First Attempt - Pulled Pork

[SoCalBill]

Went to Costco and got 16lbs of pork shoulder. I CYM and Butt Rubbed them on Thursday night. Friday I set the Auber to 225 and filled the smoke generator with 4.5 hours of Apple and Hickory pucks.  I used a large aluminum disposable tray and filled it 50/50 water and apple juice.

They went in at 5:30PM. I put the larger cut on the bottom and the smaller above. The large piece hit 195 at 11:00AM and the smaller at 1:30PM. It took longer than I planned for, but the dinner party isn't until tomorrow. I FTC both for 3 hours and was amazed at how hot they still were.

Here are the pics.. Taste was awesome.

The larger of the two


Smaller one


Wife snapped a pick with I was picking. I love these gloves too


Final product. As I said the dinner party isn't until tomorrow so I covered with heavy foil. I'll add a little apple juice and put into the oven to warm back up.


And if that wasn't enough..... This is going in the smoker in 2 hours....9.5lb of Brisket

[ArnieM]

Pork looks good Bill, but that brisket will probably take 12 hours.

[SoCalBill]

I was going to giving myself 15 hours cook time at 225 plus 2 more for the FTC. 17 hours total. Do you think that is too much time? i just need to make sure it's out of the smoker by 1 at the latest. The dinner is at 3PM tomorrow.

[SoCalBill]

My last brisket I figured at 1lb per hour. I put it in a 8AM a 8lb. 9hours later is was at 185 and thus didn't have time to FTC cause my family was expecting to eat at 6.  Granted when I did it I didn't have a PID either so my temps were swinging like crazy

[ArnieM]

There's almost no such thing as "too much time" Bill.  Any large hunk of meat can FTC for 3-6 hours, no problem.  The rest and allowing the smoke to even out is good for it.

[SoCalBill]

Cool, If I want to start the FTC at noon. Do you think I should wait till  9 or 10 tonight. That would give me 14 hours with a 3hr FTC so long as I get it out by noon.

I love smoking, but the time figuring out IS the worse part

[ArnieM]

Sounds OK to me Bill.  Yeah, the time can be highly variable even for the same size and weight of meats.  It depends on the cow or porker.

I always like to cook ahead.  You can always warm it up.  That's considerably better than people sitting around with nothing to eat.

[SoCalBill]

Thanks for taking the time to answer all these questions. I'll start warming up the smoker at 7:30 and get the brisket in at 8PM.. shut the door and no peeking till the Maverick goes off.

Speaking of the Maverick. The distance on mine is awful. It loses it sync more than 15/20 feet away even on fresh batteries. Like to find one that actually connected to 802.11b/g/n network with a smartphone app. That would be awesome.

[ghost9mm]

Bill...the pulled pork looks really good, good luck on the brisket, we will be watchin for the finish of the brisket...

[beefmann]

yum

[muebe]

Pork looks great ;D

Good luck with the brisket ;)

[Indy Smoker]

Hi Bill - Be careful with those long overnight smokes.  That's how I do my butts too, and have done several over the years.  Last month I had my first (hopefully last) fire when doing 2 butts. 
I suggest making the hole in the V tray larger, scraping the V tray every couple hours with a putty knife to keep te juices flowing to the wate bowl, and make sure you change the water every few hours, don't let the pucks stack up.

Happy smoking !!

[seemore]

that butt looks good  make sure you change the the water pan I put a big  aluminum pan it helps
seemore

[SoCalBill]

I did swap out the little dog food like bowl for a big tray the same footprint on the smoker. I was very concerned with fire, so I slept on the couch and woke up every few hours to check on it. I opened the cabinet 3 time to check the try and added more water. The V tray stayed pretty clear of obstructions. In fact the drain hole was still wide open at the end. I'm sure every smoke is different.

One this I did do to help my piece of mind is set the Maverick "High" smoker temp to like 250. I figure is a fire did hit I would get a warning.