Kamado Joe - Big Block XL Lump Charcoal

The Kamado Joe XL charcoal I ordered online came into the store after two weeks, longer than I was expecting.The charcoal bag contained very few large blocks and, toward the bottom of the bag, had a large amount off charcoal ‘dust’ and tiny pieces that cannot be used in a smoker/bbq.The purchase price was right but the bottom of bag wastage made it more expensive.I bought two bags at the same time so I will be evaluating the wisdom of my purchase after finishing the second bag.

Not every bag is consistent in lump size. The lumps in most bags of this charcoal vary from gargantuan to tiny. Occasionally there are very few giant and gargantuan lumps in a bag. Often the very largest chunks are too big to be suitable for what I am grilling so I keep a hatchet handy to knock them down to merely giant size. Even knocked down to giant size they are often quite a bit larger than in other brands of lump charcoal. (I'm looking at you, Cowboy)Every bag always has settlement of the smallest charcoal bits to the bottom. This is not unique to this brand. Only the gargantuan and giant lumps will be on the top of the heap inside the bag so you must dig around some inside the bag to create good mix of large, medium, and small chunks for a long burning fire ... MoreNot every bag is consistent in lump size. The lumps in most bags of this charcoal vary from gargantuan to tiny. Occasionally there are very few giant and gargantuan lumps in a bag. Often the very largest chunks are too big to be suitable for what I am grilling so I keep a hatchet handy to knock them down to merely giant size. Even knocked down to giant size they are often quite a bit larger than in other brands of lump charcoal. (I'm looking at you, Cowboy)Every bag always has settlement of the smallest charcoal bits to the bottom. This is not unique to this brand. Only the gargantuan and giant lumps will be on the top of the heap inside the bag so you must dig around some inside the bag to create good mix of large, medium, and small chunks for a long burning fire with even heat. The smallest pieces will light quickly and they in turn kindle the medium and large chunks which then burn hot and long. Use a chimney starter for easy results. If you don't do this and only use large chunks your fire will be slow to start and then, if the lumps aren't stacked just right, -- which they won't be if you dump them out of a chimney starter -- it will never get really hot. I learned this the hard way over several bags of this brand.If you are of the mindset that you are not bothered by the little bit of extra effort required to make your fire "just right" you will love this charcoal. Get yourself some disposable kitchen gloves for handling the job of sorting chunks and rooting through the bag. If you just want to put your charcoal into your grill and light it you may find the extra effort annoying which is why I only gave it four stars.

I've bought 2 bags of kamado xl lump charcoal and both bags were full of small pieces. They both also had trash in them. They both had some sort of plastic pieces which looked like it might be mylar or something. The first bag had a half soda can and the second had some sort of clay like rocks. My coal chimney burns down halfway before it's ready. Maybe I've just had bad luck two times in a row but I will never buy it again