Good discussion. Here’s my two cents. Pellet smokers really don’t get hot enough to sear or grill, so you need the egg or a grill for that. I know of some hacks you can do, but bottom line is don’t try to seat or grill on a pellet smoker. Also the egg probably gives better flavor than pellets, but pellet smokers are much more convenient. Traeger smokers allow you to change out the wood you are using pretty easily using the trap door on the hopper. That’s a bonus if you care about varying the wood flavor based on what you’re smoking, which I do. The parts are sturdy on the Traeger (I’ve had the augur break twice on Green Mountain smokers before I gave up and bought a Traeger.) A final point worth mentioning is that fish dry out in hot smokers (defined as any smoker that heats beyond 100 deg F. If you want to smoke fish and keep it moist, minimize the temp. Fred mentioned the Traeger gets down to 155-160 deg, which is pretty good. But the best for fish IMO is a Bradley electric smoker. The heating element is outside the smoke compartment, so you can cold smoke the fish. But it’s a small compartment so you can’t smoke a lot of fish at one time. That’s all I have to offer on the subject.
