Cheap Charcoal for the 4th

trailboss wrote........I think that moderation is the key, along with genetics predisposing people to issues. I tried the charcoal that had lighter fluid in it...I think it is called match burn...sucked donkey balls, felt like I was eating gasoline infused meats. I never use any petroleum products to start my coals, I use a chimney starter, have been doing so for decades.

Kingsford Brand Charcoal ingredients

By JOE O'CONNELL, cbbqa past President



Kingsford Brand Charcoal Briquettes are the best selling briquettes in the U.S. They are also widely used by many veteran barbecue experts, including cooks at barbecue contests.



Some claim that Kingsford briquettes have an unpleasant odor, especially when they are first lit, and many wonder if they contain any petroleum products. After an investigation, it has been determined that neither Kingsford Brand nor any other known commercial charcoal briquettes contain any petroleum products. (At this point I think Joe assumes the bbq'er would never use match light briquettes)



Kingsford ingredients

Kingsford sends a form letter in response to consumers' questions about the ingredients. According to the form letter sent in August, 2000, Kingsford contains the following ingredients:



wood char

mineral char

mineral carbon

limestone

starch

borax

sodium nitrate

sawdust

Purpose of ingredients

There so many ingredients because the addition of each requires another to offset its negative affect. For example, in order to make the briquets easier to light, sodium nitrate is added. But then limestone is added so that, when the briquettes get started, they have the typical light-ash color.



Here are the purposes for each of the ingredients:



wood char: for heat

mineral char: also for heat

mineral carbon: also for heat

limestone: for the light-ash color

starch: to bind the other ingredients

borax: press release

sodium nitrate: to speed the ignition

sawdust: to speed the ignition

History of the charcoal briquette

Around 1915, Henry Ford was using large amount of wood to manufacture automobiles. Ford operated a sawmill in the forests around Iron Mountain, Michigan to make the wooden parts, so there were piles of wood scraps. Ford learned of a process, which had been developed and patented by Orin F. Stafford, which involved chipping wood into small pieces, converting them into charcoal, grinding the charcoal into powder, adding a binder and compressing the mix into the now-familiar, pillow-shaped briquettes. By 1921, a charcoal-making plant was in full operation.



According to Kingsford:



E. G. Kingsford, a lumberman who owned one of Ford's earliest automobile sales agencies and was distantly related, briefly served as manager of the briquette operation. A company town was built nearby and named Kingsford. In 1951, an investment group bought the plant, renamed the business the Kingsford Chemical Company, and took over operations. Its successor, The Kingsford Products Company, was acquired by The Clorox Company of Oakland, California, in 1973.



Today, KINGSFORD charcoal is manufactured from wood charcoal, anthracite coal, mineral charcoal, starch, sodium nitrate, limestone, sawdust, and borax. The wood and other high-carbon materials are heated in special ovens with little or no air. This process removes water, nitrogen and other elements, leaving almost pure carbon.



The briquettes do not contain petroleum or any petroleum by-products. KINGSFORD charcoal briquettes with mesquite contain the same high-quality ingredients as KINGSFORD, but with the addition of real mesquite wood throughout.



Manufacturing briquettes begins with preparing the wood charcoal using one of the following methods:



Retort processing -- Waste wood is processed through a large

furnace with multiple hearths (called a retort) in a

controlled-oxygen atmosphere. The wood is progressively

charred as it drops from one hearth to the next.



Kiln processing -- The waste wood is cut into slabs and stacked in

batches in a kiln that chars the wood in a

controlled-oxygen atmosphere.



Once the wood charcoal is prepared, it is crushed and combined with the other ingredients, formed into pillow-shaped briquettes and dried. The advantage of using charcoal over wood is that charcoal burns hotter with less smoke. [See the discussion of Kingsford described below.]

At issue is coal's content of uranium and thorium, both radioactive elements. They occur in such trace amounts in natural, or "whole," coal that they aren't a problem. But when coal is burned into fly ash, uranium and thorium are concentrated at up to 10 times their original levels.