I have been intrigued by the Jealous Devil brand of charcoal for a while now. Jealous Devil make several different styles of charcoal including lump, rods and briquettes. They also sell a line of wood pellets and logs. The branding for the Jealous Devil products looks pretty cool.
After reading the sales information on their website I decided to give the Jealous Devil briquettes a try.
What Makes Jealous Devil Charcoal Briquettes Special?
The marketing material from Jealous Devil says that their “Maxxx Briquets” are made from 95% Quebracho Blanco Hardwood and 5% vegetable starch. The product contains no borax, nitrates, etc which results in a long, hot burn time with extremely low ash production.
The briquettes are are Extra Large and come with the claim that Bigger is Better.
The charcoal comes in a 10 pound resealable plastic bag that has a carrying handle on the side.
Jealous Devil vs Kingsford
Jealous Devil markets itself as an upgrade over Kingsford and takes a few fun passing shots at the blue bag charcoal on their website. I decided to check out the two brands “Head to Head” to see what the big differences were.
Right off the bat it is obvious that the Jealous Devil briquettes are much larger than Kingsford. I weighed a bunch of briquettes and found that the average weight of a JD briquette was 57 grams compared to 25 grams for a Kingsford briquette.
By weight Jealous Devil is 130% large Kingsford which is about the same difference you see visually.
I loaded up two charcoal chimneys, one with JD and one with Kingsford, and recorded the weight of how much of each brand was used. I lit the chimneys and placed them into foil pans to catch all of the ashes.
I let the charcoal burn completely down in both chimneys which took about two and a half hours. I did not take exact notes on burn time but my casual observations did not notice any meaningful differences.
When the charcoal had completely burned I removed the chimneys. The ash production looked very similar between the two products (Kingsford on the Left, JD on the Right).
I weighed the amount of residual ash from each burn and compared it to the initial weight of the charcoal placed in the chimney to calculate a percent ash composition.
Kingsford: Start Weight = 1,606 grams, Ash Weight = 291 grams = 18% Residual Ash Composition
Jealous Devil: Start Weight = 1,779 grams, Ash Weight = 298 grams = 17% Residual Ash Composition.
The last time I measured the Residual Ash Composition of Kingsford (See B&B Charcoal Review) I measured a value of 21% so this burn yielded a slightly lower result.
That being said, while the Jealous Devil product might have slightly less ash production than Kingsford, I did not see anything to support the marketing claim that the Jealous Devil briquettes have extremely low ash production.
Grilling with Jealous Devil Briquettes
Burning a bunch of charcoal in a chimney is one thing but putting it to use in your grill is what really matters.
I filled another chimney about 2/3 full with Jealous Devil, got it lit and banked it on the side of my Weber kettle. I kept the top and bottom vents completely open for maximum heat and, after about 15 minutes the kettle was running plenty hot.
I loaded up the grill with an assortment of steaks and sausages and proceeded to have a fun grilling session. I had some of the steaks wrapped in bacon so I could have fun searing them off over the coals.
I had a lot of fun cooking up this meat feast and had no complaints about the performance of the charcoal. Jealous Devil burned well, gave off plenty of heat and did not impart any funky flavors onto the meat.
Overall Impressions
My overall impression is that Jealous Devil Maxxx Extra Large Briquets is an okay charcoal that is more about marketing than performance.
I did not find any meaningful performance differences between this product and Kingsford Blue.
Notable Differences From Kingsford
The main differences I did see between the products are:
JD briquettes are 130% larger than Kingsford.
JD branding is “sexier” than Kingsford.
JD comes in a re-closeable plastic bag with a carrying handle while Kingsford’s bag is paper.
JD costs over twice as much on a per pound basis as Kingsford.
As far as the packaging is concerned I have a personal bias towards Kingsford paper bag. I like to rip of sections of the Kingsford bag to help light the chimney. I also hate the fact that the plastic bag from JD is going to end up in a landfill.
Bottom Line: Jealous Devil briquettes are an okay product but I will not be buying them again.