I just read this article:

http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2015/05/05/harvard-class-cooks-ultimate-bbq-smoker/0O4fLQ0rbt9qMGsllPoTjK/story.html?p1=Article_Trending_Most_Viewed

and found it to be really interesting idea. I’m curious because all of the historical bbq joints (I’m reading aaron franklin’s book right now *) seem to use side fireboxes where you do full combustion of wood which is supposed to achieve a much cleaner smoke and then the amount of “heat” allowed in the cook chamber is controlled in various ways vs. these upright drum smoker variants where the heat and smoke are the same area as the meat and you have to control the heat in the smoking chamber by controlling combustion which results in smoking via smoldering (supposedly a dirtier tasting smoke flavor).

I wonder if the nerds (my highest commendation) who took this, the greatest class in history, were thinking in terms of flavor or mostly temperature control from a scientific standpoint (like i have been since basically about two weeks ago).