Probes with different temps - which one to believe

[waynerto]

Right now I am smoking a pork belly.  I am doing about half of it in one big slab, the other half I have cut into cubes for burnt ends.

Using my Thermoworks Signals I have two probes in the slab and they are reading about 15 degrees different.  Which one should I trust?  I am guessing the one with the lower temp as it is probably closer to the middle of the meat whereas the other probe is likely to too close to the top or bottom of the slab.  Is that the right way to handle this?  Or should I average the two probes?  Or believe the higher temp?

FYI - the slab is currently wrapped in foil, but I had the same issue prior to wrapping.  I am doing pretty much a 3-2-1 type of technique for both the slab and burnt ends.

[Habanero Smoker]

There could be a number or reasons two probes in the same cut of meat are reading differently; especially in a cut like pork belly; but 15 degrees is a lot. First make sure your probes are fully inserted into their connection. I have a Signals, and once I was getting reading from one probe that didn't seem right, and it was because it was not fully inserted. But in this case one probe may be in meat, and the other probe in fat. To get a more accurate reading, when this happens I generally will move the probes in and out to find the lowest reading, or relocate the probes, and then go by the lowest reading.

I generally use remote food probes as a guide, and always check with an instant read thermometer, and if it is a large piece of meat I will check in several areas. Also the pork belly, and the burnt ends may be better if you finish them off with higher heat to crisp the skin on the belly, and to better carnalize the sauce on the burnt ends.

[waynerto]

Thanks.

[waynerto]

I did another pork for pulled pork and found the same thing.  Two probes that read 11 degrees different from two Thermoworks signals probes.  When I used my instant read thermometer I got readings that varied from 194 to 213 depending on where I inserted the probe.  The lower readings were on the bottom which was closest to the heat source.

So if I want to cook until the meat is 204, should that be the mean temperature across various spots?  The minimum?  The maximum?

[Habanero Smoker]

For pork butts you are over thinking this. There are various muscles in a butt, and those muscles are going to cook differently, so you are going to get different temperatures at different areas and at different depths. But what I go by, if you are looking for a temperature of 204°F, that should be the minimum temperature reading you should get at the thickest part of the cut without touching the bone.