Wireless Probe Slot
- 3 Rib Hangers
- 3 Cooking Grates
- Cookbook and Manual
- Everything you need to start cooking is included (Ed. Except the fuel and the food, of course)
Here’s Orion’s official advertising blurb:
The Orion Cooker® is a new, innovative outdoor convection cooker that uses three cooking processes simultaneously: convection, steam and smoke (if desired).
This cooking process couldn’t be any easier and yields incredible results every time.
Using 100% indirect heat to create a convection current, there is absolutely no cooking maintenance with drastically reduced cook times.
When compared to traditional smokers, the Orion Cooker is unmatched in cooking speed.
Charcoal & Wood
Orion recommends to use match light charcoal as coals and food never intermingle with this design. The smoking chips – dry – are loaded around drip pan at bottom of cooker. We used apple for pork and chicken tonight.
You should be able to replace the charcoal outside with wood, but that will make a longer cooking/smoking time. That’s something we plan on experimenting with in the future.
The cooker uses absolutely no propane or electricity.
So How Did The Smoker / Cooker Do?
Orion offers the following cooking chart on their website for our model of smoker / cooker:
Some users have reported doing 7# loin roasts in an hour, and said it was nearly too long of a cooking time.
We were doing a 10 # roast, cut in half into two 5 # roasts, and we decided to guess it to take about 1 hr 10 minutes, and would confirm doneness by thermometer (note to self: remote thermometer in our future).
We popped the lid at 1 hour 10 minutes and perfection. Do note that nothing but instant light charcoal is recommended by Orion, but in an emergency we feel we could use wood and get enough heat to use with additional time & slower cooking.
The meat Is contained with only the smoking wood so chemical free; can use anything outside smoker because it does not come in contact with food inside.
This is about 30 minutes in – juice and smoke is really starting to pour out of the cooker. It’s supposed to do that. I could hear the meat popping and sizzling inside.
I went out again about 10 minutes and we’cracked it open to check the internal temp. The smoker is unique in many ways, including the “set and forget” no-peek cooking. You smoke/cook by weight and time chart and do NOT open until the time is up.
An hour and 10 minutes we pulled it. The bottom rack loin and all but thickest end of top rack loin was 160+; thickest part of top rack roast was 150. We brought it in and foiled it to finish cooking.
Here’s what the results looked like:
Next Up In The Smoker / Cooker? Chicken
We then put frozen boneless skinless chicken breasts on top rack to smoke since coals were still hot.
Chicken breasts, frozen, took about 40 minutes top rack after removing the loin and without adding any more coals.
The results of chicken: very very moist; smoky flavor throughout.
They were cooked/smoked from frozen; Great Value generic Walmart brand. We’ll try a bunch from start sometime instead of just trying after a loin; cooking time probably pretty darned quick.
The Unit
This is the unit after putting all the accessories in for storage. The flat things on top are to hang racks of ribs vertical. Can do three hung racks and another rack on the three horizontal grill racks. In the center is the removable poultry stand to smoke chickens and turkeys.
Unit requires simple assembly.
No info on using wood outside the cooker in an emergency, but we think it would work,but cooking times would be longer and not as hot. Need to research online.
Unit is 100% stainless steel; outside needs no maintenance. We will store ours covered in garage.
Assembly took about 20 minutes.
Company offers full line of accessories and spare parts. We got the “original” size, there are three sizes.
Customer service is outstanding and well reviewed.
Biggest selling points: long-lasting stainless; convection engineering cooks AND smokes in fraction of time of normal smokers.
Disclaimer: We have no affiliation with either the manufacturer or the vendor for the cooker, and all items mentioned in this article were paid for out by Mammy & The Man Of The House.
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Thank you for the Article Mammy
Ok, to be perfectly honest I’m not so sure about this product, mainly because of the ‘quickness’ of cooking time.
I’m one of these old farts that is into slowwwwww cooking in a smoker, my outdated thinking is that a hunk of meat should cook very slowly and absorb the ‘smoke’ more and cook slower for the tenderness.
I look at the cooking time chart provided, it’s about 1/3 the cooking time of ‘Normal’ slow cooker…. Sorry sounds like this unit is wayyyyyy to hot. I want the ‘rub’ and smoke and juices to have time to intertwine and marinate more when cooking. A set of Baby-Back-Ribs in 1hour 15 min. is not going to get the same results, might as well toss em in the oven and smear some Liquid Smoke on them.
I look at this as the Microwave – in the “slow cooker” world.
Again thank for the Article. Keep on Smok’in……
PS; yes a good old ‘Charcoal Bullet Smoker’ for $60 is not a bad way to go.
Plus that thing looks like a pain to stack the charcoal on the top, than get access to the innards.
Could you comment on the amount of charcoal needed to cook in this unit vs. say a Volcano Stove or a charcoal BBQ unit? From the pictures looks like a fair bit of charcoal burning around that unit. Results sound WONDERFUL #Yum 🙂 I might print out this article as a Birthday Gift to me….
Charcoal is pretty easy to make from junk firewood, limbs, knotty un split able bits and such using a steel container and a vent hole to “Cook” the wood into charcoal. I’ve taught my Boy Scouts years ago when they actually made things how to make charcoal as part of the homemade forge build out.
Mammy’s not available to sign in at the moment but I forwarded your message to her and here’s her reply:
“Our first trial took a full 11 lb bag of match light charcoal. There are two charcoal chambers….the ring at the bottom and the ring at the top. The double chamber design creates an internal convection to speed cooking the food. The 11 lb bag kept the cooker cooking at an acceptable level for probably 5 hours, which is long enough for a number of different cookings. We have a lot of playing to do with it so we’ll update info as we go…”