Major breakthrough on naturals

[Aggroman]

OK... after some moderate success in trying different techniques in
getting my lump charcoal to stay hot I've finally discovered the
ultimate secret. I was asking the owner of a local shisha
den if I could buy some of his charcoal and he told me that whatever I
was using was probably just fine; it was all about how I was preparing
it.

Here is how it's done right:

- Fire the coals up on the stove in a pot with about 5 evenly spaced
1/2 cm diameter holes in the bottom (a good shisha place will carry
these pre-made).  Only cook them for 5 minutes at the most as you
dont' want to burn them out prematurely.

- Next he directed me to a local store where I bought a small charocal
holder, just a very simple tin 6x9 inch box on legs with no top. 
No holes, nothing.  Just plain tin so that it gets very hot very
quickly.  After your coals are lit, you put them in here and leave
it outside or at the window.

- Now here is the key.  Your first go won't be that successful
because you first need to build up some ashes in the tray.  This
is what will insulate your coals and get them white hot.  Once you
have a good pile of nice ash, you just dump your lit coals on top of
this and 99% of them will be nice and white after about 10 minutes.

This has been the end to what has been a major nightmare for me.  I hope it helps some of you. 

Cheers.

[[LB]]

a guy at a hookah bar showed me this too once when i asked him how he
got his natural charcoals so good. Even then i find grabbing a golden
charcoal and lighting it, then trowing it on my bowl within 3 minutes
is faster. 

[Donkeema]

so hows the shisha been getting along then.

and how long has your coal been lasting for ?

would love to own a hookah shop sadly...i dont damn !

[Aggroman]

I'd really love to get my hands on some of this Golden quicklight stuff
if it's as close to naturals as everyone says it is.  Best part
about the quicklights is that there's not just a damned mess to clean
up.   I tried switching back to 3 Kings after going the natural
route and there's simply no comparison for me.  The 3 Kings tastes
like #($* in comparison.


Now that I'm doing things right I'll have to re-evaluate which are the
best coals.  So far, the generic stuff from the local bakala burns
nicely for about 30 min (1 inch chunks), but I have some bags of
African stuff and some other unlabeled bags from the Shisha shop that
I'm curious to try.  We'll see... all I know is that after 2
fairly frustrating months I'm smoking like a champ again

[Dr Hookah]

Aggroman save your money. To me, quick lights taste real bad and can
ruin your experience. I buy Lazzari Fuels Mesquite Orangewood Natural
Hardwood and I cook it in a little $40 party grill that I bought from
Target that you plug the small cans of propane into and it has a round
burner in it. Then I stick the charcoal in a charcoal chimney that I
bought for $10 from Home Depot. Lazzari Fuels Mesquite will work good
as well but if you can get a hold of the Orangewood, you will be set.
Good luck in your search.