Kamado Joe Jr 13.5 inch Charcoal Grill in Blaze Red

Ive owned a large Big Green Egg for over 20 years. The quality is excellent and I love grilling/smoking on it. But cooking for me and my wife the large egg is sometimes overkill. Firing it up for a couple steaks or pork chops seems extreme. Id been looking at the Mini Max but couldnt justify the price. I started looking at the Joe Jr, its the same size as the Mini Max, at a more budget friendly price. It was delivered to my home packaged very well! I unpacked it and set it up on my deck. The quality is every bit as good at BGE it also includes standard the heat deflector, ash tool and grill gripper which are options on the BGE. I fired it up and did a reverse sear on a Tri Tip roast. It held 250° easily for the smoking period. I removed the roast, took out the deflector, opened the top and bottom vents fully. The temp quickly rose to over 600° for searing. The Tri tip turned out perfectly! Im very pleased with this grill/smoker and would recommend it to anyone!

I purchased a Akorn Jr previously from Walmart.com. I really liked it but after 3 years even leaving the smoker covered outside, it completely rusted out causing the grill temp unable to be controlled. The Akorn was purchased on sale for less than half of what it sells for normally, so I decided to upgrade to a ceramic grill. The Kamado Joe Jr was on sale for a hundred dollars off regular price and with free shipping. It arrived perfectly intact from FedEx ground shipping. Nothing to put together. I made a nice table for it since it is too short to use without something to lift it to a comfortable height. It has proved to be easy to light and adjust the temp. It gets hot quickly. Looks nice too.