To this point my only experience with pulled pork has been consuming it. Therefore, I have plenty of questions. I've checked the recipe site, so I'm hoping I'm set on preparing and cooking stages, but anything additional advice would definitely be appreciated. My first question is what cut of meat should I use? I typically hear shoulder or butt or boston butt. Are there major differences between them? I know the boston butt has a bone through the middle (not sure about the others). How does that effect the cooking through the middle of the meat and where would I want to position the therm probe? Also, do you guys typically brine the meat or just rub and smoke?
What you want is a pork shoulder, butt end.
A whole pork shoulder has a shank (picnic) and a butt end. Also called a boston butt.
Sometimes I brine, I depends on the timing(how much time I have)
I rub it, wrap and plastic and let it rest in the fridge 24 hours.
Pre-heat the smoker.
I put four hours of smoke on @205F and continue to cook @205F until an IT of 195-200F.
FTC for at least an hour.
Pull and enjoy.
Here's a pic of the meat map.
(http://i276.photobucket.com/albums/kk7/flbentrider/bradley/pork.jpg)
I've done 2 so far. I've preheated the smoker to 250º before I put the meat in. When you open the door and put the meat in the temp drops down to where I'd like it. I've set the temp on my PID at 220º but because of the size of the meat and it's temp the temp of smoker drops further and usually remains around 205º. I smoke for 4 hours and the last time I used hickory. Of course you can choose your favorite.
Allow plenty of time. My last one was a 7 lber and it took 22 hours. Then I FTCed.
Never had one with a bone. I got the boneless ones. I put my probe right in the middle or as close to it as I could guesstimate ;).
I've haven't tried brining and have only rubbed it. I used this one. http://www.susanminor.org/forums/showthread.php?86-Pulled-Pork-and-Sauce
Wow, 22 hours for 7lbs? Hopefully I'm not getting in over my head here. You can FTC for up to 6-8 hours though, right?
With the probe, my question was more for if the meat had the bone in it still. Since the bone goes through the middle do you just put the probe next to it? I didn't know if it would effect the temp reading.
Try to get your probe in the thickest part of the meat without being interfered with by the bone. The bone or fat will give you inaccurate readings.
db, smoking a Butt is very time consuming, but very rewarding.
You can't hardly mess one up.
FTC'ing for 6 to 8 hours is on the far end of the stretch, but up to 5 is probably more like it.
been several post on Turbo cooking butts at 250* or more and the results were very good
and cuts down on your cook time.
The bone doesn't run all the way thru the Butt so there is a part that the probe can be placed.
Get you a Butt and go for it. You will be pleased.
RAF128 - gotta a question ... where do you put the PID controller probe relative to the pork when you cook it? Is it above, below and by how much?
I put the PID temp probe just below the lowest rack of meat.
Thanks- that was my plan but wanted to check with the experts.
Quote from: BuyLowSellHigh on April 28, 2010, 08:51:33 AM
RAF128 - gotta a question ... where do you put the PID controller probe relative to the pork when you cook it? Is it above, below and by how much?
I drilled a hole in the top of my smoker and feed it in that way. I goes down about ½ way in my 6 rack and ends up beside or just barely below the meat.
Thanks!
I am a fan of the Turbo method Classic talked about. Cuts down on time significantly and was awesome.
Since I'm cooking without a PID, I may end up turbo cooking whether I want to or not ;) I'll probably try something in between. I won't be cooking it at 205F, but I probably won't be at 250F either. Somewhere around 230F might be a good comprimise. Ideally I should try one at the low end and one at the high end so I can compare.
I found with my digital 6 rack that there is quite a diffence between the temp shown on the PID and the temp displayed on the Bradley. The Bradley is quite a bit higher. Before I got the PID everything seems to take a lot longer. IMO it's because of the temp difference. When the is set on the Bradley it's lower than the actual temp. I believe it's because of the location of the sensor.
Difference between Low and slow and Turbo are;
Low & Slow
Put food in Bradley
Drink several adultry beverages
Take long nap
Wake up and change water
Drink more adultry beverages
Take second long nap
Wake up and take food out.
Turbo is:
Put food in Bradley
Drink several Adultry beverages
take long nap
wake up and remove food.
I like the two drink two nap method. ;D
That seems like sound logic to me, I think we all could use a few more drinks and an extra nap.
and the Turbo allows you to drink, nap, eat as stated by Classic but then go play golf and drink more
is there a general rule of thumb for how many people per pound (pre-cooked weight) of meat?An 8 pound butt would feed x many people?
Depends on how hungry they are and what else you're serving. Last Saturday we had 8 adults. A 7 lber fed them all with enough left over for 4 more sandwiches the next day. We had plenty of other things too like potatoe salad etc. Normally I'd say ½ lb each.
roughly figure 50% of usable meat per raw weight.
ie: an 8lb butt will give you 4lbs of pulled pork
Approx 16 1/4lb sammies.
You will probably get a little better than 50%.
Sounds good, thanks.
I'm trying to put together some food for my wife's graduation party (so that shows my age) next weekend. I would like to do this, but the wife is skeptical since I've never made it before. Maybe she would be less skeptical if she actually ate any of the stuff I make (she's not a meat eater sadly, chicken is about all she'll do.) The alternative would be to make ribs, which would be no problem for me. I just think we would get a lot more bang for our buck on the pulled pork.
As a alternative, and to keep cost down, you can make pulled chicken or pulled turkey.
Quote from: db14 on April 29, 2010, 09:30:36 AM
Sounds good, thanks.
I'm trying to put together some food for my wife's graduation party (so that shows my age) next weekend. I would like to do this, but the wife is skeptical since I've never made it before. Maybe she would be less skeptical if she actually ate any of the stuff I make (she's not a meat eater sadly, chicken is about all she'll do.) The alternative would be to make ribs, which would be no problem for me. I just think we would get a lot more bang for our buck on the pulled pork.
That many butts, I would find a place to buy a case, like a Sam's.
should be less than $1.10 lb.
Quote from: classicrockgriller on April 29, 2010, 02:14:15 PM
That many butts, I would find a place to buy a case, like a Sam's.
should be less than $1.10 lb.
If only I had the freezer space for that.
A case is 8 buts packed in 2's