We just recently reviewed Cowboy's "Mixed Hardwood" lump charcoal from Mexico, so now we move on to Cowboy's "Oak and Hickory"
lump charcoal which is made in the USA.
We use quote marks around the oak and hickory because close inspection of the bag reveals that this charcoal
is predominantly Southern Oak and
MAY include hickory and other southern hardwoods. So your "oak and hickory" charcoal MAY
contain hickory? Not a great way to win customers.
But let's move on and see how the charcoal performed in our tests. First of all, we will point out the easy
open bag. The bag is sealed with the usual paper tape folded over the top and secured with string stitching.
But there is also a tan strip of paper under the stitching that when pulled, miraculously undoes the stitching.
Maybe other manufacturers will copy this method and put an end to all the lottery ticket videos on the internet.
You can see a photo of this tan tape here.
As usual, the first thing we do is spread
the charcoal out on the ground for sorting and inspection. We didn't find anything unusual in the bag. We did
find four small rocks, but even after deducting the weight of the rocks, the bag was still over its advertised
weight.
As for size distribution, as you can see in the following table, it was pretty miserable with
nearly 60% of the bag being small pieces. The
5.4% chips and dust is Low (
) compared to all other brands tested,
but the amount of small pieces is quite large.
| Large |
2.1 pounds |
11.4% |
| Medium |
4.6 pounds |
25.3% |
| Small |
10.6 pounds |
57.9% |
| Chips/Dust |
2.0 pounds |
5.4% |
|
|
|
| Total |
18.3 pounds |
|
|
We test the ease of lighting by seeing how many sheets of newspaper it takes to get a fire going in a standard
Weber chimney starter. Cowboy took only 2 sheets to get going which is Very Low (
)
compared to other brands. Very few brands of charcoal are as easy to start as this one. The smell of the charcoal
smoke as it burns is surprisingly mild, about as mild as we have ever observed. If you don't like smoke flavor, this
charcoal might be worth looking into. And while the charcoal was starting there was no popping and only mild sparking.
The maximum temperature test also proved to be a strong point of this charcoal. It burned at 967°F which is
Very High () compared to other brands. There was very little sparking
and popping while the charcoal was burning. The fire spread rapidly, which is no surprise in light of how easy this
charcoal is to start.
Next is our burn time test and Cowboy Oak and Hickory Lump Charcoal burned an extremely long time. It ranks number 2
on the all time list. Needless to say, this ranks Very High ().
This should come as no surprise in view of how light this charcoal is. Cowboy must be cooking it to a relatively
high temperature which increases the ratio of carbon to other components in the charcoal. Since carbon burns longer
per pound than all the other components, a light charcoal will burn longer. This also accounts for the very mild
smoke. Also, when lighting with a MAP/Pro torch, again there was very little sparking and popping. Of course,
always exercise caution when using a torch of any type to light lump charcoal.
Finally, the amount of ash produced by Cowboy Oak and Hickory Lump Charcoal was
Low () compared to other brands.
So what we have here is a charcoal which is insanely easy to light, burns hot and long, and produces very little ash. But
unfortunately, the size distribution is miserable. And then there's the fact that their "oak and hickory" charcoal may not
even contain any hickory at all. Normally, a charcoal of this caliber would get a Highly Recommended rating, but due to
its poor size distribution, we can only give it a Recommended rating with an asterisk, where the asterisk stands for
"...if you don't mind the size of the pieces."
