How long to run smoke for?

[Aprntice]

Hi everyone,

First time poster here.  I'm doing my first whole pork shoulder for mother's day on Sunday.  It weighs in at 19lbs.  I have the Bradley 6 rack digital smoker.  I've done a fair bit of reading on the topic and figured I would smoke it for 4 hours and then cook to 195-200° with the oven temp set at 230°.  Lunch is on Sunday afternoon.  I planned on it taking 1.5-2 hours per pound so anywhere from roughly 30-40 hours for total cook time.  If it is done early I will either hold at a lower temp in the smoker for a while and the FTC it or just FTC it as soon as it hits 195° depending when exactly it gets there.  I put it on today (Friday) at 5pm.  What I didn't realize is when I moved the smoker from my garage to my deck that I didn't have the cords plugged in all the way.  So the smoker only heated up to 130° for the first 4 hours.  The smoker element was pumping smoke for that whole time, just the temp on the smoker didn't come up to the 230° I had it set for.  It took me a while to figure out what the problem was but I did some searching on here and solved it now and the smoker is heating away.  My question is do I need to pump more smoke into it or will that initial 4 hours be enough even though the oven temp wasn't as high as it should be.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks greatly in advance.  One more thing I'm not 100% sure on is what I should have my vent set to.  Full open, Full shut, half open. 

Thanks,
Aprntice 

[Habanero Smoker]

Hi Aprntice;

Welcome to the forum.

Your meat was in the danger zone (above 40°F and below 140°F) for sometime. For this application I would say the meat is still safe, others may disagree. In the future you don't want the meat lingering in those low temperatures that long. The four hours of smoke that you had already applied should be all you need. The hotter the surface of the meat gets, the less smoke will penetrate.

The vent settings you will get different points of view. My experience is that the vent should be adjusted to control moisture buildup in the cabinet and to control heat loss. For example, for this type of cook I would set my vent to 1/2 - 3/4 open. Others feel the vent should be left wide open to prevent any moisture build up. You should experiment to see what vent setting(s) work for you.

Vent Guidelines

[beefmann]

you  dont need any more smoke, glad you  got the problem fixed you  should be good to go on the rest of the cook,,, you also have been in the danger zone close to the max like habs has indicated ...proceed with the  smoke and good luck with it

welcome to the forum

[terry08]

I have learned that if Hab's, posts it. You can file it under the gospels.

Sent from my SCH-I500 using Tapatalk 2

[NePaSmoKer]

What flavor of kool aid is that?

[Aprntice]

Thanks everyone for the responses.  Everything seems to be coming along good now.  Looks like I've hit the stall point at 154° from what I've read.  I'm hoping it makes it close to tomorrow morning before I have to take it off.  But if not I will get up in the middle of the night and FTC it until noon and then pull it.  One more question, what would be the maximum time you would FTC it before food safety would be a concern for a chunk of meat this size (19lbs).  I've also read that it may be better to hold at 170 once the cook is done and then pull it and FTC once closer to meal time.  If you recommend holding it what would be the longest you would hold at that temp without worrying about too much moisture loss.  Once again everyone thanks for the help it is greatly appreciated, you are all a wealth of information.  Thanks in advance for the replies.

Thanks,
Aprntice

[KyNola]

You should safely be able to FTC for 4-6 hours.  Anything beyond that and I would suggest you wrap the shoulder in foil.  Add some sort of liquid, be it apple juice, stock or even water to the package prior to sealing it up.  Place in a roasting pan and put it in your oven at the lowest setting, say 200.  You could even hold it in your Bradley at 170 as you mentioned.

[Habanero Smoker]

Glad to see that you have everything under control.

This forum is a good place to get information and help. For the most part you get good sound mature advice, but there are always those strange exceptions. :)