Oooooh! you are making my mouth water. Steve in Baltimor

Oh, Don. You are a tease. I love smoked meats and when I lived in Socal I smoked everything (legal) that I could lay my hands on. I've never used olive wood but I can imagine it's nice. I had great results with butterflied leg of lamb smokes over apple chips.

Smart & Final - I used to go there all the time:)

I am new to smokers, we bought one(electric) yesterday, and used it today, the meat was okay, but the water in the pan did all the smoking, the wood chips did not do anything except turn a little black. Any suggestions. I noticed in your post you used a marinade in the water pan? should we have used a marinade instead of water, and we did soak our wood chips first should we have left them dry. Thanks anybody for any help we would like some good smoked meat.

Okay Don, you've made me hungry.
Keep it up buddy and you'll have the Garden Party knocking on your door.:0)

Wow, I was just at S&F and looked at the brisket. They also have turkeys now getting ready for turkey day. Almost bought something but decided to wait.

To answer Caroll, I soak the wood chips at least for a couple of hrs. and wrap them in foil then place on the heat element. Punch a few holes in the foil. Slow heat is usually better and long times are required. Many cuts that are smoked are some of the tougher cuts and need the longer times to get tender. Also with brisket I put it in a pan to cook in it's juices with open top for smoke flavor.

If you can control the temp that helps. Some smokers have better heat controls. Much of the art of smoking is experimental and discovery is a big part of it. There is a forum on THS for outdoor cooking and gobs of info on the web. I am by no means an expert, just a back yard experimenter.

Jan, any time. Would love to have you for dinner.

Here is a link that might be useful: Cooking Outdoors

Well now you've done it.
Not only am I considering buying a Sock Monkey Kit and trying my hand at sewing, I clicked on that cooking link and the Turkey Help thread
has me thinking i'll take curlylocks advice on cooking
my turkey on the grill.

Help! someone stop me, PLEASE.
Michelle and Maryanne, you need not respond to my pleas for help with the grilling part. I seem to remember something about y'all lighting a grill once and oh! never mind, i'll just go ahead a blow the darn thing up, i've had my eye on one of those fancy smancy stainless steel grilling machines anyway. Maybe if I had one of those high dollar sewing machines it would help with those little sock monkeys.
Heck, maybe I could do little monograms on their little
tails.

Turn off your computer Don, before you create a monster here. I'm on a roll. ME, cooking a turkey on the grill and making little sock monkeys, who'd thunk it.;0)

Go for it Jan!

For the record, Jan, the matches were wet and we were in complete control! I get a lot of use out of our fancy schmancy stainless steel grilling machine. Steve got one of those teeny cast iron smoker boxes for it, but he's really eying electric smokers. We've been making wild game sausages and he wants to be able to smoke them too so I'm sure it's only a matter of time...

Jan, if you do sew those sock monkeys, please let me know. I've got some muslin lying around and could sew the cutest little white jackets for your lil' stocking simians. I'd make the sleeves reeeeeaaally long... and they'd fasten in the back with cute little buckles... ;-)