Should You Pre-Cook Meat Before Smoking It?

Smokers have become incredibly popular in recent years since the food these cooking gadgets produce is always bursting with flavor, but there is a downside. The best way to cook with a smoker is low and slow which means the process can be pretty time-consuming. One way people try to get around this is by pre-cooking the meat before smoking it. To find out whether this is actually a good idea, we reached out to Robbie Shoults, celebrity chef, third-generation owner of Bear Creek Smokehouse, owner of Marshall Mercantile and High Horse, and founder of Bear Rubz Grillin' Spices.

"I would not recommend pre-cooking meat before you smoke it," Shoults told Tasting Table. "If you've already got your smoker fired up, just let it do all the work for you, and I promise you will be happy with the end result as long as you take your time and don't rush."

If you're new to smoking meat and hoping to find some good tricks to level up your game, it might be tempting to try this pre-cooking shortcut, but it's not worth it. This is especially true if you plan on pre-cooking ahead of time. The USDA warns that if you only partially cook meat and store it in the fridge to cook later you are increasing the likelihood of foodborne illness even if you plan on fully cooking it later. It's much better to fully cook the meal from start to finish on the smoker.

Increased risk of stomach pains aside, smokers are designed to cook the meat all the way through. If you decide that smokers take too long to cook and want to start using it as a quick flavoring tool, you're missing out on a lot of what makes smoked meat so great. After all, you can get a little smoky flavor onto anything with just a splash of liquid smoke if that's what you're looking for.

Whether you're smoking a delicious chunk of brisket or getting ready for a rack of ribs, there's simply no substitute for low and slow cooking. Your patience will inevitably be rewarded with more tender and more flavorful meats. You better believe that if there was a way to get the same quality of meat in half the time people would be all over it — us included. But if you want to smoke meat the right way, you have to put in the time. If you're really in a hurry to get the cooking done quickly you may want to consider trying a different, quicker style of cooking and pulling the smoker out a different day when you're not so crunched for time.