Apple Wood for Smoking Meat

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By

James

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Apple, cherry, pear, plum, and almond woods are all noted for providing a sweet, fruity flavor to most meats. But if you are looking for the finest option with a pleasant aroma too, applewood is an excellent use that results in a light, fruity, sweet smoke flavor!

It is excellent to use for beef, pork, chicken, and fish. Apple smoke flavors take a while to permeate the meat, so better to anticipate several hours of smoking.

Are you looking for an applewood product to compliment your smoking needs? Check it out here.

Our Top Picks


Below is a summary of the top picks from our SummerBaron.com team. To help you understand where each pick ranked, we have included “badges” next to each pick’s key findings. “Best Overall” is a combination of price and value. “Best Budget” is great for summer lovers who want a top-quality product but are on a tighter budget. “High End” is for people who just want the best, and price is no object.

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How did we pick these products?

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Our Top Pick

Folds compactly for storage and offers three different height adjustments

Easy to clean with a cup holder for baby

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Best Budget and Value

Folds compactly for storage and offers three different height adjustments

Easy to clean with a cup holder for baby

View On Amazon

More Information

Best High-End

Folds compactly for storage and offers three different height adjustments

Easy to clean with a cup holder for baby

View On Amazon

Reviews of Each Pick


Below are our detailed reviews of each product. Each product included in this review is reviewed by our team ⎯ with 1,000s of hours testing and working with products to help you pick the best one for your specific situation.

Our Top Pick
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Pros

Big chunks

Adds great flavor

Cons

Lots of smaller chunks

This Apple BBQ Smoking Chips is an excellent choice for a charcoal, gas, or electric grill. Packed with 180 cubic inches large-sized Apple BBQ Smoking Chips, it’s heat-treated to eliminate and prevent pests, mold, or rot. It guarantees you a hundred percent natural!

It is best to make a variety of appealing apple smoked meat, Beef Sirloin or Fillets, Salmon or Trout, Braised Brisket, or Pork Loin. You can name it all. 

Burger-lover? Chicken-lover? You can try this Western Premium BBQ Products Apple BBQ Smoking Chips with American favorites: Hamburgers, BBQ Smoked Wings, Baby Back or Spare Rib, or even Whole Chicken.



How to cook?

If you’re using wood chips for smoking your meats on a gas or charcoal grill, place dry wood chips in a foil pack or a smoke box and place them over the heat. Let the apple chips start smoking, and then move them to one side of your grill. Place your meat on the rack and close the lid—Cook to time or temperature you usually would, keeping the top closed as much as possible. 

If you’re using wood smoking chips in a charcoal grill, load your grill with lump charcoal. Light the charcoal using your preferred method; however, we would recommend you avoid using lighter fluid, so your meat retains the natural apple smoke flavor. Several minutes before cooking, fill a smoker tray or a foil pouch with one to two handfuls of chips. Place the tray or bag on the hottest part of the grill surface until it begins to smoke. 

Once the chips have begun smoking, move them with tongs to make room for your future meal. Add your meat to the grill, close the lid, and smoke until you achieve that excellent apple smoke flavor.

Best Budget and Value
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Pros

Great flavor

Price value was great

Smells exactly like the soap

Cons

Wood burns up too quickly

Weber Wood Apple Chips Product has chip size pieces with a delicate hint of sweet apple to a fish fillet that brings a light and refreshing feel to your plate.

This two-pound bag of wood chips can be the perfect alternative to charcoal briquettes as a heat source for grilling. Give your poultry, game birds, and pork (especially ham) a slightly sweet, fruity smoke flavour!

Best High-End
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Pros

Good smell. 

Great flavor

Cons

Very small package.

Packed in an easy to handle resealable 1-pint plastic container, Camerons Smoking chips- Kiln Dried is a 100% natural extra fine wood smoker sawdust shavings. It is perfect for your indoor electric smoking that will pair with beef, chicken, pork, big game, seafood, cheeses, and vegetables. 

It’s a great deal that it will yield approximately 30 smokings. One more thing, it will ignite quickly and combust a hundred percent. 

Are you an ultimate grill guru? You can develop your mix from 8 additional flavors: oak, pecan, alder, maple, cherry, soaked bourbon oak, hickory, and mesquite.

View On Amazon
Pros

Wood smells good 

Burned well with no smoky smell.

Cons

Overpriced

Applewood from the Iowa and Missouri Region. 100% Applewood from virgin hardwood trees that are dried, chopped and put in a box. It’s very good and smells great but is extremely expensive compared to other finer woods.

The J.C sticks are great for larger smokers and can burn for 7 hours, so if you plan on having a bbq weekend and want some wood that you don’t want to keep messing around with, just put two sticks in and your good to go.

The sticks are not too dried out, but not wet either, this adds to a terrific flavour for your beef jerky, BBQ ribs, prime steaks, and more. Soaking in water before using is not recommended, because it was ready to use. 

View On Amazon
Pros

Easy to use

Adds the smoke flavor

Cons

Too small

Before you decide on which applewood product to choose, here’s a must-check smoker box for your grilling needs. 

Char-Broil Cast Iron Smoker Box is an Amazon’s Choice for stainless steel smoker box. It forces wood chips to smolder rather than flame. The chips smolder within the Cast Iron Box to add flavour with no mess. It can be used with gas, charcoal, and electric grills. It has a dimension of 1.38″ x 5.13″ x 8.12″, and weighs 4.2 lbs.

This features a durable cast iron body and lid and vented to direct smoke towards food. It has weight and is quality; If you don’t run over it with a tank or otherwise try your best to destroy it, it will outlast your smoker or grill, which is what many people wanted. Tried numerous other smoker boxes and none had these large vents and most had to be thrown away after several seasons of smoking and grill. 

Each one holds about 2 cups of smoking chips or dust or pellets. Because of the dense cast iron construction, these smoker boxes can be placed on a hot grill or the lower rack above the flame in a smoker or grill.

Once you get past the heavyweight compared to the almost feather-weigh of the other smoker boxes, you will see how much these are!

Final Takeaway

Different woods impart different flavors. So you might want to try apple wood for pork, sausages, and chicken that is sauced; oak for chicken, duck, turkey, beef, and fish; alder if you can find it almost everything including cold smoking cheese; and mesquite for beef as a last resort. 

Or for milder meats – chicken, fish, pork – you might prefer fruit and light nut woods. For heartier meats like game and beef, you might prefer oak, hickory, and small amounts of mesquite.

I’ll consider smoking and grilling flavors as a matter of experimentation. Cooking is an art, though.

About The Author


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Reviewed by

James

James is a writer who is a self-confessed kitchenware and coffee nerd and a strong advocate of Sundays, good butter, and warm sourdough.