Extruded Coconut Charcoal Review

As we related earlier, a box of Komodo Sustainable Extruded Coconut Charcoal appeared on our doorstep a few weeks ago (the day before we had knee surgery, argh!). We have just posted the review which you can read at this location.

Just to recap for any of you new to this form of charcoal, back in the 2002-2004 time frame, Kamado sold a wonderful extruded coconut charcoal that was made in the Philippines. It burned reasonably long, hot and even, and made a great fuel source for long overnight cooks.

Well, rumor has it that Kamado never paid for that charcoal and thus could never get it again. So they started selling various truly dreadful formulations that produced huge amounts of ash, smelled bad, was moldy, and burned for relatively short periods of time. Most of the people who tried it were aghast.

Back in 2009, Komodo Kamado (not to be confused with the Kamado company just mentioned) attempted to source that first great coconut charcoal but discovered that for various reasons, you just can't rely on suppliers to deliver what they promise. The charcoal they obtained was "sort of ok" but it wasn't the really "good stuff."

So, Komodo Kamado went off and either bought or manufactured all the equipment they needed to produce their own charcoal, and the result is this 2011 Komodo Sustainable Extruded Coconut Charcoal. You should read the review, but let us briefly state that this is exactly what Komodo Kamado was striving for. We hope you enjoy the review!

- TNW

Custom Covers For Your Cooker

We just thought that we would share with you one of our favorite suppliers, Coverworks, makers of custom covers for just about anything you own. Coverworks is run by John Edwards who goes by "Johnnyboy" online. Previously, he has made covers for our medium Big Green Egg and Komodo Kamado cookers. Well, just today we received two new covers, one for a large Big Green Egg and one for a classic Kamado Joe. We thought owners of these popular cookers would be interested in a source for quality custom covers.

Here you can see the custom cover he made for our large Big Green Egg. All his covers are made from Sunbrella. Sunbrella is a woven synthetic canvas fabric from Glen Raven Mills, Inc. that is made of 100% solution dyed acrylic fiber by Du Pont. Sunbrella fabric comes in a range of colors and is color-fast and resistant to fading, cracking, scratching and hardening. It will resist mildew growth as well. Stretching and shrinking is minimal with Sunbrella fabric. Sunbrella products provide up to 90 percent UV protection from sun rays.

We now have all our cookers, save one, being protected from the elements by covers from Johnnyboy's Coverworks. We have been very pleased with the performance of our covers, so if you are interested, you can contact them via email at coverworks@hotmail.com.

- TNW