Secondary effects of high temperatures

[Lightning]

Over the years, my hard used kettle's  lid vent got gunked up with grease and wouldn't turn unless it was hot.  The grill likewise had hard gunked on grease near the ends of the bars that wouldn't come off no matter what I did.  Two nights ago, I used the Kettle Pizza I bought three years ago for the first time and buried the thermometer well past 700 Fahrenheit.  It couldn't have been that far off a thousand degrees Fahrenheit.  The pizzas cooked in under two minutes each and they were great, but on cleaning up the grill the day after, I discovered that all the gunked up crap was gone from the grill and the stuff jamming the lid vent had gone too so it spins freely cold again for the first time in years.  I guess it doubled as an oven self clean cycle for the kettle, which also makes me glad I let it burn down for quite a while before cooking the pizzas.  They probably wouldn't have turned out well at all if I whipped them through while the crap was still burning off.

Still, good to know for future reference that this is one way of getting rid of the really stubborn grease...

[Travis]

Ha! That's a hell of a fire and heat to do that! Looks like a St. Louis heat wave!




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[mike.stavlund]

Yeah I used an old grate in my Kettle Pizza setup, and it came out almost perfectly clean!

[greenweb]

That's neat!  2 questions for you.

1. any damage to your kettle outside porcelain finish?
2. how much charcoal did you use- normal 1 full charcoal starter load or more.

Thanks,

[MacEggs]

@Lightning , check out this thread of mine after the first use of the KP.  Lots of gunk got burnt off.  Almost like a self-cleaning oven.

http://weberkettleclub.com/forums/bbq-food-pics/kettlepizza-first-time-firing-it-up/

[EricD]

Can I borrow someones Kettle Pizza I need to 'clean' my kettle!!!

[Lightning]

I took a look at the kettle after and the lower bowl was unscathed but the porcelain on the outside of the lid showed a bit of discolouration on the side that had been over the fire.  I'm giving some thought to reserving this kettle for high temperature work like the Kettle Pizza and picking up a second for everything else.

The first time I used the Kettle Pizza, I used a chimney filled level to the top with Royal Oak briquettes and two small logs and the second time, another chimney the same way but only one piece of wood. I think I might cut down the amount of charcoal next time because I still buried the thermometers and I'd like to try cooking pizzas in the correct pizza temperature range on the gauge.